Bridging the Gap between Social CRM and the Enterprise
by Jim Foy on April 23rd, 2012
Any casual observer can see the impact social media has had on the way we as consumers create, retrieve, and share information in our day-to-day lives. Companies enthusiastically jumped into social media to use it as a marketing channel while consumers have just as enthusiastically engaged those same companies (and legions of fellow consumers) to make known product or service issues or questions they want addressed.
For example, look at a recent U.K. study of social media customer service published last month by Sitel and TNS. It found that more and more consumers are using social media to get
information or resolve issues with companies. The study shows changing behavior as people are adopting a “tweet first” approach when looking to get information from — or resolve an issue with — a company. In fact, 17 percent of the Gen Y segment responded by saying companies should improve response time when a query is posed on Twitter.
Predictably, service-minded organizations are turning to common ground by building or expanding their presence on social outlets like Twitter and Facebook. Initially, these moves were more reactive than proactive as a way to stem negative, brand-damaging posts from going viral. But as customer engagement begins to deepen on social platforms, companies are seeing the benefits of a proactive social-service model. They are adapting a more collaborative approach, allowing their customers to play a part in shaping and managing their own customer-company relationship.
Just employing social CRM is not what makes a social business, however. Weaving social ideas and practices into every part of a company’s operations internally as well as externally is what classifies a business as truly social.
From customer service agents to IT to finance and beyond, every person within an organization is an integral part of making a business social and, for that matter, making a business successful. Removing the silos and replacing them with an enterprise philosophy that promotes collaboration will bring all that is good about social CRM home to the (social) enterprise. This collaboration-powered enterprise allows for expertise and knowledge to be shared and socialized across any and all departments – all of which ultimately translates to an enriched customer experience. It also means delivering much sought-after answers to those consumers’ questions and issues we talked about earlier. So, we have come full circle here.
All of this reinforces our view of next generation customer contact – that is, always looking for ways to bring people (within and outside the enterprise) and information together to improve the customer experience in ways not previously possible. It removes communication and workflow bottlenecks and produces smarter, more efficient business processes and ultimately, more profitable customer interactions.
Facebook and the Growing Impact of Social
by Tim Dreyer on March 9th, 2012
Social is here to stay. And now that the question of whether businesses should be using social media to engage with their customers has been answered, companies still face the vexing challenge of how to integrate social into their customer contact strategy.
A few statistics drive home the urgency of finding answers in the short term:
44 percent. That’s the percentage of global Web traffic that visits Facebook on a daily basis.
845 million. The current number of registered users on Facebook. It’s only a matter of time before it hits the one-billion mark; imagine having access to one-seventh of the world population through a single platform.
$4.27 billion. The total revenues for Facebook in 2011, of which $3.8 billion was generated from advertising. In advance of its impending IPO, Facebook is in the midst of revamping its advertising platform to give companies new ways to reach customers.
As companies spend more resources to engage with customers through Facebook, it’s fair to assume that customers will start to expect that the conversation should work both ways: that is, if companies can push products more aggressively on Facebook, then customers can use this same channel for customer service.
The main problem is that once one company figures out a way to interact effectively with customers through this channel, consumers will expect all companies to do so. It hardly seems fair, but welcome to the next-generation consumer.
As your business considers how to integrate Facebook into its customer experience strategy, you should assess your organization’s capabilities across three areas:
Current customer contact platform—If you have unified important call center functions to give agents the tools to interact with customers across a number of channels, then it’s an incremental step to add social. If not, you have to crawl before you walk, and that means enhancing your platform first.
Integration of internal functions—One of the challenges of social media is that it spans marketing, sales, communications, and the contact center. We’ve discussed the need to tear down the walls within your company to enable collaboration among these departments. If just one department takes ownership without involving the others, companies won’t capture the full value of social.
Customer experience strategy—The majority of customers will call the contact center as a last resort after exhausting other options. Facebook is set to become an even more dynamic source of company and product information as well as customer feedback. Understanding how Facebook can complement existing efforts can help companies prepare their contact center agents to deliver better service.
Since companies don’t have unlimited resources, how can they be effective across forums, self-service, FAQs, Twitter, LinkedIn, and other emerging channels? The answer can vary significantly by industry and type of company. For instance, an airline — for which customer service is an integral part of business strategy and operations — is going to take a different approach than a professional services firm or hospital would. However, as customer service becomes an even more integral part of business strategy, it’s imperative to figure out the right mix for your company.
