I’ve spent the last 25 years working in contact centres and in a conversation earlier this week with another long standing, highly experienced person we agreed that many of the issues that we were dealing with 15 or 20 years ago are still challenges that face our industry today. When I was on the phones supporting a mobile phone network, I can remember receiving transferred calls that just weren’t for me to deal with. 

For instance, the Sales team pushing something through to Service when the issue was that a handset order hadn’t gone through correctly. Knowing that they weren’t going to make a sale to someone who had already purchased, Sales decided that it was now a service call.  I’m sure we can come up with a hundred examples if we wanted to.   

However, we can’t change what happened in the first half, we can only change the result through playing smarter in the second.   

If the process was broken can automation help fix it?

There is a potential for a law of unintended consequences; you may not get what you initially signed up for (ask Harry)…. If the process is broken and you automate it then you could just generate more improper transfers at greater speed, as the bot just powers through. Not the fault of the bot, it was just doing as it was told.

If someone is getting questions that sit outside of their skills then they could be spending time searching for an answer or be passing the call on unnecessarily, as a result CX suffers. But how to catch such issues before they are the talk of Feefo and Trustpilot?

Increasing QA sample size and use of auto QA tools has to be an opportunity to identify issues quickly and make critical adjustments to the process, training of the agent and or the bot.

What are the root causes of poor CX? 

Automation of QA and enabling first level managers to identify and address coaching opportunities more quickly is only half of the story.   

Access to more data and insights allows businesses to better understand customer effort and the issues creating friction in customer journeys, issues which could be driving churn, creating grumpy customers and maybe unhappy agents who are then more likely to attrite.   

Whilst we in the industry don’t like talking about AHT anymore, customers do talk about how long it took for their issues to be dealt with. The age old Wait Time, and Hold Time are still important to customers (they are important to the person paying for the contact centre too). Root cause analysis remains a key opportunity to identify where AHT can be reduced and agent workflows can be optimised.   

Customer surveys are great, but really they are much better when the meta data from the call, the quality score and the survey feedback are all joined together.  Customer dissatisfaction data should be an opportunity to identify training needs and make changes, it helps when you have the full context of the interaction in one place.   

If the customer had to contact more than once then it becomes even more critical to link all that data together, identify the processes that are most likely to generate multiple contacts and consider how you can remove those additional contacts driving customer and employee experience.

“Take action to reduce the number of improper transfers”

There are typically 3 key drivers of improper transfers, the key is to take action to reduce them.  I’m sure we’ve either all caused issues through the following or have dealt with the consequences of them during our careers.   

What can you do about it?  

AI powered insights enable faster understanding of issues, patterns can be seen more quickly, improvement areas can be identified and actioned before the end of the shift, not the end of the month.

  1. Identifying coaching opportunities and actioning them quickly can make a material difference. Issues with processes not being completed right now may lay dormant for months, years even?  Consider change of tenancy processes, the details of the tenant or a meter read may be entered incorrectly now which doesn’t present as an issue until the customer receives their first bill (smart metering should prevent this, but what if the start date was captured incorrectly?).
  2. Use of screen capture to see what actually happened, what the agent saw and therefore advised the customer can be critical to identifying system issues, or issues with accuracy of information in the knowledge base.  These are key considerations and opportunities for organisations to be more informed in their decision making.   

“If things are going well now, that is a reflection of the work that went in 6 months ago”

The performance being delivered by your contact centre team is going to reflect the work you have done previously to ensure that you have the right people, processes, and technology.   

Sometimes you may make the wrong choices, the best you can do is play what is in front of you, keeping an eye on the horizon so that things are less likely to come as a surprise. The thing is that through using technology and AI our ability to see what is on the horizon is much improved versus what it was 20 years ago.    

I was speaking with a partner who has seen a 48% increase in QA audit deliver a 30% reduction in AHT.  They’ve used the insights from the QA to reduce improper transfers, improve processes, provide better training for agents and ensure the tech stack is aligned.   

Now I know people don’t like talking about AHT but I’m guessing we’d all be happy to talk about the benefits that could be delivered in improved employee and customer experiences, reduced wait times, more investment time, lower agent attrition, reduced recruitment and training costs, increased customer retention and of course, that all means reduced costs to serve and improved profit margins.   

