Omnichannel and personalization have become the two major factors that determine B2B (“business to business” or business-to-business) sales, according to the report “The Global Pulse of B2B Business” by the consulting firm McKinsey& Company. Added to this scenario is the trend that has been consolidated in recent years in B2B relationships and sales: data-driven decision making.

The study dictates that these businesses are in full transformation and customers are changing the way they interact, placing greater importance on flexibility through channel adoption and finding more personalized and seamless buying experiences. “They are better positioned to meet their customers’ expectations, improve business performance and achieve a step change in their growth,” notes McKinsey. This goes hand in hand with a survey by Forrester that revealed that 41% of shoppers believe analog channels have become less important than digital. It should be noted that the pandemic has also caused this process to accelerate.

This means that, today, companies that do not provide their teams with the necessary tools to work more efficiently and productively, such as access to new technology platforms or improved data access, have a clear problem. With respect to omni-channeling, it is worth noting that 72% of B2B companies that sell through seven or more channels increased their market share. This new omni-channel standard translates into the use of ten by more channels in three interaction models.

The Value of Data in B2B Sales

The rise of virtual selling has meant that B2B sales-focused organizations are increasingly willing to use the latest technologies to support their strategic decisions on data.

According to a Gartner study, by 2026, 65% of B2B sales organizations will move from the traditional model of intuition-based decision making to a data-driven plan. The goal is to leverage technologies that are able to bridge workflow, data and analytics. In addition, due to the modernization of virtual sales strategy they will be able to create a support designed to improve customer engagement, support salesperson actions thanks to data and simplify salesperson workflows.

Given the importance of data, Gartner experts recommend that organizations evaluate two types of B2B transactions:

– One based on volume and velocity, in which sales cycles are shorter (less than three months), are related to smaller deals (less than $25,000), with a small buying committee, consisting of fewer than six stakeholders, and generally for products of less complexity.

– Another model of larger businesses running for longer periods, six months or more, with larger deals, which can be over $125,000, have a purchasing committee of between eight and 11 stakeholders, and are typically for complex products.

Simplify workflows

Automating routine tasks that consume a lot of salespeople’s time is essential. This will allow them to focus on more important tasks and thus improve their performance, leaving the more mechanical tasks aside.

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Spending time with each customer is essential to offer a good service and to go deeper into their needs and solve their queries. However, we can find ourselves in the case of calls that are too long and do not solve the customer’s problems.

When we talk about average talk time, we are referring to the amount of time an agent spends talking to customers. In any case, this time should not be confused with the average interaction time, which corresponds to the total time an agent spends completing a call from start to finish.

In general, conversation time alone does not tell much when analyzed on its own. What is important is the percentage of speaking time, as a share of interaction time. Ideally, the majority of interaction time should be spent talking to the customer, not the person waiting or the agent doing back-office tasks.

Average contact center talk time

For example, high interaction time and low speaking time indicates inadequate staff training or inadequate call routing. We cannot keep customers waiting to be served or transferring them from one department to another to resolve their questions or queries.

In addition, a low interaction time and a low talk time indicates that calls are not being handled correctly because the times are too short.

On the other hand, a high interaction time and low talk time could mean that agents are trained but call center technology is not adequate and systems are limited.

How to optimize the average talk time?

The first thing to consider is to decrease the interaction time. This reduction will allow us to handle more calls with the same number of agents. In this case, the most difficult thing is to find the balance between agent productivity and efficiency.

– Call audits to drive improvements

By analyzing all conversations and comparing which ones have the longest talk times and the most frequent problems that arise, essential information can be generated to improve the average talk time.

– Simplifying agent effort with technology

Agents are only as fast as their knowledge allows them to be. It is important that when agents are not proficient in product features or specific problems, there is a knowledge base to guide their responses.

Other metrics in the contact center

Talk time is an interesting metric for trying to find problems in contact center call handling. However, as with any other metric, the goal should not be to have the highest or lowest talk time, but to understand what it means for the customer experience.

It can also be useful to compare interaction time and talk time with competitors. These types of mystery calls allow you to see where a company stands against its competitors and compare key metrics to recognize trends, correct mistakes and uncover opportunities to improve the customer experience.

If you need professional help, at MST HOLDING we offer you our experience and services. Contact us at www.mstholding.com

Brand loyalty is becoming increasingly complicated because it is driven by more than just the product or service it sells. It is a relationship of reciprocity in which the consumer seeks preferential treatment and to feel included in the community to which they want to belong. And the pandemic is largely to blame in this aspect, since it was in the context of confinement that the significant impact on the brand-customer relationship began.

