Is stand-alone Social Engagement without the Contact Centre viable?

The more that we are caused to demonstrate the latest capabilities of Genesys to our existing clients and prospective ones the more it is becoming inherently obvious that Social Engagement is a hot-topic!  We are probably spending around 40% of our workshop time on the theme of “Socially Engaging with your customers in the Enterprise Contact Centre” in the Anana Briefing Centre. Given a typical briefing that focusses only on the Customer Experience across inbound voice, outbound voice, eMail, instant messaging in the call centre, web chat, web callback and Twitter and Facebook is around 4 to 6 hours in duration then spending a block of 2 hours alone on Social Media is a fair chunk! It is representative though of the focus and interest in it.

Not one of the many day long workshops we have done has ever had the client ask us “Is it possible to engage socially without a Contact Centre?” but it is exactly how they all arrive at Anana House! They have 2 or 3 people in the Marketing team doing the Social ‘stuff’!  I think the reason that they don’t ask this question of us directly is because they are seeing first-hand the inherent benefit of Social Engagement in the Contact Centre and it makes no sense to them to have a team in the Marketing Department attempting to engage socially on their own (which, let’s face it is how most of the industry thinks it should be done right now)! Maybe its just so obvious that they don’t ask the question! Maybe they realise it will be stupid to ask it! Many in the industry argue that this is the case.  Indeed, nearly all clients come to see us saying that they already have a mature social engagement policy and they have hired external consultants to help them build a social strategy. Come on folks, the ownership of a strategy like this is not true social engagement is it?  The industry is quick to offer social engagement as a web-desk mashup of Twitter, Facebook, et al and for some reason this is the focus of the media consultants today. I argue that to do so without the ability to cross channels and offer it within the realms of customer operations in very dangerous. Here’s why!

Our briefings typically take the form of a ‘customer journey’ – one in which we model the typical behaviour and expectations of our clients own customers. Say, for an airline, we assume the mind-set and approach of an airlines own customer, and then explore the range of scenario’s and situations that this customer will find themselves in throughout the course of a flight (if a casual flyer) or as a frequent flyer who routinely flies.  We do the same set of use-case models for various verticals be they in Banking, Financial Services, Retail, Transport, Government etc and have quite an armory of use-cases at hand.  By encouraging clients using the Briefing Centre to explore the capability of the Contact Centre solution from the view point of the Customer the focus of the briefing changes quickly. It moves quickly from ‘operational handcuffs and blinkered view based on what is done today’ to one of freeform exploration of “what could be done if we were not constrained by our expectation or current behaviour; or even policies and seemingly hard-coded rules of engagement’?

Given I have just argued that Social Engagement is a hot-topic, and having outlined how we help our clients to explore what can be done; what is the key thing that we’ve noticed in the briefings themselves?  That too is the crux of this post!

Let’s assume for any type of vertical that the customer is going to use whatever mechanism is at hand to potentially engaged with the Enterprise. For example;

• If considering buying a product or service, they may do a fair bit of snooping around the website. Could or should we proactively engage and challenge them to a dialogue if they do certain things? (co-browse, web-chat…etc)?
• If considering buying a product or service, they may ask their friends or social circle for guidance or feedback (Less than 15% of TV advertisements are trusted; but 80% of recommendations from friends are! – socialnomics source)
• If they are considering buying, but have questions, they may ask those questions directly as a result of a trigger; for example, a TV ad, in which case a phone call may be the initial engagement channel, or if a printed Ad, they may browse to a target web page, and then request a chat session
• They may have seen a campaign or offer on Facebook or on Twitter and want to follow up. Is pressing the LIKE button enough? What next?
• If they are in the middle of the buying process then they may want to speak to someone if the issue is urgent, or if less urgent they may elect to eMail an enquiry; now we are into the realm of customer operations and customer services
• If they are an active customer, with an ongoing query they are less likely to ask social circles for guidance or direction on what to do, but are more likely to go on your forum or other online resource portal for guidance; especially if a technical product
• If the customer is aged under 24 years of age (not stereotyping by the way!) then they are unlikely to physically call in any circumstance beyond a dire emergency; they are likely to SMS, and are just as likely to avoid eMail as they are a voice call
• If the customer is aged over 70 years of age then they are likely to write a lovely hand-written letter “to whom it may concern”
• If the customer is somewhere between 24 and 40 years old they may eMail or go online, and pick the telephone 3rd
• If the customer is somewhere between 40 and 70 years old they may prefer to Phone, but be somewhat comfortable with eMail but will be very unlikely to SMS