Need help finding a new star player? 

Harry Kane may be gone, but it already looks like Tottenham are marching on under Ange Postecoglou – where will they finish this season I wonder?

We’d love to chat with you about how you are planning on getting the most out of your team this year and delivering a winning performance.

In the past 12 months we have seen rapid acceleration of automation and AI solutions. However, when it comes down to dealing with customers, human relationships still have their place.

We are all customers and there are times when we just want to get something done quickly. In banking terms that may be a balance or transaction check, give me the information that I need fast and simple. It could be a renewal of your insurance or to check where an order is.

But what if the balance isn’t what you expected or you have a duplicate transaction? The renewal price has changed dramatically, or the order isn’t arriving today after all, and you’ve taken a holiday day to wait for it? Well, you probably want to speak with someone, you want understanding and empathy. Another human to say to you it has all been sorted and there is nothing to worry about, to apologise – and mean it.

So, it is likely there will always be some form of need for human intervention in the process.

People determine the processes 

AIAI can determine when a customer is likely to need to make contact based on analysis of various data points and the creation of insights. It can run tasks/journeys to make proactive contacts at the right times based on customer lifecycles.

However, it has not reached the point of autonomy yet where it can decide what the CX should look like, it can give the tools but you still need to direct the effort, so people remain key.

Are your automation objectives aligned?

 Few outsource providers have the technology inhouse to satisfy the needs of their clients directly, few clients have the experience to implement AI themselves. As an outsource community of CX specialists you have the opportunity to shape the service delivered and the enable your clients to deliver better outcomes for their customers, differentiate their brand and help them either grow their business or reduce costs.

There is no point putting your head in the sand; this change is here, it is happening now. To say “it’s coming and we will get to it” is too little, too late.

The best thing that you can do is ensure that you have the right partners to enable you to deliver the changes that your client needs and the right commercial agreement with your client to ensure that your business is sustainable.

“If you aren’t talking to your clients about AI and automation someone else will be.”

Those who simply try to protect their headcount will find that they are on the losing side when it comes to contract renewal. Don’t wait until renewal comes along to talk to clients about innovation and cost saving, they will see straight through this!  

There are benefits to automation that can support your business

We have seen massive change through homeworking during the pandemic, increased attrition, increased salary costs due to inflation and pressure on clients to manage costs as a result of reduced customer spend due to a hardening economy.

We have seen increasing amounts of work being placed offshore, however there remains the risk that other labour markets become increasingly competitive and then costs will start to rise again.

Customers expect automation for certain tasks, they crave it, so you need to be able to provide solutions for your clients.

“Choosing the right technical partner could be critical to your future success”

As a business you need to ensure that you have:

Remember you get out what you put in. Be sure to properly resource any implementation project, scope realistically, ensure you have a clear business case, deliverables, testing and sign off processes, choosing the right solutions is only half of the story.

Want to know more?

Join Us for our webinar on September 14th, when we will be discussing in more detail the opportunity that AI offers to the outsource community. 

Missed our latest payments webinar? Not to worry, we thought we would provide you with a quick recap of what you missed.

The Panel

We were joined by a super panel of industry experts that included:

Topics Discussed

The panel covered a range of topics during the session, including questions from our live audience. Some of the pertinent talking points included:

  1. Why does PCI DSS apply to contact centre outsourcers?
  2. How does an outsourcer certify their PCI DSS compliance?
  3. What is the downside if the client does not ask about our compliance?

Content to catch up to

Hit the button below to get access to a recording of the session.

The automation of customer interactions is as lively a conversation now amongst the CX and contact centre communities as it always has been.

It was in the early 70’s that Theodore George “Ted” Paraskevakos, working at Bell Labs, developed the concept known as “Automated Voice Response” (AVR). His idea involved using touch-tone telephone keypads to interact with computer systems over telephone lines. His work laid the foundations for the development of the simple touch menus and the overlay of voice recognition systems that so many organisations use today as IVR (Interactive Voice Response) and we may finally be getting to the AVR solutions he intended (read on and I’ll tell you why).

What is the relevance of this technology in a world where ‘voice’ is a diminishing part of the CX tool set and contact centre operations you may ask?

