How to Leverage CX Technology During a Crisis
If you haven’t invested in Customer Experience (CX) technology, now is the time. When executing successful customer experiences, technology is critical to optimize and enhance experiences and to support experience consistency.
Never forget that people make the difference. CX tech investments enable you to make the most of your customer-focused people and processes, to magnify and make possible the culture change within your organization.
Investing in the right technology is more important now than ever before because companies considered to be customer experience leaders fare better during downturns. While it may seem like an expensive or challenging aspect of your business to master, when looking at gold standard examples like Disney, Zappos & Ritz Carlton, with the right technology, improved CX is possible with nearly any budget.
Before we dive in, I want to introduce the two business veterans who have generously shared their insights on the value of CX technology for this blog post:
Sarah Simon, CCXP is a CX Designer at Verizon Business and works with enterprise clients to design voice and digital customer experience solutions
Chuck Ingram is CEO at CongruentX where they work with clients, “Using Data, AI, and a New Way…To Drive CRM Adoption & Outcome.”
CX technology can be invaluable during a time of crisis. With the right tools, you can listen, be adaptable with customer needs, and creative in your problem-solving. When you can provide maximum value, regardless of the situation, your customers will take note.
As such, our collective goal is simple: show you the value of CX technology, especially now during a time of business upheaval and crisis. Get a better understanding of how these tools can be used in your organization to reduce expenses, optimize experiences, and more.
Skip the Standard Script
First and foremost, don’t forget to keep messaging, scripts, and communications calming. During a crisis, it’s important that your communication is not tone deaf. Consider your customers’ emotions and then develop your communication based on that. Even if your brand is edgy and snarky, now is the time to soften the sales pitch—offer to be there as a partner, not just another business or brand.
Cut Costs and Mitigate Risks
CX technology can help you identify areas for improvement in expense reduction, cost avoidance, and risk mitigation. Here are a few simple examples of how technology can help right now:
Expanded self-service capabilities. Make it easy for customers to manage their needs without having to call one of your already-overworked customer service agents.
Advance your automation of routine, repetitive tasks. Cut redundancies so you can eliminate costs without reducing staff or cutting the budget.
Reduce redundant technology that you already have in place. For example, look for duplicate solutions being used in silos, like surveys and reporting tools.
Get more value from your underutilized tools. There are likely more capabilities that could be adopted and add value during a crisis.
Find Your CX Solution
To make the most of your CX technology, consider which of these three situations your business is in and find the best solutions.
1. Demand Took a Nosedive
What you need to do: Move from reactive to proactive as quickly as possible.
Understand the situation: Your current business model is not working under COVID-19 restrictions and recovery may be difficult once restrictions are relaxed. This is happening with brick and mortar retailers, restaurants, travel agencies, event management organizations, and hospitality companies, along with the companies that serve them.
In this case, key issues for these companies include:
The rapid decrease in demand for products or services, which means the primary concern is short term survival.
Uncertainty about when, and how long until, recovery begins. These companies are likely anticipating a long, difficult recovery.
Financial instability as they burn through cash reserves (cash flow). As a result, they are being reactive, cutting labor and other expenses when, in fact, these same innovations could be critical to helping this company step over the chasm they are currently facing. As Sarah says, there is a tension between caution and boldness.
Identifying a new offering or product that matters to the market right now while dealing with the challenges of standard product or service delivery channels being restricted or shutting down—as a result, possibly managing volatile supply and demand for the next 3-6 months
Reviewing how the CARES Act could help them and trying to find solutions with having proper crisis management procedures in place.
Use the technology: Use your tools to cut internal inefficiencies—expense reduction and cost avoidance, I.E. costs that do not directly impact customers/customer experience. To do so:
Dive deep into existing analytics and insights
Advance your automation of routine, repetitive tasks. Cut redundancies so you can eliminate costs without reducing staff or cutting the budget.
Reduce redundant technology that you already have in place. For example, look for duplicate solutions being used in silos, like surveys and reporting tools.
Do not forget to use your Voice of Employee (VOE) tech to clarify what your customers need right now. Frontline employees have daily interactions with your customers and know intimately where the journey gets bumpy and the desired customer experience breaks down. Your employees can help you identify accurately where customers – and employees – are getting frustrated so problems can be addressed.
Cut Internal Inefficiencies
It is common to find inefficiencies throughout the customer journey with so many touch-points, all of which are managed by various teams. For example, when a customer success agent solves a singular client problem—without addressing the root of the issue—other customer success agents then spend more time solving the same problem. Without the right CX technology to track issues, log customer data, and standardize processes, this will continue happening, which creates inefficiencies while delivering poor customer experience.
As McKinsey points out, “Who suffers? Not just the customer; the company itself in the form of costly waste.” What is more, McKinsey has found that metrics like “likelihood to remain/renew’’ or “likelihood to buy another product” dips by 5 to 10 percent each year when the customer experience is rated as “average.” On the other hand, tackling these issues and getting a rating of “wow” is worth 30 to 50 percent more in those same industries.
