Putting your customer in control and providing proactive notices can not only boost customer satisfaction and increase recommendations, it also can have a significant impact on the bottom-line by decreasing traffic to call centers.
A recent survey by Coleman Parkes found that 84% of people would recommend their service provider to family and friends if they received “relevant, proactive notifications” from their provider and had simple self-service apps on their mobile device.
A related poll, by Vason Bourne, found that customers also want personalized interaction with their mobile operators and that they seek communication at every touch-point.
It's no secret that a customer support request represents one of the greatest opportunities – and challenges – to telcos, says Andy Farquharson, VP of LogMeIn Asia Pacific. “How quickly it is solved can be a make-or-break moment for the customer to stay with the provider or leave.”
Telcos across the world now insist that the customer experience is at the core of everything they do.
Telstra CEO David Thodey said at the recent Mobile World Congress that Telstra has had a big focus on simplifying its business for its customers as well as to differentiate on customer service. “Our [all telcos'] reputation is not what it should be. Delivering good customer service – not lip service and not just cheap prices, but really differentiated service – is really important.”
After many years of talking about putting the customer at the center, it seems the talk is finally being put into action and paying some dividends.
Telecom Asia surveyed a handful of Asia mobile operators about the importance of the customer experience as a differentiator and the specific steps they are taking to monitor and improve customer support.
Francis Chang, DiGi’s head of customer management, says that with more telco players in the market and increasing customer demands, customers are spoilt for choice and finding it more difficult to make a decision.
“Enhancing customer experience will definitely become a clear differentiator moving forward in acquiring and retaining customers. I see greater focus by all players on this, as everyone realizes that enhancing customer experience has a positive effect on both revenue and cost, and thus has a direct correlation to the bottom-line.”