If you hear a rumble in the distance, it’s Facebook coming down the rails and picking up speed. The good news is that your company still has a little time to prepare so you can jump on for the ride and avoid getting steamrolled.
How Companies Can Use Social Media in the Contact Center
by Aspect on December 1st, 2011
In my previous blogs on compliance in the contact center, I discussed the evolving regulations that companies must navigate as well as the tools they can draw on to make their lives easier. Now I’d like to talk about the potential that social media holds for reaching out to customers.
Much of the time, contact centers view social media as a force that has made customer contact more complex and increased the burden on agents. However, as companies attempt to contact customers for both collections and proactive customer service in ways that don’t violate existing regulations, social media can be a source of valuable information.
For example, if a company needs to inform a customer or a group of customers on the status of an issue, social media would be a great channel to use. This is exactly how my utility company kept me up to date when we had the power outage in the Massachusetts area in October.
Here are a few social networking channels that can actually make it far easier to reach customers while still adhering to regulations.
1) Facebook. Legislation currently prohibits companies from calling customers after a certain time of night. With cell phones, it’s not possible to attach an area code to a time zone because of portability. However, say that an individual is a fan of the company’s Facebook page. That connection could enable the company to find out a person’s location and time zone at a given moment based on the most recent Facebook updates. This would enable an enterprise to proactively contact them through social media with relevant information to that end consumer.
Since this information is available to people or organizations within the consumer’s social network, the company could argue that the consumer has consented to the use of such private information. Needless to say, current regulations haven’t begun to address this channel.
2) Twitter. Similarly, imagine if a person had an active Twitter account and kept followers updated on an impending move, new job, or simply current activities. If people tweet that they’re just sitting at home watching television, a company may determine that it’s a good time to call.
3) Location-based channels. Technologies such as FourSquare that share location could also be utilized. If someone checked into a particular location, a company would know their time zone to determine if it’s acceptable to contact them on their mobile phone.
The regulations for proactive contact and collections at a federal level have yet to address the use of social media. However, all indications are that the FCC and FTC may start to regulate it. For now, Facebook or Twitter could be used as legitimate channels to notify people of suspicious activity on their credit card or a lost cell phone, as well as for routine reminders about payments and notifications of special deals.
The challenge for companies will be to strike the right balance with these channels to avoid souring relationships with customers. If individuals feel like the company is stalking them, it’s only a matter of time before these actions start to draw the attention of regulators.
It’s a matter of providing information that a consumer deems to be relevant via the right media type. Social channels may not be the right approach for some customers, who prefer a phone call or a text message. Therefore, companies should review their collections and proactive customer service strategy and determine how and at what stage social media notifications would be most effective to ensure customer loyalty and contact center productivity.
As with all regulatory matters, be sure to consult with your enterprise’s attorney for legal guidance.
Skype, Facebook, and the contact center
by Bill Gay on November 10th, 2011
A recent study noted that 23 percent of companies with revenue over $10 million use Facebook to support their customers. Twitter is used for this purpose by 12 percent of respondents. I’m not surprised by these statistics, but the long-term effects are interesting and it’s another proof point on how social media are changing the way people interact with companies and with each other concerning products and services.
People are already using mobile and other social channels to shop and review purchases, so it’s natural that they would want to get help using these same tools. In fact, social and mobile go hand in hand: 55 percent of traffic on Twitter and 33 percent on Facebook are from mobile devices.
I first discovered companies were using Facebook for customer support when I stumbled upon Nikon’s Ask & Answer Facebook page. The company and other users can answer questions, and it shifted my thinking to what support could be like. Of course, the “right” answer is sometimes lost in the mix and feedback, but the capability for everyone to participate is interesting and sometimes helpful.
When you add the power of Skype + Facebook to the mix of ways people can communicate, it’s not a stretch for people to want to be able to connect with companies through Facebook using these tools in real time via IM, voice, or even video calls―just as contact centers handle the multiple ways in which consumers want to communicate today from voice, Web or IM. I can easily see a day when Facebook is just another channel and support resource that companies offer to consumers.