It is hard to mention IVR without feeling tension, frustration, even damn right anger, when the technology is deployed badly. This is something we have all experienced to some extent or other, especially when so many of us are time poor and simply want to get the job done in 3 clicks or less. After 50 or so years of evolution and thinking, I do wonder why some organisations are so slow to change. Clearly some large enterprises have invested so much, and integrated so deeply, that a transformation project to address today’s imbalance of voice is seen as ‘super high risk’. Yet where historical investment is lower, there is little excuse not to feel enabled to address the challenges driven by customers growing preference to communicate with their fingers rather than their voices.

Many organisations are held back today because their customer engagement technology is rooted in the world of ‘telephony’. In this world IVR deployment and ‘change’ sits with the IT team and those supporting the ‘telephony’ environment. As a result, ‘change’ takes time and that costs money, the transformation required to take advantage current customer communication preferences mean ‘bolting on’ digital channel capability. ‘Bolting on’ is not a proper term the technical community use. They say “we have an API for that” but in reality, API’s are a very broad church and what the tech’ folk won’t tell you is how much API’s can restrict the flow of data. Which means that any future AI deployment to make sense of the organisations data flows, is looking at a restricted picture, increasing the risk of poor or ineffective decision making. All of which means that there are strong strategic, as well as tactical reasons, to get out of the muddy world of ‘telephony’ and walk boldly into the paved pathways and highways of today’s digital first world. For those that are still apprehensive, ‘telephony’ as Ted Paraskevakos knew it, became a series of 1’s and 0’s years ago.

Voice is now just another digital channel. As a digital channel, IVR simply becomes IR (Interactive Response).

As part of the drag and drop / no code CCaaS applications and ‘customer engagement platforms’, voice channel automation is a big component. New digitally driven contact centre tech’ gives organisations the autonomy and self-determination capability to set up voice driven IR data flows in almost any language, in any ‘voice’ and have those tested and deployed in minutes. Add to that AI (another broad church) and organisations find themselves in a position where the conversation is no longer about the transition from telephony (or voice) to digital, but from a digital organisation to an AI driven digital organisation. Which means that our future conversations will not be about Interactive Response but Intelligent Response…probably something closer to what Ted Paraskevakos actually had in mind when he developed his AVR technology 50 years or so ago!!!

Looking to strike the right balance in terms of your contact centre technology setup? Get in touch, we’d love to chat with you.

Whilst these are not-for-profit organisations created to provide affordable homes and to support local communities, they must ensure that support is of the highest possible standard at the most effective cost so that the maximum amount of income possible can be reinvested where it is needed most. However, as cost pressures increase how can housing associations ensure that operating costs of contact centres and service management are not eroding the monies required to maintain and build additional properties and give more families the opportunity to have a space of their own.

As England alone needs 340,000 new homes per year, including 145,000 social and affordable homes, there is significant pressure on providers with new residents to be considered, operating costs will increase because of inflation and rising wages and as the number of residents grows the cost to service them will too.

A number of organisations have turned to outsourcing as a means to support their residents, there are many benefits to this approach of using private sector expertise to deliver this including:

The automation conundrum

Working in an environment where customer contacts are often of high emotion brings challenges. Whether moving in or out of a property or if there is a repair that needs to be made, residents are more likely to be calling at a time of stress or need and who wants to speak to an IVR when feeling emotional, not me for sure.  So how do the opportunities to bring technology and automation reconcile with the imperative to deliver a personal service when support is needed? How can the use of technology ensure that those with the greatest need are attended to first?

Perhaps one solution is to get proactive, the use of insight and analytics solutions can unlock vital information and highlight trends within the housing stock, allowing housing associations to identify and remedy an issue before it even happens.

Where agent support is required it is key to ensure that they have delivered all the essential compliance and safety information that may be needed by a resident. Use an intelligent scripting and decision making tool, coupled with speech analytics, to make sure agents have done all that is necessary on the call, providing certainty for the organisation, the agent and the resident. Layer on top coaching tools and analytics and then your agent’s ongoing development is covered, whilst ensuring that key trend data is made available to the organisation. Having these processes in place means that all the right information is passed to engineer resources accurately the first time. This reduces the need for them to go back to a job, avoiding additional costs to the organisation and inconvenience to the resident.

