The Top 3 Reasons to Implement Digital Customer Service Channels (2019 Update)
By Kelly Wilson - Aug 15, 2018
Being able to interact with your financial institution, regardless of location, time, or medium through digital customer service channels is what differentiates a good customer experience from an amazing one. We live in an ever-evolving digital world that has streamlined many of the tasks in our day to day lives, such as checking out at the grocery store, buying clothes, and ordering food, so shouldn’t your financial organization be providing self-service channels to your customers as well?
Customers seem to think so. 70% of customers prefer to use self-service channels to manage their lives, and 31% said that they would leave a current provider if another offered online accessibility.
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What is considered digital customer service channels? Providing customers with the freedom to check their account details or schedule their own appointments, self-service channels allow your business to keep up with the ever-increasing customer expectations.
Why Implement Digital Customer Service Channels?
As technology grows more and more sophisticated across industries, the customer experience bar continues to rise. Due to these technological enhancements, customers expect around the clock access to your organization, real-time responses and self-service channels to do their business when and how they want to.
Like others, the financial services industry has begun to undergo a digital transformation that has led customers to expect more and more from their bank or credit union. If your organization is not providing the services that your customers are looking for, they will go elsewhere in search of a competitor who offers a more integrated experience. In fact, Salesforce recently reported that 76% of customers now say that they are more likely than ever to take their business elsewhere in search of a more enhanced customer experience.
Being an appointment-driven business, your appointment booking channels are typically a customer’s first point of contact with your organization. Allowing your customers to easily book appointments is imperative to the success of your business, and implementing enterprise appointment scheduling allows for your customers to have a positive first touch point with your financial organization.
Here are the main three reasons to implement digital customer service channels.
1. Customers Demand 24/7 Access
Today, customers want 24/7 access to all of their service providers at all times. While this may seem overwhelming, you can start providing always-on access to your organization by making strategic decisions about which channels to digitize first.
Enterprise scheduling can be integrated into your organization’s online platform to provide 24/7 access to your clients’ booking needs. After implementing online scheduling and watching results roll in for a few months, many of our clients have noticed that 41% of their appointments were booked after business hours through their online channel. This indicates that there was customer demand for after-hours appointment booking that wasn’t previously being met when appointment bookings were managed via offline channels, during normal business hours.
2. Real-time Responses Interactions
73% of customers say that valuing their time is the most important thing a company can do. Providing a real-time service gives customers the immediate gratification that they now expect. Currently, the lack of response time associated with the appointment booking process leaves customers in the dark. Customers typically have to fill out a form and wait for a response from their financial organization to see if they do indeed have an appointment for the financial service they require.
Enterprise scheduling provides customers the ability to independently schedule appointments, allowing them to choose the time and location they desire, and informing them immediately that their appointment has been scheduled. With 64% of customers saying that they expect companies to respond to them in real-time, enterprise scheduling eliminates the tumultuous task of manually booking appointments and saves both employee and customer time.
3. The Power of Personalization
Another reason to digitize customer-facing channels is to create a personalized experience for your clients. Self-serve channels can capture customer data and help companies track buyer behavior, to support the delivery of a more personalized service. 84% of customers said that being treated like a person, not a number, was very important to winning their business. Digital channels allow customers to have the personalized ‘Omni-experience’ which has become more and more common and is now an expectation. Major organizations such as Amazon, Starbucks and Hudson’s Bay are prime examples of businesses that provide their customers with an omnichannel experience, creating a tailored, personalized service.
Enterprise scheduling allows customers to have the same booking experience no matter what channel they choose to access your organization through. If a customer books an appointment through your organization’s call center, when they show up in-branch for their appointment they will be recognized and acknowledged as the same customer, allowing them to feel valued. With a scheduling solution, you can opt to capture more information during the booking process so that your customers receive more enhanced personalized service at the time of their appointment due to the additional insight into their needs.
Other industries, as well as other organizations within your industry, have begun to digitize their customer-facing channels in order to keep up with customer service trends and stay ahead of their competitors, so what is stopping you?
56% of customers actively seek to buy from the most innovative companies. Enterprise appointment scheduling is a tool that brings innovation to your organization by providing customers with new and enhanced channels, allowing you to keep up with the ever-increasing customer experience demands. Transition your organization and your customers into the future of banking technology with enterprise scheduling.
What Next?
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