Producing a clear picture of individual customers
When a customer calls a company representative, they always have a few expectations – as they should. They expect cordial, efficient service and they expect their specific inquiries to be addressed in a fair and timely manner.
In the age of social media and big data, however, customers have also come to expect call center operators to know more about them than ever before. They assume that company representatives have a 360-degree view.
“Customers expect call centers to know everything about them -- their order history, what they've posted about the brand on Facebook, and how long they've bought from the company,” report the editors at EcommerceTimes.com. “Increasingly, companies are beginning to keep up with that expectation, and the more they do, the better customer service they can provide.”
That all-encompassing view is made possible by solutions developers, such as 360DegreeView, a technology firm with a focus on large-scale business intelligence initiatives. The company’s offerings allow a business to capture an integrated picture of each of its customers.
“Few things frustrate a customer more than not being recognized as they interact with different departments within an organization,” 360DegreeView relays. “With the 360° Customer View, an organization can provide consistent service to a customer across all departments, from marketing to sales, operations, finance, and other business functions.”
Businesses don’t necessarily have to buy in to systems like the one offered from 360DegreeView, however. There are also solutions like Adobe's Insight that takes offline data (POS, call center) and consolidates it into a 360-degree view so a company has an understanding of the customer's transaction history across the enterprise. Or, there's also the option of doing it in-house through proprietary methods coupled with web-based applications and spreadsheets. But surprisingly, adoption isn’t as widespread as one would think.
Apathy about how customers would like to interact with a company has been one impediment to initiating the technology. The editors at EcommerceNews.com also chalk it up to “ignorance regarding technical feasibility” as well as a “perceived difficulty” for its implementation.
Regardless of the stumbling blocks, creating a 360-degree view will be essential for retailers to enhance the customer experience and ultimately beat out the competition. The trailblazers in this field are certainly ahead of the game, but it’s certainly never too late to get on board.
To learn about how NetSphere Strategies can supply the consultation, implementation and support services using a 360-degree tool like Adobe's, feel free to reach out to us.
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