How to let your customers be in control
In my previous article about the importance of focusing on customer outcomes to build a killer service strategy, I talked about an issue I faced with a TV provider. After making a last failed attempt and six months after trying to get the issue resolved, I finally gave up. With no sense of control, I have transitioned from a state of helplessness to exhaustion. Given a chance I wouldn’t hesitate to switch from the TV provider and take my control back.
Why do customers like control?
“It’s due to the chemical activity in their brain” according to certain scientific studies. Some scientific studies have proven that it is our psychological and biological necessity to exert control over the environment and produce desired outcomes. When we make choices to experience control, it engages certain parts of our brain associated with positive emotion processing and regulation. Basically, humans like to be in control. A Wharton study also talks about why customers engage more with a ‘helper’ brand that helps them while allowing them to be in control, as opposed to a ‘hero’ brand that tries to do everything, rendering less control. Most businesses follow the ‘hero’ approach in their customer service strategy, and fail miserably in achieving the outcomes and experience their customers want.
Here are four ways you can put your customers in the driver’s seat, while you navigate:
Control tip 1: Let them apply the first gear
How: Invest in a good knowledge base
Most customers prefer to solve their issue themselves rather than deal with customer service. In fact, a consumer survey found that 39% of people would rather clean a toilet than contact customer service via a phone IVR menu. Customers quickly get frustrated when they have to stay on the phone for simple queries that they should be able to resolve on their own. A well-structured knowledge base should help them take a first shot at their problems. An upfront investment in designing a good knowledge base may seem high initially, but will continue to drive ROI benefits for a long time.
Quick tips to create a strong knowledge base:
- Make your content effective: If a video or picture can do the job of explaining an answer properly, do not force customers to read long scripts of text.
- Link it with your Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) strategy: Think like your customers. Would you first search for your answers on Google/Bing, or go directly to a company’s website?
- Measure and manage: Evaluate the performance and effectiveness of your knowledge base by analysing your customer’s search patterns, feedback, and query deflection rate. Use these metrics to drive continuous improvement.
- Make it easily searchable: Use smart search to help users navigate easily. You can also use a Natural Language Processing (NLP)-based chatbot, which is useful with a large knowledge base. However, always let your customers be in control. If the bot struggles to answer, you should give them a choice to talk to a human agent.
Control tip 2: Get them from A to B quickly
How: Use decision matrix chatbots
Outcomes can be predictable or unpredictable in nature. For instance, if a customer wants to reschedule a delivery, the outcome is well defined and predictable i.e. delivery is rescheduled. But if a customer claims a refund based on a product defect, it is unpredictable, because one wouldn’t know if they will be eligible for it or not.
The journeys to reach predictable outcomes are generally limited and well defined. This is where you should give maximum control to customers and let them accelerate to their outcome. For instance, customers can easily achieve a predictable outcome like ‘reschedule delivery’, using a decision matrix chatbot that can retrieve available delivery slots from an order management system via APIs, and subsequently update it with a new one. As I discuss in my chatbot webinar, this not only eliminates the non-value-added activity performed by the agent, but also enables a quicker resolution for customers. A recent survey says that 54% of people would always choose a chatbot over a human if it saved them 10 minutes. It also highlights various tasks that customers are comfortable doing without human assistance. All these have predictable outcomes!
Quick tip: Remember to take back control and transfer the chat automatically to a human agent when the outcomes are unpredictable and situations are complex.
Control tip 3: Do not force them to stay in queues
How: Switch from chat to messaging platforms
Most of the legacy chat software were built after being inspired by traditional phone systems in which customers were placed in a queue before they got a turn to talk to someone. Because of this, when customers want to chat, they are first queued up to join a chat session and are forced to wait for their turn. By the time an agent gets free to take the next call, the frustrated customer leaves. To chat again, they need to re-join the queue from start!
Customers don’t like to queue up and wait. Instead, they like to multitask. They don’t queue up to have a conversation with their friends on WhatsApp. Then why should they be expected them to behave differently with your service teams? Modern messaging platforms ensures a continuous stream of messages between the customer and agent, thus eliminating the need for a chat session. This allows greater flexibility for both customer and agent to engage at their own pace. It also enables more control for your customers, as they can multitask in between, switch devices, and converse at a time that suits them more.
Control tip 4: Set expectations for a realistic estimated time of arrival (ETA)
How: Manage and communicate your service-level agreements (SLAs)
When it comes to setting expectations, businesses either play safe by setting no expectations or try too hard to delight their customers by setting false expectations. Both approaches are disastrous and should be avoided. A customer appreciates nothing more than an open and clear communication. You should look to proactively manage and communicate your SLAs, which could vary by type of customers and their preferred channel. It is okay to miss your SLA, but it’s not okay if you do not communicate the revised expectations. By proactively reaching out to your customers before they contact your teams, you not only deflect such support tickets but also let your customers stay informed and in control.
There has been a paradigm shift in how customers think and behave. They now want to be smarter, quicker, flexible, and informed. They connect better with brands that offer the same values in their customer service. Nothing delights them more than you letting them take control and achieve their desired outcomes. After all, our brains are biologically motivated to take control!