Move from Reactive to Proactive as Quickly as Possible
CX technology helps you step into the mindset of the companies who see a slowdown as a strategic opportunity. Take these two examples of moving from reactive to proactive.
Good: In a crisis, a company uses automated messaging to compassionately explain delays and set expectations. For example, Vail Resorts committed to offering everyone refunds for date-specific lift tickets and honestly communicating: "We're handling lodging first, we'll get to your refund later.”
Better: A company removes the customers’ worries by saying: "We'll send a communication to you when we're ready to process your refund..." This reduces nervousness among customers who do not want to be left out or forgotten about.
While a single message to cover the situation may seem like a good way to reduce communication, you can proactively handle the situation AND assuage the customer in the second scenario. This does not mean you should “SPAM” your customers, but many people are in a state of high anxiety, even those not particularly prone to being anxious.
The more weight and worry you can take off their hands, the more they can trust you to be on their team and not let things fall through the cracks.
Clarify What Your Customers Need Right Now
CX technology can inform your strategies and help you uncover critical data for how to move forward in a time of crisis—but nothing beats picking up the phone to check in with customers. An authentic check-in without secondary purposes oftentimes yields valuable insights and opportunities that are not captured from an automated message and quantitative data point.
Not to mention, once the connection is made, your value as a business is top-of-mind for the customer, if only for a moment.
2. One Hundredfold Spike in Demand
What you need to do: Move from reactive to proactive as quickly as possible.
Understand the situation: You are a company that has immediate opportunities due to the business environment but are struggling to scale and meet demand or add necessary capabilities to support sales through fulfillment and delivery.
During COVID, this might be the case for cloud, video conferencing, online collaboration tools, hospitals, manufacturing for quarantine essentials (I.E. toilet paper and hand sanitizer), personal protective equipment (PPE) and medical equipment (I.E. ventilators). This is likely also the case for state agencies (I.E. human services and unemployment) as well as food and package delivery service companies.
Some of the key issues you may be experiencing include:
The rapid increase in demand for products or services.
Reactive mindset—running into the storm without considering what happens after.
Supply chain disruption (exacerbated by countries worldwide operating under massive constraints).
Lack of capacity to build, create, serve, or deliver processes, policies, and procedures.
Tech barriers with existing tech not suited for current transaction volumes.
Lack of visibility into comprehensive operating costs also drives financial risks.
Minimal availability of enough skilled labor.
Risk of COVID-19 exposure to staff and the resulting shutdown or shift to a remote workforce.
Deep impact and uncertainty on how to scale to meet demand. You anticipate more acute (shorter) recovery, even possibly an easier recovery, depending on whether demand deflates as quickly as it inflated.
Possibly managing volatile supply and demand for the next 3 to 6 months.
Unpredictable behavior of partners, employees, and clients.
No time for crisis management planning and procedures. Each new or changing variable in the marketplace will require significant heroics versus adaptable org more prepared to flex.
Use the technology: CX technology can help you drive productivity as you manage the uptick in demand. Here are some ways to leverage it:
Focus on using your tech to create immediate productivity improvements.
Consider the value of chatbots to automate customer needs.
Invest in rapid customer and employee onboarding for rapid capacity expansion.
Capitalize on existing AI Capabilities.
Advance your automation of routine, repetitive tasks. Cut these redundancies so you can eliminate costs without reducing staff or cutting the budget.
Get more value from your underutilized tools. There are likely more capabilities that could be adopted and add value during a crisis.
Expand self-service capabilities. Make it easy for customers to manage their needs without having to call one of your already-overworked customer service agents.
Improve Productivity
Relying on heroes and “super agents” to routinely put out fires is costly. The right CX technology allows you to fix the root of the problem so you can focus these valuable employees on value-add solutions to customer problems. This allows you to focus on profit-enhancing activities proactively and delivering better customer value as a result because you are not reactively trying to recover from a poor experience.
This also helps you reduce employee burnout and turnover because your staff is being supported by the technology rather than chasing fires all day.
3. Demand Slowdown Equals Strategic Opportunity
What you need to do: Move from proactive to predictive.
Understand the situation: If you are viewing the situation as an opportunity to streamline your operations or innovate your business model to position yourself to accelerate growth as the economy begins to recover, you are moving in the right direction. You may never go back to the “old way” of doing business now, making this the perfect time to start disrupting.
If you are fascinated by the how, where, and what that comes after the crisis, and moving ahead with innovation and transformation, some key issues you may be experiencing include:
Effectively managing your remote workforce and maintaining team engagement and productivity.
Decrease (or limited impact) in terms of product or service demand.
Your typical channel(s) for product or service delivery may be restricted.
Your primary concern is long-term viability and strategic positioning.