Let’s not forget Twitter. Customers can easily provide real-time feedback that companies now have to manage in some way. I know of several companies who have employees monitoring Twitter feeds that can respond to this feedback. However, in most instances, it’s not managed like other communications channels and is often a function of the marketing department.
Companies have to be ahead or at least in step with consumers and their communications methods. Ensuring a consistent, managed response using the right resources at the right time is what the contact center has always been about.
Consumer 2.0 is here and change continues to be the constant. How will you create and build better company-consumer relationships?
Using social media to bring you all the good stuff
by Chris O'Brien on July 12th, 2011
As any reader of Aspect’s blogs knows, our experts devote a lot of time to talking about the value of a multichannel approach in the contact center. Social media has become a ubiquitous component of the business conversation, so companies that aren’t communicating through these channels run the risk of falling off the customer’s radar.
Being engaged is one thing; offering value can be a totally different proposition. Our philosophy has always been that using Twitter or Facebook purely as a means to promote upcoming events or showcase the latest piece of company content misses the larger opportunity to provide an overview of industry trends and topics. As fast as technology is evolving and the landscape of the customer contact is changing, no single entity controls the conversation.
For that reason, we use Facebook and Twitter as ways to aggregate the latest news, industry developments, and insight and share it with our fans and followers. While our main focus is driving the conversation around customer contact, we fully recognize that for many other companies it’s just one growing part of an increasingly complex business equation.
Since we try to have our finger on the pulse of all things customer contact, including research, interviews with industry leaders, and interesting statistics, we figure the least we can do is make sure you don’t miss key insight that could help your organization. We have a lot of compelling information to share on how companies communicate with and serve their customers, how operations can be improved to benefit the customer, and the effect of the changing IT and consumer environment on the company-customer relationship.
Our blog will remain the primary channel for Aspect’s leaders to share their stories from the front lines of customer contact. Be sure to check out Aspect’s Twitter and Facebook for the full range of perspectives from outside sources—along with some news about conferences, symposiums, and upcoming webinars and events.
As always, be sure to send us any questions and we’ll make sure our experts respond to you with their thoughts.
The value of integrating customer contact into your online marketing efforts
by Mike Sheridan on June 23rd, 2011
Companies are licking their chops to develop online marketing campaigns to take advantage social media’s ability to reach a targeted audience of engaged consumers. However, in the rush to use these channels for branding and to tap create sales, many executives have failed to address the service component. Successful business leaders are making the strategic decision to coordinate the activities of their sales, marketing, and contact center service functions before launching a new campaign – not as an afterthought.
Come to think about it, this challenge isn’t a recent development: in the (long ago) days of more traditional marketing, a print ad containing the wrong price for an offer could result in a barrage of complaints or inquiries. Often, the contact center wasn’t informed of the special or the error, leaving them flatfooted when people started calling. Then, as now, a lack of coordination could cause lasting reputational damage to a company that was ill prepared to deal with an issue.
Two recent examples highlight the lightning-fast ripple effect that social media has spawned. In the first, Air New Zealand heavily promoted a special offer that would be available on Facebook for just one hour. The promotion was a success, with 46,000 Facebook members ready to pounce on the cheap ticket deal. When the offer went live, the volume of traffic overloaded the Facebook app, leading to confusion, frustration, disappointment, and the inevitable venting in online forums.
Similarly, Amazon’s recent offer of Lady Gaga’s album had the potential of introducing hundreds of thousands of music buyers to Amazon’s platform. What could go wrong? Although Amazon is recognized as a customer service champion, the flood of traffic overwhelmed its website, resulting in album downloads that took hours. Instead of an army of new converts, the company instead had to cope with a PR nightmare. Its second attempt to sell the album was also marked by technical glitches.
Both incidents included tepid customer service responses. Air New Zealand provided this explanation: “Hi everyone, thanks for taking the time to participate. Unfortunately due to high demand and initial technical difficulties not everyone has been able to access the deal… Keep your eyes out for more upcoming Facebook Only sales in the very near future.” How would you react if a company that had just failed spectacularly instead treated it as an opportunity to promote other deals?
Let’s learn from our marketing and service predecessors and institute safeguards to ensure that no new deals or campaigns are launched without first briefing the customer contact organization. In addition, since online marketing has a strong technology component, IT should also be looped in to identify any potential issues before launch and devise a post-launch strategy to respond to mishaps. Only then can the sales, marketing, and contact center functions develop service recovery measures so that the company doesn’t end up in a worse place because of well-intentioned promotion gone wrong.
