CRM - February 2008 - (Page insert15)

Sponsored Content February 2008 15 Essential Managers Guide to Extraordinary Customer Service What your customers think about your company is often a result of their experience when they contact you. Whether or not they remain customers is often a result of the quality of service you provide. Through Extraordinary Customer Service, Avaya explores the contact center as a strategic part of your enterprise - where you can leverage differentiated services to provide a superior customer experience that can build brand loyalty and increase profits. THE CUSTOMER’S PERSPECTIVE THE CUSTOMER SERVICE OPPORTUNITY Are you utilizing your contact center as a means to cement your company’s branding and to build customer loyalty? Leading organizations see the opportunity in providing extraordinary customer service. Despite years of attention and investment, there may still be a gap between customer expectations and the reality of the service being provided. Understanding the drivers of the gap is critical and closing the gap can avoid the impact of poor service, and create the upside of extraordinary service. CUSTOMER SERVICE CHANGES CUSTOMER OPINIONS Customers expect more today from customer service than ever before. Businesses must ask themselves some telling questions to ensure they’re providing the best possible service to their customers. How many menus must a customer navigate? Are agents empowered to completely serve a customer? How does your customer service compare to your competitors? Customers are raising the bar for customer service, and so must you. To know if your customer is a satisfied customer you must continually evaluate the total customer experience. Your customers are exposed to a wide variety of customer service experiences throughout their day, and they will compare their experience to the customer service they receive from your company. Questions to Ask Yourself ■ Is customer service a core value of your company? Savvy organizations view every customer contact center not as a cost center but as a profit center. They adopt industry best practices and invest in their contact center technology and staff. The immediate result is the ability to provide better service and more satisfied customers and the long-term result is a stronger brand image. Noted customer experience expert Seth Godin in his paper, “Is Your Contact Center a Powerful Brand Experience?” says that more than 90 percent of customers change their opinion of a company based on the manner in which the company deals with them on the phone. An exceptional contact center experience, however, can change an ambivalent or negative perception into a positive one—and win a customer for life. Customers who are delighted with the experience they get from your business become repeat customers, purchase more over time and recommend your company to their peers. EXTRAORDINARY CUSTOMER SERVICE: THE SUSTAINABLE COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGE Central to Intelligent Communications is a strong technology foundation built on IP. Taking advantage of Voice over IP (VoIP) technology, a virtual contact center that is highly scalable can deliver extraordinary customer service across multiple locations and multiple time zones. Perhaps the biggest opportunity Intelligent Communications provides is the competitive advantage gained by enhanced customer service. Speech-enabled routing provides enhanced self-service and personalized content; routine, but complex interactions can be moved from more expensive agent resources to cost-effective, self-service channels. New, innovative solutions using SIP services can support universal routing of voice, video, email, and other media; voice portal technology can deliver personalized speech applications; and inbound/outbound reporting and analysis can maximize agent productivity and customer satisfaction in real time. THE PATH TO INTELLIGENT CUSTOMER SERVICE There is a definite path in the evolution of customer service. Companies are moving from simply answering the phone to providing totally integrated, fully transparent solutions, using a combination of techniques, and technologies for Intelligent Communications. Looking ahead, capabilities like communications embedded in business processes will intelligently automate and manage the human collaboration needed to conduct business. This is an essential element in the entire enterprise being at the service of the customer—the enterprise-wide customer experience. Avaya delivers Intelligent Communications solutions that help companies transform their businesses to achieve marketplace advantage. More than one million businesses worldwide, including more than 90 percent of the FORTUNE 500®, use Avaya solutions for IP Telephony, Unified Communications, Contact Centers and CommunicationsEnabled Business Processes. Avaya Global Services provides comprehensive service and support for companies, small to large. ■ How do customers regard the level of service that you provide? ■ How does your customer service environment compare to your top competitors? ■ Are your customers happy doing business with you, and will they come back (and tell their friends)? Differentiated customer service optimizes infrastructure, applications, business processes, and people to provide a customer service experience that sets a business apart from its competitors. At the core of market differentiation for any business is the ability to deliver superior customer service through intelligent communications. ■ How has your company invested in contact center technology over the past few years? This executive summary is excerpted from "Essential Managers Guide - Extraordinary Customer Service". The complete document is available for download at WWW.AVAYA.COM/EXTRAORDINARY http://www.avaya.com/extraordinary

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of CRM - February 2008

CRM - February 2008 Contents Front Office Reality Check Customer Centricity The Tipping Point The Loyalty Riddle CRM Drives Down-Market Out of the Gate: Marketers Rate ’08 Traits The Pulse Consultants Adapt to CRM’s Changing Landscape Required Reading Cover Story: CRM Gets Serious Contact Center Solutions Always On Rumble in the Office The Smallest Slice Tying Up Cable’s Loose Ends Burning Up the Paper Trail Sunny Skies for Knology No More Bumps for BlueRoads Secret of My Success Re:Tooling Scouting Report Pint of View

CRM - February 2008

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