So in summary, effective contact management can help deliver efficiency in scheduling and planning of work throughout your organisation and therefore improve service whilst reducing outlay. Plus feeding all repair data back into the analytics engine can then help with proactive scheduling of work to reduce risk.

Differentiated service

It should be considered that housing associations are the main provider of supported housing in England with 300,000 homes for older people and 115,000 for people who need extra support.

Outsourcing providers are dealing with vulnerable customers on a daily basis across all sectors and can bring both personal and technical expertise to support and develop services in this area. Access to voice analytics software in real-time can assist agents in identifying where additional care may be needed, more than a simple flag on a CRM to signify that a resident was vulnerable at the point of moving into a property. This data is linked to contact number and query routing technology to ensure that people at high risk are connected to the right support quickly. Technology can now pick up on vital clues that a resident’s situation may have changed and therefore they need to be considered as vulnerable.

Channel divergence

People are now communicating in more ways than ever before and often on multiple devices. Conversocial have previously stated that: ‘Customer care teams today are 10 times more likely to resolve customer inquiries via a private channel, like Facebook Messenger and Twitter DM, than they were years prior. What’s more, the rate of growth of conversations using private channels has accelerated to 20 times that of conversations using public channels (i.e. 900% vs 45%).’

When customers need help they should have the opportunity to interact in the channels that they feel most comfortable in, so whilst an e-mail is great for a lengthy dialogue after the event perhaps, a call has historically been the first action if you have an issue, but what about messaging platforms? These have become the key method of interaction in day to day lives and provide the opportunity to ease communication with residents. The ability to send a message and see it was received in WhatsApp, switch to a call or even a video call so that the contact centre agent can physically see an issue and in turn provide visual reassurance.

Who can you talk to about your options?

Having worked closely with a number of housing associations we have an excellent understanding of what is required to deliver excellent customer care at an affordable price. We have built a ‘best of breed’ network of over 180+ contact centres and 100+ technology providers, which makes us perfectly positioned to recommend and source the ‘right’ contact solutions for your business. We are entirely independent, so you know our recommendations are not driven by self-interest. Our selection process is managed by industry experts, so you will always be in safe hands.

For more information, get in touch.

Sources:  

6M number from National Housing Federation https://www.housing.org.uk/about-housing-associations/what-housing-associations-do/

Wednesday 5th July, 11:00 – 12:00 (BST)

Whilst we discuss why the PCI DSS applies to contact centre outsourcers, we will also shine a light on what the benefits are to you in delivering a secure payments capability, including enabling your clients to take more payments from more customers, more often, more easily and at less cost.

Points for discussion include:

• Why does PCI DSS apply to contact centre outsourcers?
• How does an outsourcer certify their PCI DSS compliance?
• What is the downside if the client does not ask about our compliance?
• How creating a competitive advantage for clients will win you more business.

The session will be based on pre-circulated content, shared on event registration, enabling you to get actively engaged in the conversation with our panelists

Meet the panel

Jeremy King

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VP, Regional Head for Europe,
PCI Security Standards Council

[/vc_column_text][divider line_type=”Full Width Line” line_thickness=”1″ divider_color=”default”][vc_column_text css=”.vc_custom_1639756841207{padding-right: 75px !important;}”]Jeremy leads the Council’s efforts in increasing adoption and awareness of the PCI security standards internationally. He works closely with the Council and representatives of its policy-setting executive committee from American Express, Discover, JCB International, MasterCard and Visa. Jeremy serves as a resource for Approved Scanning Vendors, Qualified Security Assessors, Internal Security Assessors, PCI Forensic Investigators, and related staff in supporting regional training, certification and testing programs.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column_inner][vc_column_inner column_padding=”padding-3-percent” column_padding_position=”right” background_color_opacity=”1″ background_hover_color_opacity=”1″ column_shadow=”none” column_border_radius=”none” column_link_target=”_self” width=”1/2″ tablet_width_inherit=”default” column_border_width=”none” column_border_style=”solid” bg_image_animation=”none”][image_with_animation image_url=”27797″ alignment=”” animation=”Fade In” border_radius=”none” box_shadow=”none” max_width=”50%”][vc_column_text]