The lack of face-to-face contact meant that many consumers were forced to become less personal and moved from face-to-face to embrace the digital format. But now customers have returned to engaging with brands in a more holistic way and are looking to return to that close contact they missed so much.

Many reports reveal that 53% of Generation Z consumers have started using a company’s services or products specifically because of the diversity of its customer service. Meanwhile, 46% of Gen Z consumers would stop buying from a company because of its corporate stance on social issues, well above the 35% of general consumers.

The contact center as key to the experience

The study results shed light on the challenges faced by companies when trying to engage customers from different demographics and cultures. To show empathy and establish a better relationship, brands not only have to meet the expectations of these different cohorts from a customer experience perspective, but also demonstrate that they are aligned with their environmental and social values.

This is where the role of the contact center comes in, as agents are charged with playing an increasingly important role in promoting a brand’s ethics. And they do so in defense of their brand’s values.

Thus, the contact center has managed to transcend basic customer support and agents have turned their role from answering calls to becoming the trusted advisors who guide customers through their customer journey. In fact, younger consumers are the ones who have become more aware of companies’ policies and actions within a broader social context. In addition, issues such as sustainability are among the top priorities for these younger consumers.

Agents have also become a new concept of brand ambassador. The people in charge of this position will need to understand and proactively respond to consumer needs. And while contact center agents are increasingly important in driving business growth, agent burnout remains a challenge for contact centers.

Faced with this reality, many companies have begun to take steps to better engage and retain agents as their strategic importance to business performance increases. And to keep them, they are investing in new technologies, with 78% of professionals saying that investing in digital tools is a priority for the organization.

Better agent conditions equal better customer experience.

These types of strategies are also done with the goal of boosting the company’s potential and seeing the company’s revenue grow. And it’s not subjective – more than 67% of organizations say their contact center is transforming or has already transformed into a profit center as a result of creating and maintaining more holistic strategies. This paradigm shift will require greater investment and new strategies. But today, the values associated with diversity, equity, sustainability and inclusion are crucial parts of a business strategy that can drive business performance as well as inspire customer loyalty. So creating a culture of transparency and mutual support that nurtures employees and facilitates innovation is one of the best ways to engage your workforce and, in the process, ensure that teams strive to deliver the best possible customer experience, as well as improve their image of your company.

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Sometimes, there is a mistake that many companies make when it comes to customer service training. They think that this is a dispensable factor and that the fact that a customer returns depends merely on the quality of the product. However, this is no longer the case, which is why it is necessary to know the benefits of a good customer experience in order to put it at the forefront and use technology such as artificial intelligence to achieve the highest possible performance.

One study that proves the benefits of customer experience and how well it performs is from Watermark Consulting. The company tracked the 13-year stock market performance of customer experience leaders versus laggards between 2007 and 2019. The best customer-centric companies posted gains of 307%, while the S&P index showed a 199.6% return. These excellent CX companies outperformed the index by more than 50%.

And what about the customer experience lags that were also tracked? Their numbers came in at less than half the S&P, with gains of only 90% over those 13 years. This clearly proves that good customer service triggers customer loyalty.

If the numbers from the top customer experience leaders weren’t enough, there are statistics from ACA’s research on customer service. They surveyed more than 1,000 consumers on the topic and here’s what they said:

– 73% will do everything they can to do business with a company that provides better customer service.

– 79% said they would switch if they knew of another company that offered a better customer experience.

– 52% will pay more if they know they will receive excellent customer service (that number is even higher if the company offers a convenient experience).

The factors for creating a winning CX

The overall experience is the main factor towards creating a winning CX. This means everything related to the entire experience, which can include how easy it is to navigate your website, how easy it is to communicate with the company, the product packaging (if applicable) and anything else the customer experiences while doing business with your company.

Another important aspect is the customer service that the client experiences along the way. It can start in the sales process and continue long after the sale when customers need support, have complaints or need answers and it is tied to each and every interaction they have with the company or brand.

The importance of training

Customer service training is the basis for providing an excellent customer service experience. In fact, you must train employees on how to do this, even if they are inherently pleasant and friendly people. In addition, the biggest mistake companies make in customer service training is that they only train the front line.

That front line usually consists of sales people and the team that provides customer service. Customer service is more than a department. It is more than people on the front line interacting with external customers. The best companies recognize that customer service is embedded in the culture and therefore train everyone in the company.

If you track the interactions a customer has with an organization, you will find that there is a lot going on “behind the scenes” where employees who never interact with a customer are impacting the experience. It may be someone in the warehouse making sure the order goes out on time, that nothing is missing, and that it is packaged in a way that won’t be damaged. That employee is impacting the customer, but never sees or talks to the customer.

