Achieving a 360 Degree View of Your Customer

To solve customer issues, customer support representatives (CSRs) typically have anywhere between 12 and 20 systems open on their desktops at one time.

While it's become somewhat of an industry joke that "alt tab" is the most commonly used "application" among agents, it's frustrating for agents to toggle between password-protected web platforms, emails, customer files, knowledgebases, and more, delaying the time to resolve customer issues, or worse - having to end the call so the agent can do more research.

The growing amounts of customer data across systems have resulted in the inability of CSRs to locate information to quickly resolve customer issues, resulting in negative impacts on customer service and satisfaction levels.

This problem is all too common among today's contact centers, particularly in organizations whose customers have purchased complex products that require complex resolutions to complex problems. Sound familiar? Chances are it does, but you're not alone - and we've got the research to prove it.

New Research Reveals Harsh Realities for Contact Centers

Coveo, in partnership with Omega Management Group, recently examined the harsh realities facing contact centers, given the proliferation of customer information and the systems used to resolve customer issues.

The survey results indicated that the biggest problems are caused by inefficient access to information needed to solve customer issues.

Out of companies with more than 10,000 employees, 43% report that information CSRs need to access to resolve customer issues resides in over 20 systems. 70% of respondents indicated they face significant challenges as a result of agents not being able to find customer information, citing case handling time (50%), customer satisfaction (49%), and first contact resolution (49%) as their top three challenges.

Achieving a 360-Degree View of the Customer - Via a Single Interface

These challenges are probably all too familiar. Chances are you've made a significant investment in customer service systems - CRM, knowledgebase, call ticketing, bug tracking, wikis, online customer communities, etc. While you might have tried moving customer data into a single repository, you realized that it's a losing battle, as data continues to proliferate outside those systems and social channels gain popularity.

Our advice is to leave customer data where it is, and provide ubiquitous access to it via an Enterprise Search 2.0 Platform--configured specifically for your customer service operations-- that sits on top of the entire customer support infrastructure. Gone are the days of having a dozen different applications open at once to resolve customer issues.

With an Enterprise Search 2.0 Platform, CSRs and managers gain immediate, efficient, single-screen access to critical customer, product and issue-resolution information, regardless of what system it resides in. No more toggling between multiple applications. No ripping and replacing current systems. No moving data into a single repository or "system of record."

This approach enables dynamic dashboards that give CSRs and managers 360 views of customer information correlated from disparate systems. Dashboards, configured by role, display account information, related customer cases, related sales opportunities, customer posts from social media channels, and other information located across the knowledge ecosystem, even dynamic business analytics for managers and executives.

Imagine how customer service managers and executives could use this immediate access to all customer information to make better, more informed decisions, and identify and understand product and customer trends, rates of satisfaction, and more, all before they become critical or costly issues.

The dramatic impact that a 360 view of customer information can have on your business is one you can't afford to operate without.

About the Author

Ed Shepherdson, VP of Enterprise Solutions is responsible for leading Coveo's Customer Information Solutions line of business, including product development, services, marketing and sales.

Mr. Shepherdson brings 30 years of experience in the technology industry to his role with Coveo. Most recently he was Vice President of Global Customer Support with Cognos, now an IBM company, where he spent 18 years in a variety of senior positions.

As Canada's largest independent software company and the world leading Business Intelligence supplier, Cognos supported over 20,000 customers in highly complex environments. Mr. Shepherdson's passion for delivering world class support led him to be an active Advisory Board member in several industry associations, including TSIA (formerly SSPA) and Service Strategies Corporation (SCP), which set the standards for Technology Services and Support Industry. Info: www.coveo.com.