Andrew Barratt

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VP Technology & Enterprise Accounts,
Coalfire

[/vc_column_text][divider line_type=”Full Width Line” line_thickness=”1″ divider_color=”default”][vc_column_text css=”.vc_custom_1687251077941{padding-right: 75px !important;}”]Andy Barratt has over 20 years of experience in IT and cybersecurity assurance. He leads delivery teams across a number of high-risk verticals including financial services, FinTech, and telecoms, advising on the complexities that are involved with the PCI DSS self assessment or audit processes. Andy is also a member of the Forbes Technology Council and a frequent media spokesperson both in the US and internationally.

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John Greenwood

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Director, Compliance3 and
Head of Technology & Payments,
Contact Centre Panel

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John is an innovative, award-winning contact centre specialist recognised for his ground-breaking work in securing telephone payments and his collaboration with the PCI Security Standards Council in drafting the PCI SSC Information Supplement Protecting telephone-based payment card data. He has supported over 50 PCI scope reduction projects, giving him a unique insight into the applicability of the PCI DSS in contact centres, the contact centre supply chain and the technology provider landscape. As Technology Lead and Payments SME at Contact Centre Panel, John will chair our event from a contact centre outsourcers and technology providers standpoint.

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Who should attend?

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Since the beginning of the year, I’ve been engaged in three specific projects, all with a common thread. To increase efficiency and reduce headcount. All three are well-established, mature contact centre operations with super capable management teams. All three are seeking to refresh the customer engagement component of their technology stack and replace their IVR led customer engagement and contact centre operational applications. Instead, they are identifying omnichannel customer engagement platforms with a ‘digital assistant’ sitting at the front end, from which to drive self-service transformation of the ‘easier’ use cases.

The other key thing that each project has in common is the transition from a ‘voice dominant’ customer engagement environment, to a ‘digital dominant’ environment. Across these three examples, we will see voice reducing from around 60%-70% of contacts, down to 30%-40% over a 36-60 month contract term. Judging from the client coffee table conversations I’m having this is not an uncommon aspiration. The scenario reminded me of the classic children’s story “The Wizard of Oz” – where Dorothy is swept out of her comfort zone, finding herself in a new magical world in which promises can be delivered……sounds familiar?

The scarecrow without a brain, the tin man without a heart and the cowardly lion. All now actors in our contact journey, down the yellow brick road and the promise of fulfilment of our deepest desires.

Yet at its core, “The Wizard of Oz” is a story about self-discovery and the importance of inner strength and courage. Each of the characters that Dorothy meets on her journey is searching for something that they believe will make them whole, but they eventually come to realise that they already possess the qualities they were seeking all along. Dorothy represents our need to feel safe and loved, the scarecrow symbolises our desire for intellectual capability, the pursuit of knowledge and value of critical thinking. The tin man represents the emotional and compassionate aspects of humanity, his journey symbolising the importance of empathy and the emotional connections that make life meaningful. Whilst the lion represents the physical and moral courage that we must all cultivate to overcome our fears and achieve our goals. All equally represented in our own yellow brick road.

So, what of the Wizard? The giver, the transformer and deliverer of our desires. On our own yellow brick road, we too see the wizardry that is technology. The technology sold to us as a powerful and magical thing. Well, to quote the Wizard himself speaking to the scarecrow “I think I’ll miss you most of all.” A quote that ChatGPT tells me “shows that even though the Wizard may not have had real magical powers, he was still able to give hope and support.”

So don’t let your Wicked Witch from the West disrupt and hinder your journey. Have faith, don’t fret and let us share our journeys along our own yellow brick road.

If you haven’t heard of ChatGPT, I suggest you read Dave’s article from January’s newsletter or do a quick google search – you won’t be able to miss it. The AI-powered language model is predicted to, and already is, revolutionising industries across the board. But what are its potential implications for the contact centre industry?

With its natural language processing capabilities, ChatGPT can understand and respond to customer queries in a way that closely mimics human interactions. This can lead to faster, more accurate and more efficient support for customers, while also helping businesses save costs by reducing the need for human customer service representatives.

