Webcare: a great opportunity for personal contact

Webcare is a nice word to describe responding to questions, complaints or compliments that you receive through various online channels. And of course you want to be right where your target group is. Research from Microsoft shows that 66% of consumers have at least three different communication channels available for engaging with customer service. But does this mean that you have to be present on each and every one?  No! A well-thought-out channel strategy can help get your customer right to his or her preferred channel.

Customer expectations are continually increasing. They expect a very good answer, and quickly. Add to this the fact that technology and automation are also changing. Statista states that 18% of consumers expect an immediate answer to questions they ask via a social media channel. 28%  expect a response within an hour.

But personal contact and service are also important indicators for consumers. No less than 72% of the consumers expect that when they contact the service department, an employee will know who they are, the purchases they’ve made and that any previous contact has been saved. Walker research shows that by the end of 2020, 88% of consumers will expect to experience personalised service.

So take advantage of this! By approaching a customer in an empathetic, personal way you can build a strong bond, and the customer will feel heard. It’s also a great way to get to know your customers well and can improve your service at the same time, thanks to the valuable feedback (which can be either positive or negative) that you receive.

Online customer service in a high-demand world

With recent advancements in digital communication technologies, such as customer relationship management (CRM), online customer service has changed dramatically. Social media interactions between customers and organisations are taking customer engagement to a whole new level. Customer expectations are definitely changing, driven by millennials who place much higher demands on customer service. 

As an online customer service, how can you respond to these new technologies, and at the same time navigate a complex customer-oriented market? Well-organised customer service can certainly make a big difference! One that starts with providing the necessary insights into the types of questions you’re getting from your customers.

Make customer questions even more transparent

What types of questions are your customers asking? How long do your employees spend answering certain questions? These are important issues that customer service managers deal with on a daily basis. In order to answer these questions, and more, we at OBI4wan have expanded the webcare statistics functionality in OBI Engage. These new statistics can be used by customer service managers to gain further insight into customer communication.

Product Owner Jordi Krom explains the benefits for our customers — and our customers’ customers:

“Our customers get huge amounts of messages daily. In order to gain even more insight into what types of questions our customers’ customers ask, we’ve expanded the statistics functionality in the webcare environment. This gives service managers more insight into the work being done by the webcare team, and helps them aim for an even better effortless service. ”

With these insights you can streamline customer questions more effectively, which allows you to set up your service teams accordingly. You may find out what the most frequently asked questions are, so you can, for example, already put certain information on the website beforehand, or you may find that a particular employee needs extra guidance. In any case, the ultimate result: satisfied customers!