Uncertainties about when, or how long until, economic recovery begins.
Possibly cutting other expenses (I.E. real estate, materials, and supplies).
Determining the most strategic opportunities to invest in new technology, offerings, products, channels that matter to the market.
Possibly managing volatile supply and demand for the next 3 to 6 months and/or proactively recalibrating supply chain due to global impacts.
Considering how the CARES Act could be helpful.
Use the technology: There are strategic opportunities available to you, so being predictive and investing in the long term will be beneficial. Leverage your tech to:
Crystalize your customer listening strategy.
Identify small, steady steps rather than giant, risky leaps.
Fine-tune your tools and expand existing AI capabilities.
Invest in expanding your analytics capabilities.
Fine Tune Your Tools
If you are a Category 3 company, now is the time to perform a rapid assessment of your CRM and agent desktop—call center—tools. Your goal is to identify opportunities for improving the user experience and the effectiveness of the tools in terms of delivering the high-quality experience that your customers need right now.
Focusing on your CRM is critical because it’s often the primary technology used to support customer-facing business processes. It also helps you develop a ‘360-degree view’ of customer interactions, both internally and externally, which informs every employee within the organization and every interaction outside the organization.
When auditing your CRM tool, consider whether it is providing consistency of service and providing clear visibility into key customer information and customer touchpoints. Are you noticing improved response times and response accuracy? Or is that data currently on a downward slope?
Do not forget to use your CRM to collect and analyze customer feedback that can provide actionable insight into improving the customer experience—now and beyond. The importance of a connected technology landscape and master data management strategy cannot be underestimated.
Crystalize Your Customer Listening Strategy
Put the brakes on your pre-crisis customer listening and voice of the customer strategy. Now is the time to focus even more on the voice of the employee (VOE) and employee listening posts, along with how and where you listen to them.
When updating your voice of the customer (VOC) strategy in times of upheaval and crisis, start with the information you already have. Now is not the time to initiate extensive surveys to begin learning about your customers. Instead, use your CX technology to evaluate the delta of what you need to understand how and what may have changed, and then executing an appropriate strategy.
While you should always keep your feedback channels open, put relational (NPS) surveys on hold. Too much has changed for your feedback score to yield important insights. When soliciting feedback right now, use only transactional surveys after key interactions. Do not nag for a response with multiple follow-ups and update the survey messaging to be empathetic and relevant. For example:
“We know this might not be the right time for a survey. We love doing business with you and want to serve you in the best ways possible!”
Do not forget to tap into social listening and sentiment analysis to uncover important information about customer needs during this time as well. Be active on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and others and tune into the conversations. When doing so, compare your customers’ needs, wants, and feelings from pre-crisis data to now:
How have their needs changed?
What topics are they currently focused on?
Which support issues are most relevant?
What questions are they asking now that they were not before?
Once you get a better understanding of your customers’ wants and needs, form hypotheses, and validate your assumptions by continuing to seek feedback as you innovate products, solutions, and service ideas. This is a great time to include customers in your innovation process, albeit a rapid process.
Capitalize on Existing AI Capabilities
Now is a critical time to be capturing data and insights with your CX technology while leveraging the capabilities of tools you have already integrated into your process, specifically AI functionalities.
While AI may sound like technology reserved only for large enterprises making large investments, it can also be adopted by SMBs. The key is to start small and hone in on AI-powered apps that are accessible. For example, you can access the benefits of AI using smart apps, which are ready-made solutions that boost efficiency through the use of your organization’s data.
The benefits of investing in this CX technology now are many, including:
Personalized customer experiences
Consistent and efficient customer service
Effective marketing
Automation of repetitive and time-consuming work
Access to predictive and prescriptive analytics
The last benefit is one of the most valuable. AI support channels provide access to valuable customer insights, too. With AI-driven tools, you can automatically gather data that answers questions like:
What are the key customer concerns?
What part of the journey or experience is causing confusion?
Are certain topics trending up or down?
What is the next best action for a sales rep to take to get a sale opportunity?
Are there other steps we can take (I.E. messaging, FAQs, KB articles) to proactively address chief worries?
One of the most popular uses of AI in business right now is chatbot messaging. Consumers like the ease and accessibility of chatbots. In fact, 86 percent prefer engaging with a chatbot versus filling out a form, according to the 2019 State of Conversational Marketing. Chatbots can be a valuable tool for improving customer experience in many ways, including:
Providing 24/7 service
Making the contact process seamless and easy
Reducing or eliminating IVR phone support
During a crisis, when contact centers are experiencing massive volume, agents are out sick, and the contact center is in emergency mode trying to transition agents to at-home, chatbots can answer critical questions and calm nervous customers.
Use CX Technology During a Crisis
With the right CX technology, you can mitigate risk, connect with customers, and fine-tune your existing process. Don’t discount the power of these tools during a time of crisis.