Which brings me to the topic at hand. If consumers have different patterns of expectation about the channel and media that they are likely to use, then its key that the modern contact centre is able to cater to them all.  Not for any other primary reason than the consumer base that the Enterprise supports is diverse and has a range of primary expectations.  It is not for this reason though that I argue social engagement could work in the operational Voice only call centre.  Why wouldn’t it work very well?  The key reason is that Social Engagement is as much about capturing what consumers are saying ABOUT you as much as it is a capture of a specific customer services or product request AT you.  As such, many engagements back out to the Customer are going to start on Twitter, or Facebook; but require quick channel change to another medium that lends itself to the dialogue more readily.  For example, I may go on Facebook and ask my FRIENDS would you buy a product from the ABC Company? [a notional company for arguments sake].  I may get 4 or 5 responses from FRIENDS on Facebook who are familiar with the product or service at hand.  If I say something similar to my FOLLOWERS in Twitter, then I may get as many responses back; but one of them now that the Enterprise is Socially Engaging in the Contact Centre, so they might say “Our product or service is excellent. This is what other customers have said about it….” with a shortened URL to a customer quotations or references page.  Should I as a consumer wish to respond to this challenge from the Enterprise Contact Centre, what would I do?  Would I say “Well thank you!” and perhaps check it out?  Perhaps! What if I wanted to move to the next stage?  Is it relevant, or appropriate that I would want to share this intent ‘socially’ with my friends and followers?  Perhaps not!  It is here where Marketing Department driven social engagement falls down.  It is able to offer “Air Cover” and PUBLISH; but is NOT geared to dealing with the resulting questions. It simply redirects potential customers to working hard to re-engage through another channel.

Not only that, but if we focus on Social Engagement in the Contact Centre as a Customer Services tool then you can be sure that within the first interactions within the conversation the Customer Services Representative needs to identify the customer specifically (Would the Marketing Department know this in any scenario?).  This may already be known to the Genesys Customer Interaction Management Platform system; [which I'll be writing about later in another article] or it may have to be derived through dialogue”.  In this case the CSR may ask “Can you please FOLLOW US and DM us with your Account Number?” – which returns the HIGH EFFORT paradigm back to the potential customer!  I therefore argue that it is important that Social Engagement be taken seriously as an element of a holistic eServices strategy across chat, eMail, SMS and Voice in such a way that the conversation in the form of interactions may take place over any channel, at any time, with a focus on retaining LOW EFFORT for the customer but of HIGH VALUE to them at the same time.  Suddenly, eServices has new relevance as a Cross-Channels Communication paradigm, driven by Social Engagement; of which Voice forms but an element.  Not the entire thing.  Cross Channel Communications is something I touted widely when I worked at Genesys back in the day; but now; I feel, for once, that I might actually understand it!

Therefore, a more logical customer journey is not one where the Enterprise Contact Centre dictates to the customer HOW they may contact them; but by facilitating an open and more deliberate but flexible approach of “You may choose to contact us in any form that suits you” we achieve several key aims;

1. We maintain the dialogue, as in interaction which forms PART of the conversation
2. It doesn’t matter who starts the dialogue; the customer or the enterprise
3. We are ready to cross channels with our communications with ease at any time
4. We reduce the perceived effort that the end user faces about being forced to use channels that they don’t like or prefer (try asking someone under 24 years of age to phone you or write to you and see what response you get!)
5. We no longer have to strive for “First Interaction Resolution” [First Call Resolution in Voice days!]
6. We strive for service excellence and incredible user experience irrespective the media that they choose to use at any given moment in time or situation

Anyway, I’ve realised in this post that I’ve actually crossed several very hot themes and lines of reasoning.  All of these and more will obviously be discussed in future updates to the Blog.