The Future of Customer Service: 2020 Trends to Look At
The customer service sector is evolving at neck-breaking speeds.
Mostly due to up-and-coming technologies.
But how are these technologies shaping the future of customer service?
Today we will review a few trends to keep in mind when thinking about the future of customer service.
Omnichannel Support will become an Expectation
The expectations from customers for quick, easy, and omnichannel customer service will only increase over the next few years.
From email to live chat to in-person customer service, all your channels should work together to provide a seamless experience.
For example, let’s that you run a hair salon and often get requests for bookings. Are customers able to do book appointments through every one of your communication channels?
If this is not the case, you might be losing out on business from customers who do not bother to contact you through several channels and jump through hoops just to do business with you.
Live chat will overtake email
Email and customer service go hand-in-hand. However, the need for faster and more convenient customer service has fueled the rise of live chat as a customer service channel.
In fact, most customers are now preferring live chat over email when it comes to contacting a business.
After all, live chat tends to results in faster responses and resolution times.
On top of it all, live chat can also be a sales channel. The truth is that if you have not implemented live chat into your business you might be leaving money on the table.
Customer Data will become even more valuable
The more you know about your customers, the better you can cater to their needs.
This is what ends up giving value to customer data. As a result, your business will have a competitive advantage if it can effectively collect, store, analyze, and use customer data.
Customer Data not only allows you to increase the quality of your customer-focused operations, but it can also add value to your business when it comes to a company valuation.
If you’re not using a powerful CRM to build your customer database, you’re missing out on a world of valuable insights that can help you grow your business.
Browser recordings will become standard
Browser recordings work by adding a short snippet of code to your website. This code then records, stores and analyzes recordings from each user users’ browsing session on your site.
These recordings can help you review common website issues, conversion paths, UI/UX problems and more.
Browser recordings can also boost the efficiency of your customer support operations by letting your support reps have a direct look into your customers’ screens without the need for screen-sharing software.
Feeding off the last point, browser recordings will also build your customer database and make it even more valuable with further insights.
Customer Success will become expected
We’ve talked about customer success in the past and the role it can have in your company.
Customer success refers to a set of practices and incentives that businesses can use to help the success of their customers.
While these practices are more common in B2B businesses, the expectation for such services will become more common as it becomes easier to create educational content online.
Furthermore, customer success strategies will help differentiate your business from competitors and improve your customer retention rates.
Closing Thoughts
At the end of the day, no one can tell the future.
But when it comes to the world of customer service, there are clear trends that will only become more relevant over time.
What do you think will come next?