From Agents to Ambassadors:Creating Better Customer Service Experiences

W H I T E P A P E R

From Agents to Ambassadors:Creating Better Customer Service Experiences

Customer service and customer experience are becoming key differentiators for organizations across all industries, including Financial Services. According to the 2017 Microsoft State of Global Customer Service Report (i), as brand differentiation becomes more difficult to achieve through price or product, 96% of global consumers say customer service is important in their choice of, and loyalty to, a brand.

Great customer service starts with your Customer Services Agents on the front-lines. They make the first impression during any sales or service interaction, always providing the first touch and acting as the face of your organization. Being able to provide high-performance service is key to retaining Financial Services customers. Customers today have placed superior service as a priority in their decision making of whether to stay with a company or leave. In fact, 54% of global consumers have higher expectations for customer service today than they had just one year ago – and the same was true last year and the year before that. In other words, the bar is continuously being raised, so it is imperative to find a way to differentiate the service your firm provides from the rest of the Financial Services industry.

Service Ambassadors on the Front Line

It is a common misconception that the level of customer service provided by agents in a contact center is inherently limited by the fact that interactions are not face-to-face. The truth is all Customer Service Agents have the opportunity to go beyond providing basic service. They can use interactions as an oppor-tunity to understand customer pain points, gather feedback, identify areas of value delivery, communicate the importance of the service relationship, and advise customers on additional service that can generate value and support success (ii). At PowerObjects, we have found that successful businesses are providing this type of customer-centric service to meet their customers’ evolving expectations. Did you know that increasing client retention rates by just 5% leads to an increase in profits of between 25% and 95%, or that the cost of acquiring a new investor or channel partner is at least five times as high as simply retaining one you already have? (iii) By building rapport with customer and allowing them to create deeper relation-ships, you’re not only increasing customer satisfaction and retention – but also laying a groundwork for future business.

Customer service research firm, The Service Council, states that “73% of organizations reporting an in-crease in customer satisfaction state that the improvement was due to an increased focus on front-line personnel.” (iv) Indeed, it is time to start viewing your own agents as more than just support personnel and start empowering them to be service ambassadors.

KEY DATA POINTS

#1 Poor customer service is rated as the top reason for customer dissatisfaction.

71% Of customers rate personnel professionalism to be ‘extremely’ or ‘very’ important in evaluating field service performance.

45% Of customers identify a service provider based on a recommendation from a friend or family member.

73% Or organizations reporting an increase in customer satisfaction state that the improvment was due to an increased focus on the front-line personnel.

Something to think about: What kind of impression is your organization making through your front-line Customer Service Agents? How can you empower these agents to enhance investor success and strengthen channel partner relationships?

Providing Value-add Service, Not Sales

Interactions with your Customer Service Agents are a great way to promote cross-sell and upsell op-portunities – that’s a no-brainer. However, it’s important to make sure your service agents are framed as service ambassadors and not sales representatives when interacting with customers. For Customer Ser-vices Agents, this means resolving customer issues and using personalized data to make suggestions that align with customer needs. Sales should not be their primary objective, but providing a value-add service should be – and more often than not, that value-add service will be (or will lead to) a sale in some form or fashion.

Providing your agents with the right information at the right time empowers them to be able to make recommendations to customers based on key information like account or purchase history and even pre-dictive analytics. Value-add service opens the door to creating deeper relationships with your Financial Services Customers.

Beyond Knowledge: Key Insights

For Customer Service Agents to take the next step in becoming true service ambassadors, they need more than just the knowledge to solve issues. They must have access to accurate customer data that will help provide a personalized and proactive experience. In terms of cross-sell and upsell capabilities – which flow directly and naturally from excellent service ambassadorship, 72% of consumers who contact a ser-vice center expect the agent to know a plethora of information about them, including contact information, purchase history, and prior service requests. (i) Obviously, it’s with good reason that 73% of global market-ers believe success depends on their ability to deliver a personalized experience for their customers. (v) By providing customer service agents with an omni-channel platform that delivers a 360-degree view of the customer, they will have the background information needed to provide personalized experiences.