According to a report by Grand View Research, the global contact centre market size was valued at USD 350.4 billion in 2020 and is expected to grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 9.4% from 2021 to 2028. With such a large market size, there is significant potential for ChatGPT to have a major impact on the industry.

One of the biggest advantages of ChatGPT is its ability to handle large volumes of customer queries simultaneously. Traditional contact centres often struggle to keep up with high volumes of requests, leading to long wait times and frustrated customers. With ChatGPT, however, customers can receive immediate support without having to wait in line for a human representative. This can lead to faster resolution times, higher customer satisfaction rates and increased loyalty to the brand.

ChatGPT can also provide 24/7 support to customers, which is especially important in today’s globalised economy where businesses operate across different time zones. This means that customers can receive assistance at any time of the day or night, regardless of their location. This can lead to improved customer experiences, as customers are able to get the support they need when they need it.

In addition to providing faster and more efficient customer support, ChatGPT can also help businesses save costs. According to a study by Accenture, the average cost of a customer service call is between £5 and £7. With ChatGPT, businesses can handle routine queries at a fraction of this cost, as the technology can handle multiple queries simultaneously without the need for human intervention. This can lead to significant cost savings for businesses, as they are able to handle a larger volume of queries with fewer resources.

Furthermore, ChatGPT can provide personalised support to customers by analysing their previous interactions with the business, their purchase history and their preferences. This level of personalisation can help businesses build stronger relationships with their customers, leading to increased customer loyalty and repeat business. A study by Gartner found that by 2025, 80% of customer service interactions will be handled by AI-powered technologies like ChatGPT, which highlights the growing importance of this technology in the industry.

While ChatGPT can handle routine queries, it’s important to note that it’s not a replacement for human customer service representatives. There will still be situations where a human representative is needed to provide more in-depth support or to handle sensitive issues. However, by using ChatGPT to handle routine queries, businesses can free up their human representatives to focus on more complex queries, leading to higher-quality customer support overall.

In conclusion, ChatGPT is a powerful tool that has the potential to transform the contact centre industry. With its ability to handle large volumes of customer queries simultaneously, provide 24/7 support, offer personalised support and save costs, businesses can significantly improve their customer support infrastructure. As ChatGPT continues to evolve and improve, it’s likely that we’ll see more businesses adopting this technology to enhance their customer support operations and improve their bottom line.

However, I’ve been trying to catch up over the Christmas period. Mainly in between my leftover turkey sandwiches  and watching some questionable films I would not normally watch – but hey it’s Christmas!”

One of those recent finds was that of ChatGPT. A curious sounding name that had me intrigued instantly. I thought “what is ChatGPT?” and “what is a GPT, is this the new lingo the kids use?” Bingo, it was time to do some research! Here’s some of the more pertinent details on ChatGPT that I found:

What is ChatGPT?

Launching back in November 2022, ChatGPT is a chatbot that uses conversational AI to interact with the human user at the other end. ChatGPT uses natural language processing (NLP) to understand the user’s question(s) and responds accordingly.

The tech itself was developed by San Francisco-based OpenAI, a research company led by Sam Altman and backed by Microsoft, LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman and Khosla Ventures.

What can ChatGPT do?

In the context of Contact Centres, ChatGPT will be able to perform a number of functions. This includes, but not limited to:

How does it work?

Through the use of NLP technology, the chatbot is able to understand user input by recognising patterns in conversations and breaking them down into key components such as context, intent and entities. Once it understands what the user is asking, it can then provide an appropriate response.

ChatGPT also has the ability to learn from its conversations, meaning that it can grow and improve over time. This allows it to become more efficient and better at understanding customer needs and providing useful answers.

Will we be using ChatGPT anytime soon?

So far, the response to ChatGPT has been overwhelmingly positive, with many praising its advanced capabilities and ease of use. It remains to be seen how ChatGPT will be used in the coming years, but it’s clear that it has the potential to be a major player in the world of NLP.

By the way, ChatGPT wrote that last paragraph. When asked by a reporter at CNBC to write a news story on ChatGPT, it came up with a very well-rounded response (including that last snippet).

Why not give it a go?

