Making connections easier for everyone: The omnichannel support centre 2.0

Meet customers where they want. That is the basis for omnichannel communications – providing access via any channel and from any device. Contact Centre 2.0 has to have multiple channels of contact, be more understanding, and give the solutions customers are looking for – as quickly and accurately as possible and in the most amicable manner

The convenient, personalised, and real-time expectations of service are a reality for both customers and staff, conditioned to the immediacy of modern user-centred services, from ride-sharing to online shopping and meal delivery.

A 2017 Ombudsman Services report found that bad customer service costs UK businesses an estimated £37 billion every year. Customer experience is the new competitive advantage. The number of companies investing in omnichannel approaches to customer service jumped 80% in 2020 from just a 20% uptake in 2010, according to a 2020 PwC report. A RingCentral and CITE research study found the top three current types of customer service interactions are through email (83%), voice (71%), and chat (49%), with chat (61%) predicted to overtake voice (60%) within the next 12 months.

AXA, a global insurance leader, observed the changing preference of its customers. “Many customers will continue to use the phone, but increased customer engagement in the future will be on digital channels,” said Christoph Schröder, head of front office customer care for AXA Switzerland.

The company turned to RingCentral to increase digital touchpoints to meet its customers’ communication habits through Facebook Messenger, Apple Messages, WhatsApp, and similar digital-first channels. Its solution proved to be a win-win for both the customers and the contact centre agents. AXA saw a 50% month-over-month increase in digital interactions, a 50% reduction in time to resolution, and a tenfold increase in case resolution.

Littlefish, an award-winning provider of managed IT services based in the UK, found the contact centre platform’s smart skill-based routing and AI analytics features a valuable addition to its already outstanding customer service. It matches customers with the agents who can help them best, and the agents are armed with the correct data at the right time to address customers’ issues.

For example, callers can be directed to any one of the six languages supported by a multilingual service desk to suit preference. The analytics also improve agent performance by reviewing the efficiency and giving more profound insight into customer engagement and opportunities.

“We are now able to give our agents enriched information about the users engaging with Littlefish by integrating RingCentral with our ticketing system. Now when an agent is ready to take a call, they can see a plethora of information about the caller, so they are in a better position to help and deliver a much greater user experience,” said Becky Roberts, service improvement manager at Littlefish. “RingCentral’s reporting capabilities are providing us with a big ROI. The reports help us do (more) informed resource analysis, manage our scheduling, and improve employee productivity.”

It is critical to equip contact centre agents and company employees with the right tools, insights, and capabilities to communicate internally and assist customers quickly and efficiently – via any mode, any device, anywhere.

This is indispensable when a hybrid workplace is part of the new norm. RingCentral Contact Centre offers an extensive API suite to fit any environment with pre-built integrations to leading CRM systems, including Salesforce, Microsoft Dynamics, Zendesk, and ServiceNow. This makes it simple for agents to transition between their home and corporate offices as they have access to the tools and information to do their job wherever they are.

The all-in-one system also comes with a 99.99% uptime guarantee – which is the minimum required by 81% of organisations to ensure the inherent reliability of their systems, applications, and networks.

One hour of downtime is estimated to be a loss of £77,000 in revenue and end-user activity, according to 47% of SMBs in ITIC’s 2017 Reliability and Hourly Cost of Downtime Trends Survey. In addition, an IBM Global Services study found that unplanned downtimes’ estimated average revenue cost reached nearly £2.1 million per hour for large enterprises.

Contact centre 2.0 improves customer experience and agent productivity while creating a better communication environment between the agents and the company. The technology is only getting better, so you either go with flow or risk being left in analogue isolation in the digital-first world.

To help you prepare your customer service for the age of hybrid work, explore RingCentral cloud contact centre.