What technology solves single customer view in call centres?
We’re pretty clever, us human beings. When we speak to a friend or a family member, we can usually remember a lot of the interaction we’ve had over time. So, when we’re in dialogue, we have a whole bank of memory that we can rely on to empathise, give advice and, essentially, have a meaningful conversation.
If, however, we spoke to somebody for the first time, with whom others had previously engaged, but we had no access to learning about their background, the conversation would be totally different. And, what if we were in that situation many times a day in our job role with customers? How could you possibly have a meaningful conversation with a customer without knowing their previous engagement with your company?
We all like to be known…and understood
The fact is that, in order to effectively communicate with customers there needs to be a full understanding of exactly who they are, what their relationship has been with your company so far, what they do and don’t like and, ultimately, what their sentimental value is.
But the information is everywhere!
The challenge is that these individuals will have engaged with your company via a number of channels; – email, phone, internet browses, in person and presence on social networks. What’s more, they’ll have a history of interaction – purchases, contracts, returns, maybe even complaints or, even better, praise or gratitude.
It’s therefore essential that call centre agents have what is known as a ‘single view of the customer’ in order to have relevant, meaningful dialogue with their customers. This is a call centre’s El Dorado.
Why is it difficult to tie up?
In order to achieve this there needs to be a way to join up all the views from the various sources so that one picture, one single truth of each individual, exists. This way, any inbound enquiries could be managed both swiftly and correctly – as the agent will have full visibility into the person’s history with their company – across every channel.
But this El Dorado isn’t easy to reach. It can be a complicated and potentially painful journey with numerous roadblocks and difficulties to get through. The three main challenges to this are:
1. Poor data quality
2. A siloed environment within the call centre
3. The inability to integrate the different channels and technologies.
For the purpose of this blog, we are going to focus on point 3 – integrating the different channels.
The best way to tackle a big project like this is in bitesize chunks.
The way to get there is to build a strong foundation and then gradually work towards more sophisticated customisation:
Customisation Heaven
Customisation heaven – as we define it here at Gnatta, means that not only can you customise, but that business process builders can do it without the need for developers to get involved.
Ideally you should be able to customise the below in minutes for a true omnichannel experience:
1 – Customer service priorities
2 – Query routing by multiple criteria
3 – Variable automated responses combined with knowledge recall base
4 – Dynamic agent scripting
5 – Open API integrations into any internal or external system
6 – Proactive customer notifications based on new products, recalls, etc.
What that results in is a single view of the customer however they decide to reach out to you, and that’s worth its weight in gold.
Gnatta – delivering universal customer engagement.