You can take this further by identifying trends, anticipating opportunities, and gaining insight through predictive analytics within service centers. For example, if a customer calls into the client service center with a specific concern about an investment product, predictive analytics can recommend solutions and services to resolve the issue, provide upsell/cross-sell opportunities, and automatically notify his or her customer service representative. With the ability to use predictive analytics, not only do you impress your customer with proactive service, you also open the conversation to more opportunities. Two-thirds (67%) of organizations are planning to invest in advanced analytics solutions in pursuit of providing a better customer experience, so focusing on predictive analytics and proactive service is a must for Financial Services firms. (vi)

Happier Service Ambassadors = Happier Customers

According to recent research, 90% of consumers admitted that the perceived happiness of a customer service agent directly affects their overall customer experience. Two-thirds of consumers go so far as con-firming that their experience with an individual customer service agent significantly impacts their overall brand impression. Obviously, then, it is critical to keep your service ambassadors happy. But how best to ensure a happy agent? While work conditions, salary, and benefits certainly play a role, research confirms that agents also feel high satisfaction when “being provided with the tools I need to improve productivi-ty and drive better customer experiences.” We have yet to find an agent who doesn’t want to do a great job resolving client inquiries. Today’s agents are keenly aware of the need for superior technology to help them better serve the tech-savvy consumers they interact with daily. (vii)

It’s clear that service agents and technicians want to focus their time and effort on providing great service and developing customer relationships. So how do you make sure your ambassadors are maximizing the time they have with Financial Services customers? Reduce the amount of busy work, redundant data en-try, and repetitive tasks required. By providing integrated technology solutions for your customer service agents, you can optimize processes, streamline tasks, and eliminate your agents’ need to repeat questions or spend time looking up information across disconnected databases. By making service experience a pri-ority and empowering your ambassadors with the right tools, you can improve worker engagement and in

By providing customer service agents with an omni-channel platform that delivers a 360-degree view of the customer, they will have the background information needed to provide personalized experiences.

turn, you will see a reduction in turnover and Opex, and an increase in client retention.

Service Ambassador Success

How can you start down the path of service ambassador success? The first step is finding the right solution to help you make your vision a reality. PowerObjects is experienced in delivering tailored custom-er service solutions that leverage the power of Microsoft products, including Dynamics 365, USD, Knowl-edge Management, Power BI, Office 365, and PowerObjects PowerPack add-ons. We believe in achieving high-performance, omni-channel service by addressing all three key areas of success: people, process, and automation. With our high-performance model of service, your team of service ambassadors will delight your Financial Services customers and forge long-term relationships. You can absolutely lay the ground-work for providing top-notch customer care by reducing turnover among your client services agents, improving process optimization, and implementing automation, all through Microsoft Dynamics 365

Start setting up your service ambassadors for success today! Reach out to one of our Financial Services Practice Director to get the conversation going.

References

i Microsoft, “2017 State of Global Customer Service Report,” 2017 http://info.microsoft.com/rs/157-GQE-382/images/EN-CNTNT-Report-DynService-2017-global-state-cus-tomer-service.pdf

ii Sumair Dutta, “Service Agents: The Success Ambassadors We Need – A TSC Research Summary,” 2016 < http://www.powerobjects.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/TSCReport-2016-ServiceAmbassadors.pdf>

iii David Malone, “Customer Retention – the battleground for Sales Success in 2017?,” The Sales Institute, 15 June 2017 (http://www.salesinstitute.ie/news/customer-retention-the-battleground-for-sales-success-in-2017)

iv Sumair Dutta, “Service Agents: The Success Ambassadors We Need – A TSC Research Summary,” 2016 < http://www.powerobjects.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/TSCReport-2016-ServiceAmbassadors.pdf>

v Kimberly Morrison, “Is Personalization the New Buzz for 2017?,” AdWeek, 20 January 2017 (http://www.adweek.com/digital/is-personalization-the-new-buzz-for-2017-infographic/)

vi Deloitte, “Deloitte’s 2017 Global Contact Center Survey: Omnichannel Customer Experience Dominates Contact Centers’ Future,” Cision PR Newswire, 16 May 2017 (http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/deloittes-2017-global-contact-center-survey-omnichan-nel-customer-experience-dominates-contact-centers-future-300458231.html)

vii Barton Goldenberg, “Happy Agents, Happy Customers,” 2013 http://www.destinationcrm.com/Articles/Columns-Departments/Customer-Experience/Hap-py-Agents-Happy-Customers-90100.aspx

Greg Moser Service Practice Director - PowerObjectsgreg.moser@hcl-powerobjects.com