Can you still create memorable customer experiences?
Can you still create memorable customer experiences, even in these trying times?
“Customer Experience: The Art of the Possible” was the theme of a webinar HCM recently participated in, which was sponsored by Ring Central. Ring Central is an industry-leading provider of automation technology for contact centers, work from home and customer engagement. HCM has worked with Ring Central for more than a year to integrate advanced automation technologies into its hospital revenue cycle management solutions.
The webinar was filled with insightful conversation about how call centers are evolving into customer excellence centers.
Scott Schoenherr, HCM’s Sr. VP of Operations and Technology, and Shep Hyken, New York Times and Wall Street Journal best-selling author, joined Ring Central’s Joanna Palmer and Max Ball in the event.
Take a look at some of their insights and opinions on how working from home (WFH) has proven to be a positive change for their customer service initiatives.
The new WFH economy creates opportunities for innovation
The group agreed that working from home presented challenges, but it also fostered greater collaboration within their teams, positively improving customers’ experiences. That collaboration, paired with automation, enabled their teams to find success in their environments.
Scott revealed that HCM uses automation to deliver an excellent customer experience, but he emphasized it’s not just about chat bots. It will involve combining automation with customer service to create interactions that feel more human. Sure, automation is essential for improving efficiency and collecting data, but more importantly, developments will drive better engagement with clients’ patients and consumers.
That’s why HCM partnered with Ring Central to build a modern automated, customer-patient-centric solution that allows them to:
- Better monitor customer experiences and quality.
- Increase productivity and efficiency within their internal teams.
- Offer their clients more options to connect with their customers and patients.
As a result of the WFH shift, Hyken noted that most organizations went virtual within two months and found that their people are more comfortable working from the comfort of their homes. In fact, many plan to continue doing so, especially for contact centers.
Furthermore, Palmer pointed out that companies are shifting from “voice only” to incorporating automation so agents can focus on more important matters, like increased customer engagement.
How employee experience shapes the customer's experience
Building a more compassionate, customer-centric experience was a central thread throughout the webinar. Here are a few summarized remarks:
Scott: Compassion stimulates understanding and creates more meaningful conversations with others. Better understanding engenders greater customer confidence. It’s not about just calling someone to get them to pay their bill. It’s about understanding them and having compassion for them.
Hyken: Customer service should not be a department or what happens when the experience fails; it’s a philosophy for everyone and a critical part of the end-to-end experience. Customer service should become “customer retention” or “customer loyalty.”
Palmer: Customer-centric is larger than the contact center – a customer-centric organization involves every employee. But the contact center is a central element in becoming customer-centric. Collecting useful data from customer interactions is crucial.
From contact center to customer experience center
The group discussed necessary actions to transform a contact center into a customer experience center. A few pointers were:
- Reframe the contact center from a cost center to a customer experience model that yields positive ROI.
- Redesign and transform call centers using digital channels and data-driven tools, such as cloud technologies, AI, big data, analytics, IVR, workflow automation, e-commerce, social media, videos and FAQ lists.
- Emphasize outreach and personalization to build empathy, know your customers and understand their needs.
At HCM, we always appreciate being invited to join conversations about customer experience and are very interested in your views. Please check out the webinar here and let us know your thoughts and ideas.