Multichannel Customer Support

Customer support is the business of making life easier for your customers. This covers everything from having liberal return and exchange policies to hiring skilled and attentive customer support agents. Customers often cite slow service, unprofessional agents and the inability to easily switch between communication channels as common reasons for leaving a brand. This leads to lost business, as well as a negative brand image.

Offering multichannel customer support gives your customers varied touchpoints through which they can reach your brand.

Customer Channels Needing Live Support

Interactive Voice Response (IVR)

IVR is an automated system that is usually made available in conjunction with live agents. It’s a great channel for brief transactions that involve dealer location, order status, and collection information, among others. It provides appropriate responses via voice, fax and callback.

Social Media Response

Customers turn to social media to voice complaints, air grievances and make inquiries. Integrating this channel into your customer support strategies can help you capture brand mentions on social media, particularly the negative ones, as well as respond to these mentions accordingly. This lets your team get a feel of your customers’ social media activity and manage mass perception of your brand.

Live Chat

Live chat is ideal for customer inquiries that pertain to sales and service. It lets your agents respond to these inquiries in real time, and as customers browse through your site. It also lets your company take a proactive approach to customer support and engagement.

Email Response

Email management technology gives your agents the means to send auto response, as well as respond to customers’ emails quickly and efficiently. It’s a reliable channel that gives you alternative ways with which to address customer support issues.

Will Multichannel Customer Support Work for You?

The key to making multichannel customer support work for your business lies in providing customers with a seamless and joined-up experience despite the availability of several channels. They should also be able to switch between channels with ease and still get adequate and timely support.

When done right, it leads to improved customer experience, higher satisfaction levels and increased retention rates. It can also translate to a more positive perception of your brand.

Would your company benefit from mutichannel customer support? It depends largely on your business requirements and your resources, as well as the results you want to see as far as customer support in concerned. Sticking with just one or two channels should work just as well if this is sufficient to cover all of your customers’ needs.