cakapdigital.com – No matter what years or era it is, customers will always be one of the keys to a flourishing business model. As the backbone to a running business, it’s been a continuous effort for companies to engage with their customers in a world where rapid development of technology and the fast-moving of the working landscape, where consumerism is becoming more significant each day.
It’s therefore the norm and hardly subtle implication that customer experience is also a contributing factor to the kindling of a long-term relationship between a company and its customer, hence the relevant will likely to remain for business leaders in the global field for years to come. Despite the obviousness of customer experience’s integral role for a smooth business ride, what exactly are the giveaway customer’s interactions in practice that strengthen this fact?
Before that, let’s start by defining what customer experience means for both the customer and the company.
Customers on Customer Experience
From customer service, advertising to product or service packaging and features, and the digital transformational technology that integrates the process of serving customers, it’s deliberately part of the customer experience, but customer service certainly makes up the determining point of whether a customer stays or left. A Customer Service Expectation survey conducted by Gladly in 2018 found that 92% of respondents would stop purchasing from a company after three or fewer poor customer service experiences and that 68% will pay more for products or services from a company with a strong record of good customer service.
Companies on Customer Experience
As a creator and provider of product or service, it’s, therefore, a company’s task to make customers happy that in turn, becoming loyal customers that are willing to purchase the latest launch of new products or subscribing to new or upgraded service. The happiest customer is when the company can provide them with their needs before the customer even asked, coupled with an attentive customer representative that readily answers the customer’s inquiries.
Now on to the set of key points that describe customer’s tendency and preference of their supposed expectation and feedback of customer experience…
1. Customer Service
Great customer service washes away the customer’s reluctance on engaging with the company. 54% will make up their mind from the customer service alone while the 19% see it as the most significant element. Hence why, a customer service that manages to be responsive, respectful, and kind can make the customer feel valued, therefore forging a long-lasting relationship with the company that in turn increasing sales and boosting the traffic while crafting an excellent brand name to potential customers and partnership with other businesses alike.
2. Personalization
Statistics show that 59% of people would choose personalization any other day against the 53% that lean toward speed. While this shows a small gap between the preferences, it’s worth considering that when the two elements can be achieved with balance, all the more convenient for a customer.
3. Undervalue
As briefly mentioned in the first point, value is inherently the thing that people seek for in the things they’re doing or earning. As such, it’s also important for people to feel valued because that makes them feel good and cared for. So when 61% of customers feel that they’re not treated as people and instead, as case numbers, this is certainly not a good sign in any kind of business. Your business relies on the audience, and if the audience feels that their stay isn’t welcomed, then maybe it’s their time to switch the ticket to another show.
4. Inconsistent Response
Getting further down the rabbit hole when consulting with different customer representatives right when a customer is supposed to get enlightened with the same issue they have, in the end, might dwindle their interest and desire to engage with the company. Sadly, this is quite common when 76% of customers have inquiries about a certain issue but having to be delegated from representative A to B.
5. Growing Interest In Products (or Services)
Another angle of people interaction toward the customer service as part of the customer experience is that they are willing to pay more for the company’s products or services, as 68% is on-board with letting out their cash more than usual to companies with a strong record of good customer service.
6. First Impression Matters
That’s right because 3 or fewer bad impression of the customer experience accounts for the 92% of customer that move on to other company. The research found that customer only takes approximately 50 milliseconds to create the first impression of the business, which means the subconscious is faster at processing information while concluding the business identity and reliability.
7. Human Assistant Over IVR
Between the two unlikely counterparts, human still wins this round, as 98% want to get connected to the human assistant instead of assisted via IVR (Interactive Voice Response). It’s clear that even in business, almost all customers still prefer asking questions for the human agent as the former allows the customer to ask a more nuanced question as well as receiving a nuanced answer from the customer representative, while in IVR, it usually provides a limited set of answers and therefore is less flexible than the human agent.
Conclusion
Now that the customers’ preferences have been revealed with these 7 statistics, it’s time for business leaders around the world to regard the customer experience as part of the critical priority as a means of ensuring customer satisfaction. By connecting with customer rightfully through online interaction such as email or chat, store, or phone call, companies can, therefore, nurture business relationship on a more personal level when they can offer a customer detailed and clear information on the plans, pricing, discounts, and suggestions specific to the customer needs and expectations.
Coupled with the technological advancement that supports customer experience, businesses will be then ready to embark on their own digital transformation, which allows for the synchronization of customer demands to be fulfilled with the right technology and human resources.