So while the problem isn’t new and the solution seems to be common sense, many organizations have yet to adopt a more integrated approach. As these two experiences drive home, companies shouldn’t dip their toe into the social media pool without a well developed plan in the event they fall in.
Four steps for integrating social media into customer contact
by Mike Sheridan on June 8th, 2011
I had a conversation recently with some executives that were grappling with an interesting social media challenge. The company’s marketing and IT leaders had sought to expand its presence on Facebook, and their efforts had delivered impressive results: in just nine months, its number of followers had increased by 150,000.
But the more robust Facebook community also presents some risks: in essence, the company had created a massive, engaged community in an unregulated space. The executives can’t afford to assign employees to continuously monitor the growing stream of comments and activity on the page, but they also understand that negative feedback in this space can do disproportionate damage to their brand.
So they’re at a bit of a crossroads: the company recognizes that social media has changed the relationship between customers and companies, and the old tools and strategies won’t work. But they aren’t sure how to incorporate social media so that they get the greatest return and manage potential risks.
Doing nothing isn’t an option. So what’s the best path forward? Companies should consider four actions to bring social media into the contact center, increasing the value of these interactions while minimizing risks.
Reorient the contact center around a blended environment—Since consumers want to be able to engage with companies across multiple interaction points, social media can’t be viewed as a stand-alone channel. In addition, delivering a seamless experience regardless of the channel is crucial. That means the contact center’s infrastructure has to change. Companies should ensure that their contact center’s platform can accommodate traditional channels such as voice, e-mail, and chat as well as text messaging and social media.
Integrate functional areas—In the example above, marketing was in charge of the social media effort. However, the contact center wasn’t initially in the mix. Given the current climate, key functional areas of the company will need to operate in tandem. While achieving greater collaboration will require a shift in organizational structure and processes, accomplishing this goal will enable companies to assemble a more complete picture of their customers and devise more effective responses.
Make strategic use of social monitoring software—As the consumer landscape continues to evolve, social monitoring products have emerged that can help companies track comments about them across blogs, Facebook, Twitter, and other online forums. Products run the gamut of prices and features, so it’s important to understand your needs and ensure that the technology you select supports your strategy. The real opportunity comes when companies use this information for proactive contact. Since service agents are specifically trained to interact with customers, the contact center is best placed to execute customer retention strategies.
Consider company-sponsored online forums. To reassert some control over online conversations, many companies have created forums where customers can ask questions, access product information, and interact with employees. With sites such as Facebook, registered users don’t expect their posts and feedback to be suppressed. Nestle found out the hard way that trying to restrict opinions was counterproductive. Company-sponsored forums aren’t held to the same standard, offering a bit more flexibility while still providing value to visitors.
When it comes to social media, there’s no “one size fits all” approach; instead, before entering the social space, companies should do the hard work of understanding what they hope to achieve by engaging in these channels and then commit the necessary resources to capture the full value of the opportunity.
How has your company altered its approach to customer contact to benefit from social media? I’d be interested to hear what’s working for you as well as any challenges other executives should be aware of.
How companies should integrate social media into customer contact
by Aspect on February 25th, 2011
David Mastronardi with the social business design firm Dachis Group wrote an interesting blog on how Facebook and Twitter are operating as shadow customer support. He cites a recent experience where he was able to get his flight rebooked during a weather delay by using Twitter instead of calling customer service. This was due to the fact that different departments within the company handled social media and customer service. In fact, the social media team was in the Communication department, not customer service. Now, he was lucky in that the person who handled Twitter questions was able to somehow change his reservation on the fly.
What does this mean to enterprises? A few takeaways.
- Consumers will increasingly use social media as a way to obtain service. In fact, it’s happening already. Social tools are the first place many people, including myself, go to for service.
- By having a non-customer service organization handle service inquiries from consumers, companies run the risk of not giving consumers the service they need. Although in David’s example things turned out great, the company is rolling the dice in terms of support.
- Ultimately, the number of consumers who turn to social channels may become as prominent as those who call your contact center. …Read more >
Improving the way companies communicate internally and externally with their customers is an important objective for all organizations. This blog is focused on levaraging the collective knowledge withing Aspect.