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How Cloud Contact Centers Can Boost Customer Loyalty

 

Meeting the demand of customers as you scale can be tricky, especially if you’re hoping to provide a positive enough experience to enhance their loyalty and lifetime value. Cloud contact centers have become among the best tools in the customer service arsenal because of their ability to scale and expand service channels while reducing the per-call workload.

Research shows us there’s a positive correlation between quality customer service and loyalty- that this loyalty increases future sales.  People are even willing to spend up to 13% more for services that have excellent customer service.

The more consistently you can deliver high-quality service, the more likely you will retain customers across the lifespan and yield increased sales. Cloud contact centers play a significant role because their functionality is designed to both improve your agents’ capabilities and make your service more consistent and reliable, even across new channels.

To best understand that potential, we should look across three areas of opportunity.

1. Meeting customers on their preferred channels at any time

Contact centers improve loyalty by making it easy for people to get the support they need quickly in whatever their preferred method is. For today’s current customers, that often means social media support. Multiple studies have found that more than 66% of all online shoppers messaged a company on social media in Q4 of 2019, and half of the people who will message you now expect to get a response within an hour.

One of the easiest ways to introduce social media support, SMS, or other new channels your customers request is to adopt a cloud solution. Cloud contact centers take an omnichannel approach so agents can interact with customers on various channels from a standardized interface. This gives agents the data they need on a customer and their issue without scaling a workforce for each channel.

The customer just sees a quick response to their issue from your brand, ready whenever the customer has an issue. That requirement hits at another core way cloud centers are boosting your ability to deliver a positive customer experience. Cloud systems generally have an availability and uptime greater than 95%. Ring Central promises 99.999%, which means the platform could be down for less than an hour each year.

When customers know that they can reach you at any moment in the way they prefer, they’re more likely to trust you and utilize your service if agents can resolve issues or provide the support they need. Your audience is demanding convenience from every solution they use, and cloud systems give you your best chance to deliver the experiences your customers want.

2. Simplifying the support process

Even if your customers don’t know the best channel to get their solution, a cloud contact center makes it easy for agents to move between channels to deliver the best support in the way that’s most helpful.

Think about the user who needs help managing a piece of software. Contact centers that support digital assets can work with the customer to share videos and images that provide support based on that software. If it only operates in a full-screen mode, agents can move a chat conversation to a mobile call and walk the customer through the steps on their computer.

Another practical example would be someone trying to get help fixing a garage door opener that reaches out via social. The support agent can follow up with a video call for a better look at the issue and try to determine what’s happening, all while being on a mobile device, never having to hang up or stop a text chat.

Omnichannel solutions incorporated into your contact center allows your agents to help customers on the first channels they use or proactively move them to the best tools to resolve an issue. If a channel does need to be changed, agents can initiate the second interaction point before the first closes, mitigating any disruption or frustration a user might feel.

3. Demonstrate value by personalization

One way to build customer loyalty is to treat each customer as an individual and learn about your repeat customers. Greeting them by name and addressing their situation quickly can make them feel like you care, especially if you’re able to utilize existing data instead of gathering information like they were a new account.

By integrating with your CRM and other tools, cloud contact center software can pull in the necessary information to know about your customer as soon as they call. Seeing past interactions or complaints, knowing their company size and account details, or simply understanding their preferred nickname lets the caller know you care.

As an added benefit, pulling in and using this data can speed up your service calls and experiences. Knowing a customer’s software package, their account, location, and other information can help agents narrow down possible issues and solutions without running the customer through the question gauntlet. Context-awareness minimizes the steps needed to address almost any issue.

Agents also appreciate an integrated CRM since they get to treat each caller like a familiar face. It’s the same type of experience that keeps us going back to our favorite stores, coffee shops, restaurants, and more.

On the back end, you can also use past customer information to route calls to the best agent the first time. When a phone number, IP address, or work email domain are attached to accounts, intelligent routing can pair the user with the available agent who has the best experience and track record with their organization type or past concerns.

Modern solutions are built for loyalty

Cloud contact center software focuses on improving the experience for your agents and customers. They utilize the same approaches discussed above to provide you with effective, competent support whenever you call or chat for help.

RingCentral Contact Center and RingCentral Engage are excellent examples of platforms that prioritize building a positive customer experience to increase loyalty. They learn from users and their agents to continually refine solutions to deliver support best.

If you’re considering the move, we suggest you start with this Cloud Center Migration Guide that can help you understand what cloud centers offer, the groundwork to do to make the most of cloud tools, and a little help finding the solution that best fits your business. Or, if you’re interested in seeing a cloud center in action right away, contact us and request your free Ring Central Demo today!

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