You don’t need to train behind-the-scenes employees the same way you train front-line employees. But they still need to be trained properly. Everyone needs to understand what the company’s goals are  and how their role impacts those goals.

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In this article we are going to highlight the difference between two concepts that are often confused with each other. We talk about the differences between conversational bots and Artificial Intelligence.

They are two closely related terms, but in reality they are not at all synonymous. In fact there is a typology of conversational bots that does not rely on AI.

In fact, Artificial Intelligence is a step above, since it is not a tool but an advanced resource to enhance tools and procedures. We will explain this in more detail below.

THE USE OF ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE IN CHATBOTS

To many people it still sounds like something out of science fiction, but Artificial Intelligence is something we all live with much more than we are aware of.

Every time we use something as everyday as an Internet search engine or type any text on our cell phone, we are making use of it in a completely transparent way. Connected devices “learn” from the way we use them, both personally and by extracting usage patterns based on different segments of the population (another very famous concept comes into play here: Big Data).

This, taken to user-machine interaction in the context of eCommerce, has one of its greatest exponents in conversational bots. Thanks to the use of technology, we can achieve advanced systems that provide solutions to increasingly complex queries using natural language and semantically interpreting the intention behind the user’s query.

Moreover, AI enhances an already existing tool, and does so by providing new strategic variants and functions. It directly turns chat into an ally when it comes to converting and closing sales. Undoubtedly, this is the real leap in quality with respect to those versions of bots that do not incorporate the use of Artificial Intelligence.

SO, ARE THERE CHATBOTS WITHOUT ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE?

Yes, and it is something relatively frequent. If we understand as conversational bot a software that is able to interact with a user we can distinguish between the intelligent ones and the ones that use something called ITR (Interactive Text Response).

The latter allows us to configure the tool by setting a series of predefined responses that will be launched by the system according to the user’s questions.

The main difference with those bots operated through the use of Artificial Intelligence is that ITRs base all their effectiveness on what we are able to foresee and define previously. They do not have the ability to learn from the interaction or use the natural language of people, so they are less accurate.

ADVANTAGES OF CONVERSATIONAL BOTS WITHOUT IA

Do not make the mistake of assuming that by using a chatbot that does not incorporate AI, you are dealing with a necessarily basic tool.

On the contrary; if you are working with an advanced solution, the synergies and possibilities are practically endless. In fact, the chatbot does not have this technology, but through its connection via API it allows you to do amazing and really advanced things like tracking orders, displaying a map so that the customer can get directions to your physical store, showing recommendations in the chat co-viewer directly…

The implementation is very fast although it requires a detailed and deep analysis of the circumstances of use in which it is necessary.

This has the enormous advantage of working from the first moment exactly as well as 6 months later. Its effectiveness will always be the same and does not require a “running-in” time to evolve.

They can be somewhat cheaper, although not in all cases, and they do not represent a substantial difference with an AI-supported solution.

ADVANTAGES OF CONVERSATIONAL BOTS WITH IA

They are a living tool, capable of training itself. Thus, their effectiveness increases with the simple passage of time. What’s more, the higher the number of interactions, the better the decision making process.

If we are talking about highly complex technical systems, this is obvious, but one of the best things about these bots is that this is not transferred neither to the implementation nor to the day-to-day management.

The tool is less dependent. It could be used 100% autonomously, but even in cases where Artificial Intelligence is used, the human touch is always advisable for a matter of empathy and the ability to react accurately to new situations.

It also gives us the possibility to attend our public 24 hours a day, which is much more complicated if we need to have staff resources available all day long. We hope we have clarified the differences between conversational bots and Artificial Intelligence.

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We often talk about digital transformation and how its consequences have transformed our daily lives. While this is true, as technological innovations span all fields and offer us new opportunities, first of all, we need to know what this phenomenon truly means and its relationship to data. Thus, digital transformation can be referred to as the application of digital capabilities to processes, products, and assets to improve efficiency, customer experience, manage risk, and uncover new revenue-generating opportunities.

Digital transformation: what it is and its technology

Digital transformation is the integration of digital technology into all areas of an organization, which comprehensively changes the way it operates and delivers value to customers. On the other hand, it also implies a cultural change in which companies must adapt to the context and to the new needs of consumers.

What does this phenomenon entail? Among other things, the redesign of products, processes and strategies through digital technology. In addition, it affects all areas of an organization: supply chain, workflow, employee skills, customer interactions and the variation of the final value.

