Verint recently took part in the Customer Response Summit in Las Vegas, a forum for customer experience and customer service executives.  One of the primary themes of the conference was “Leaders Learning from Leaders.”  

Verint’s contribution to this theme was an interactive general session called “Customer Engagement LIVE!” where we grouped executives into discussion groups of nine or ten for interactive discussions and summary presentations.  Here are some of the highlights we heard during the read back presentations around customer engagement strategies:

What’s Old Is New Again. When is the last time you received a handwritten note or personal email from a business you engage with? It was memorable, wasn’t it? Think of ways you can incorporate genuine, personalized touches with customers. The strategy can be scalable: one “wow” moment can generate genuine delight and powerful word-of-mouth amplification.

Think Mobile. Do you have a mobile strategy? The need is clear: provide information, customer support, “wow” moments via mobile channels. But be careful: consumers often have limited ability to “digest” content you are sharing with them (because they are at the airport, walking, at home, multi-tasking), so be sure your content and communications are as short and to-the-point as you can.

Develop a Journey Map as Part of Your Customer Experience Strategy. Our group defined a Journey Map as a diagram that illustrates the steps your customers go through when they engage with your company across different channels and touch points. The more touch points you have, the more complicated—but necessary—the journey map becomes. Creating a customer journey map is an investment but is well worth the cost. For some creative ideas on journey maps, check out this recent blog post by Verint’s Nancy Porte Five Tips for Building a Customer Journey Map.

Develop a Comprehensive Work-from-Home Strategy. One great reason to offer work from home is that you have the ability to recruit some of your organization’s biggest “fans,” regardless of their location. If you offer part time or flex time, you could have highly enthusiastic providers of information—and raving fans—who support your solutions or services. The customer experience these fans deliver could be very meaningful.

Build the Feeling of an In-Store Experience Online. Meet customers at the right moment when they are challenged. Know when they are about to defect. Provide the support they need when they need it. (How are you doing in this area? One idea is to implement a journey map project as mentioned above.)

Consider an Automation Pilot. Organizations are under pressure to increase processing efficiency and productivity, reduce errors, cut operational expenses, and maintain security and regulatory compliance. Key advancements in the areas of robots/bots, artificial intelligence, and machine learning are creating opportunities to service and engage with customers like never before.

Organizations should consider automating repetitive and time-consuming processes, allowing employees to focus on more complex tasks, cross-selling and delivering a personalized experience. The net: position automation as beneficial—and not a threat to your employees’ jobs.

Do you have some creative or best practices ideas to add? We’d love to hear those, too. Help us continue the conversations and submit your idea in the Comments section below.

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