{"id":31803,"date":"2020-02-05T10:27:38","date_gmt":"2020-02-05T10:27:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/africa\/?p=31803"},"modified":"2020-02-05T10:56:25","modified_gmt":"2020-02-05T10:56:25","slug":"embracing-a-self-service-world-to-improve-customer-experience","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/africa\/2020\/02\/05\/embracing-a-self-service-world-to-improve-customer-experience\/","title":{"rendered":"Embracing a self-service world to improve customer experience"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Wynand Smit, the CEO of INOVO, talks about how organisations can embrace a self-service in order to improve customer experience.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Irrespective of industry sector, 81% of customers want to take matters into their own hands and solve queries before reaching out to a contact centre agent. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In fact, 67% of people prefer self-service over speaking to a\ncompany representative. So, how can companies leverage this to differentiate\nthemselves in the market?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At a basic level, organisations must first conduct an honest\nassessment of their existing self-service offerings and how effectively these\nare meeting customer expectations. The reality is that when it comes to\nself-service, most South African businesses do not even fulfil even the most\nbasic customer demands. This is where analytics become crucial to understand\nthe problems customers are experiencing and the journey they take to try and\nsolve it themselves prior to phoning a contact centre.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So, not only must decision-makers focus on improving the\nself-service options currently available on their websites and mobile apps, but\nthey must also be willing to adopt new channels such as WhatsApp and social\nmedia to engage with end users in an environment where they are most\ncomfortable in. For example, if a customer is sending a WhatsApp query, a\nbusiness can immediately create significant intimacy by wishing them a happy\nbirthday or introduce another personalised component based on the data they\nhave on that individual.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Of course, the risk in embracing multiple channels is that\ncompanies might not have a fully-fledged self-service offering available on\neach platform. This could easily result in customer frustration, if not managed\ncorrectly. An example of this is a chatbot only being able to process statement\nrequests via WhatsApp and not allowing for refunds that might be available on\nthe website.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Integration is vital<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

During tough economic times, delivering good customer service is\ncritical to the success of any business. In the past, companies could get away\nwith not fulfilling this mandate as moving to a competitor was difficult and\nmost of the services available were similar. However, this will be the year\nwhere the competitive environment in South Africa will show its maturity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

People now have a wealth of options available to them from\ninsurtechs and fintechs that are more agile in meeting their needs, are more\ncost-effective and provide the level of self-service expected of a digital\nenvironment. For example, there are a plethora of hardware stores available in\nthe market. Yet, a new entrant is differentiating itself by offering free DIY\nclasses in-store to attract customers. A completely different mindset is\ntherefore needed when it comes to service in this country.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But in addition to building differentiation, self-service is vital\nto improve security. While it is possible for malicious users to find different\npieces of information on an individual and use that to gain access to their\naccounts via traditional channels, it is much more difficult to do so via a\nself-service channel.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Take online banking as an example. Not only does a user need to\ndownload and install an application, but their device must be linked to the\nservice in addition to a username, password and OTP. All these elements\ncontribute to a more secure (and authenticated) environment. While\nidentification is great to deliver personalised service, authentication is\nessential to verify that the customer is who they say they are.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Overcoming roadblocks<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Self-service (at a basic level) is not that difficult to roll out.\nMost local businesses have already implemented it whether that is on their\nwebsites or through an application. However, when it comes to using newer technology\nthat enables things such as chatbots and WhatsApp, decision-makers are still\nhesitant to implement them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To this end, they are adopting a wait and see approach especially\nin terms of determining the use case capable of providing customers with the\nservice they expect. With current channels not providing a sufficiently high\nlevel of self-service, it is hardly surprising that companies might want to\nfocus on getting those areas right first.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Even so, changes are coming as South Africans start becoming more\ncritical of the service they receive – and the ways and means available to\nsolve it themselves.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Wynand Smit, the CEO of INOVO, talks about how organisations can embrace a self-service in order to improve customer experience. Irrespective of industry sector, 81% of customers want to take matters into their own hands and solve queries before reaching out to a contact centre agent. In fact, 67% of people prefer self-service over speaking […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":25,"featured_media":31804,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4950,399,10675],"tags":[5221,679,8254,12511,453,6520],"class_list":["post-31803","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-analysis","category-more-news","category-thought-leadership","tag-contact-centre","tag-fintech","tag-insurtech","tag-otp","tag-south-africa","tag-whatsapp"],"acf":[],"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31803","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/25"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=31803"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31803\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":31807,"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31803\/revisions\/31807"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/31804"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31803"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=31803"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=31803"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}