This digital transformation at the enterprise level makes it possible for companies to meet the needs of consumers at the pace and with the quality they demand. To this end, the emergence of different technologies make it possible to meet these needs, such as cloudcomputing, information technology, mobile platforms, machine learning and artificial intelligence technologies.

In addition, there are other technologies driving digital transformation in forward-looking companies that are interesting to know about: blockchain, augmented reality, virtual reality, social networks and the internet of things (IoT).

The importance of data in the customer experience

Digitization turns processes into data, which allows companies to view their actions and analyze them based on objective facts. Considering that companies are built through processes with the goal of creating efficiency, focus and quality, digital transformation reduces the processes a company does, automates the work to people and turns the process into software.

Data shows that users matter and that customer experience is vital. Thanks to data and the ability to associate it with indicators or problems through analytics, companies can become more efficient and change what they do wrong. In terms of employeexperience, as Up Spain points out, data shows the needs and what is happening with the employee, beyond the organization being able to draw its own opinions.

In addition, data makes companies quick to meet the needs or expectations of customers and employees in an increasingly volatile and competitive market. Therefore, process automation is necessary, transforming processes and making them more reliable, as well as relieving the workload on employees.

From the customer experience, it is not how quickly the organization answers the phone, but how quickly the customer can complete an order. The customer experience and satisfaction lies in the fact that the customer does not need multiple conversations with the organization. The need for a meeting can be done quickly and done once.

Conclusion

The digital transformation brought about by the explosion of data and connected devices is a limitless world of opportunity for organizations, enabling the improvement of the customer experience. Data collection and analysis makes it possible to innovate and generate new ideas to create better products and provide good customer service.

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Identifying the most effective way to build customer loyalty is one of the most intricate tasks for a company. Brands focus their efforts on acquiring new customers, even though this may cost seven times as much effort. A customer who is already familiar with a brand is more likely to buy again if he or she is satisfied.

Therefore, it is important to implement strategies to improve customer loyalty and improve the purchasing process.

Customer retention vs. customer loyalty

Loyalty is one of the most important aspects of a business, there is no doubt about it. To this end, serious efforts are invested in designing attraction strategies (or Inbound Marketing), but unfortunately they are not always rewarded with new buyers.

Regardless of the environment in which you develop your activity (online or offline, or both) it is essential that you maintain a high level of satisfaction, so that your customers never want to leave your side.

The main difference between retention and loyalty is customer engagement. Nuances that “retain” customers are often superficial and less effective. You should not keep customers, they should be the ones who choose to stay. How do you do this? Make sure your products or services meet their needs: sooner or later, satisfied customers will buy from you again.

4 strategies to improve customer loyalty

Building loyalty with existing customers takes time, effort and resources. But when you do, you’ll have many more opportunities to gain your customer’s attention and, ultimately, get more sales.  Here are 4 strategies to improve customer loyalty.

Get to know your customers

People like to be known and to be known. Therefore, customers will be more receptive to organizations that go the extra mile to empathize with them. We need to spend more time strengthening ties with customers to understand their concerns and needs to build a closer, more real relationship that benefits both parties.

Reward their loyalty

There is nothing that serves as a better loyalty weapon than listening to your own customers. A feedback system, such as a satisfaction survey or simply talking to them personally, will help you to know first-hand their opinion about the service you are providing them. This feedback can be the trigger to put into practice brilliant ideas for improvement and innovation that they are throwing at you. Listening has never done so much good.

Surprise them from the first moment

In fact, there are several reasons why these expectations, if met with satisfaction, are crucial to client retention.

– Getting the project to be delivered to the client weeks or even months in advance.

– Eliminating uncertainty. The client will know what to expect and when, which can give them the peace of mind needed to make them feel comfortable doing business with you.

– Having a clear vision from the start can help your company develop key performance indicators (or KPIs) around specific expectations, which will set you up for success.

Be friendly

Combining good service with gratifying gestures to your customers is always recommended. Give a gift or send an email to congratulate your customers on their birthday. People remember when something has surprised us and making that feeling last in time and in your target’s mind is something you can’t pay for with money.

Put these loyalty strategies into practice and start building customer loyalty. The more buyers trust, appreciate and love what you do, the more likely it is that your brand will stand out from the competition.

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A study reveals that most companies from the USA and the United Kingdom are clearly aware of the digital transformation benefits and they make it their number 1 priority for 2022. 

The digital transformation is now a business priority from the top management for most companies from the United States and the United Kingdom. Collected from interviews with 403 executives, the study reveals to what extent the pandemic has served as a catalyst very necessary to adopt the digitals tools and processes that are necessary for a sustainable and resistant business growth.