Whilst we wait for a simplified solution that can be integrated within our current contact centre technology stack, you can still give this piece of tech a whirl by visiting OpenAI’s website.

Here’s a joke that ChatGPT put together for me:

Me: Tell me a joke about Batman and Superman?

ChatGPT: Why did Batman bring a ladder to a fight with Superman? Because he knew he’d have to climb up to Superman’s level!

Oooo burn.

Today, it’s more important than ever before that enterprises deliver a world-class customer experience for their target audiences. A great CX builds brand loyalty, adding significantly to total customer lifetime value and turning casual customers into word-of-mouth evangelists.

The challenge is that many businesses still struggle to make effective use of their data to help them understand their customers and deliver a highly personalised, interactive experience based on that knowledge.

Earlier this year, analyst firm Corinium Intelligence surveyed data-focused executives from 100 global enterprises about their efforts to create world-class digital customer experiences. The resulting report, entitled How Data is Driving Next Generation Customer Experiences, revealed the top challenges facing global CX brand managers and how the world’s most innovative business leaders are working to overcome them.

Here’s a summary of some of the key findings from that report.

Macroeconomic Challenges Hamper Efforts to Improve CX

The past several years have been volatile, to say the least. The COVID pandemic had massive implications for the global economy, prompting the closure of many brick-and-mortar stores and accelerating digital transformation and cloud adoption in the retail space.

As companies shift into post-pandemic recovery mode, many of the broader economic challenges that originated during the pandemic persist. Supply chain performance has improved, yet the availability of many products and raw materials remains uncertain. Costs are rising. Many companies find it difficult to hire and retain skilled workers.

As a result, automation and cost savings have been key areas of focus, eclipsing efforts to improve overall CX. The Corinium study found that 79% of global CX leaders viewed cost savings as the highest priority, and 74% were focused on a return to “business as usual” in the wake of the pandemic and its aftermath. Many CX leaders feel as if they are merely treading water, rather than moving forward with initiatives that lend strategic value to their organizations.

Harnessing Data for Next-Gen Customer Experiences

The solution is the intelligent application of data. The Corinium study found that only 37% of organisations surveyed have a well-developed enterprise data architecture capable of supporting high-quality, data-driven, and personalized CX.

The companies surveyed by Corinium rated the quality of their CX at an average of 6.7 out of 10. That means most organisations see plenty of room for improvement. Using data to drive a personalised CX is an obvious winning strategy, but many are still poorly equipped to turn that potential into a reality.

The Corinium report outlined seven key business benefits of a data-driven approach to CX. Better targeting and personalisation capabilities, for example, deliver the right messages to the right people at the right time. When companies communicate relevant, timely information, their messages are simply more likely to get through. A holistic data-driven approach increases conversion rates as well, and it improves the customer journey across multiple channels within a company’s omnichannel landscape.

Data Quality and Data Governance Are Key

The authors of the Corinium report noted that problems with data quality and data governance hamper efforts to move forward aggressively and effectively with key initiatives aimed at improving CX. Data accessibility is the number one barrier to creating data-driven customer experiences. Lack of relevant or current data comes in second place.

Legacy systems and a lack of integration are frequent root causes of these problems. Many organizations also lack the kind of current, high-quality data for enrichment, including mobility and geospatial information that add powerful context alongside existing customer data.

Great CX is dependent on a unified and coherent approach to customer communications, yet 56% of respondents in the Corinium study agreed or strongly agreed that siloed, uncoordinated communications prevent their companies from delivering seamless digital experiences for their customers.

Proactive programs to manage data quality at scale are a necessary precursor to personalised, targeted digital CX. Data governance ensures information can be effectively accessed across the internal organisational boundaries that often stand in the way of effective data access.

CX Investments Are on the Rise

According to the CX leaders who responded to Corinium, most have made significant investments in customer communications over the past two years, or they plan to do so in the near future. The most popular initiatives include text messaging technology, customer relationship management software, and omnichannel communications platforms. Data integrity is also a high priority for top global brands, incorporating enterprise integration to eliminate silos, data quality to ensure accuracy and completeness, and data enrichment to provide richer, more valuable context.

To learn more about trends in customer experience management and next-generation CX, download the full Corinium report today.