COVID as a catalyst for the digital transformation

The historic chain of events that followed the designation of COVID-19 as a pandemic,  can last years to be a filled process and understood on the social level. Just then it will be possible to extract the necessary knowledge and formulate the learned lessons to test the elements and operations that were exposed that are more vulnerable that sustain our global society and the institutions that support them.

In the other hand, for world companies, the necessary steps to isolate, eradicate the exposed functional weakness and enhance their proactive capacity in front of the continuous disturbances were presented in real time.

With the understandable exception from companies of the travel and hospitality sector, every company from all sectors that are vertical oriented to the client, faced the constant change of the expectations and needs from the clients had something in common: it reached the digital maturity.

The client experience definition has changed  

In the first three months of the pandemic, the 76% of the consumers had change the channel, to online shopping. Early 2021, the positive client experience definition (CX) had been adapted to include a website easy to navigate, live chat support and 24 hours a day assistance.

This client experience reestablishment is the reason why the 81% of the companies will increase their investment in CX provision in 2022. It is also the reason that for most boardrooms, the key to realign with the consumers and make the investment count is the transformation.     

The digital transformation is the strategic priority for 2022

The 96% of the companies’ leaders have made the digital transformation of the company as a topic of interest for 2022 and the 64% of the managers cited it as a priority for next year.

The corporate appetite for digitalization has been growing in the last 18 months. In the 2020 summer, the digitalization went from being a topic of conversation to a consideration. It moved up the agenda of the managers to the point where the 24% of the global CEO’s identified the digitalization of the operations and the basic business processes as their number one priority and the other 20% situated it in the second place. 

This priorities change is the reason why the brands are already taking concrete steps on this transformation journey. One of every five CEO declare that their company can be considerate digital-first and the other 36% of the companies had passed the proof of concept phase and the digitalization pilot at the end of the first quarter of 2021.

A clear competitive advantage

The study also makes clear the tangible benefits of the digitalization and that the brands that prioritize the digital are already enjoying its competitive advantage.

For example, one of every four companies leaders respondents for the study reveals that the y have established speech and text analytics and data mining and the 36%  had gotten to a point where it could tap into enough different data sources to make real time adjustment in their CX offering.

And what is more important,  one third of the included companies in the survey sample group already share the data and information across the company, at an operational level and not only in the executive strata.

Until data is democratized in this way, it will be impossible to leverage information or empower all employees to share ideas and the knowledge that can continue to drive a business.

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Users expect to solve their problems faster each time and in a more effective way. The technologies have made us used to the immediacy without sacrificing quality. The need to solve incidents of a different nature for the same product and serve a large number of users in a personalized way is becoming more and more common. It is for all these needs that HelpDesks have become an obligation for any company that offers technological products or that wants to start a process of digital transformation.

These help desks, as they are also called, help us coordinate technical service teams, allow us to storage data on incidents that occur and they automate processes whenever is possible. The result is a faster and more efficient service, both for the user and for the organization.

HelpDesk: more productivity and better communication

The function of any HelpDesk begins when the user requests help through a ticket system. Data such as the date and time of opening the incident or other information provided by the user are archived in this file.

All of that allow us to:

Reduce dedication time: The stored data of already solved incidents allows future problems to be solved quickly, by being able to recover an already proven and effective solution.

Improve communication between user and technician: Opening the Ticket creates an online space where the user can describe their problem and provide additional information such as photographs, invoices, etc. The technician updates the ticket with the incident status and closes it when it is already solved, therefore, both can use the ticket to search relevant information.

Monitoring of results: Statistical data can be obtained from each of the actions that are generated, both from communication with the user and from the actions carried out and the time spent, in order to generate future improvement actions.

Increase the efficiency of the technical service: The HelpDesk organizes the incidents and redirects them to the most qualified team member to resolve them, which directly influences the time spent and the quality of the incident resolution.

Establish service levels: Service levels can be created to deal with incidents of different complexities, automating the process for those that are less complex.

Identify work peaks: The tool extracts data related to the volume of incidents to anticipate the need to expand the team.

Improve user satisfaction: As the processes are streamlined, the user has a good perception of the service provided. This is reflected in the satisfaction surveys.

The storage of data on tickets and incidents produced allows us to develop improvement plans to avoid or reduce future incidents. In addition, the HelpDesk collects detailed information that allows you to create a knowledge base about the product and act accordingly.

Users will be increasingly demanding with customer service, therefore, having a HelpDesk will be necessary to generate trust in consumers, optimize time, processes and human resources for technical service, and, ultimately, become in a digital and competitive company.

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