RedefiningCustomer Experiencein the Digital Age

Engaging Customersin the Digital Era

The proliferation of digital devices – and accompanying rise in customer expectations for always-on services – are factors driving much of this shift, transforming the business models of organizations and contact centers globally.

The new purchasing journey places customer demands firmly ahead of a company’s business needs. Every interaction customers have with a company contributes to their overall impression and engagement with the business, defining their entire experience with the brand. In fact, across multiple regions and sectors, more than 80% of consumers agreed that their choice of providers depends upon customer experi-ence2.

With greater exposure to mobile and social media technologies, consum-ers are now more informed, empow-ered, and discerning than ever. Customers can access, create, and share information anytime, anywhere, enabling them to dictate the terms of their interaction and experiential journey with brands. Technology is fundamental to this shift where personalization, instant gratifica-tion, and proactive services are the top three priorities cited by custom-ers, irrespective of sector.

From awareness and purchase to retention and advocacy, a customer now engages with an organization through multiple channels in a non-linear manner. Nearly 60% of customers surveyed in a Frost & Sullivan study revealed that they regularly change how they contact an organization; 84% use the web as the primary mode of interaction, while 35% use more than four channels to communicate with businesses.

The growing number of touchpoints — social media, mobile apps, email, web self-service — requires businesses to accurately respond to customer needs faster than ever before. While multichannel solutions offer customers greater choice, companies still struggle to synergize the customer buying process. The challenge lies in integrat-ing multiple touchpoints within a single interaction for more personalized, context-driven customer services.

Artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning, cloud, and big data analyt-ics are improving operational efficien-cy and represent the next phase of growth, further accelerating the customer experience (CX)-driven impact.

Table of Contents

1End User Priorities for Customer Engagement, Frost & Sullivan, Global, 20172Frost & Sullivan IoT-Enabled Customer Experience Survey, 20162 3

Creating a sustainable competitive advantage amid intensifying competition and the threat of digital disruption are among the biggest challenges facing organizations today.

Nearly 60% of customers surveyed in a Frost &

Sullivan1 study revealed that they regularly change

how they contact an organization; 84% use the

web as the primary mode of interaction, while 35% use more than four channels to

communicate with businesses.

Engaging Customers in the Digital Era

Voice as a CX Imperative

The Last Word

3

10

14

5

6

8

1. Evolution Toward Omnichannel

2. AI and Analytics: Enablers not Disruptors

3. Striking a Balance in Outsourcing

Evolution Toward Omnichannel01

Today’s hyper-connected customers demand a consistent experience across multiple channels, making omnichannel a strategic imperative. Many businesses support multichan-nel customer interaction points (e.g., live chat, email, social media, video, and web self-service). In 2017, digital channels accounted for 50% of customer service interactions, and are expected to surge in the near term, likely driven by the high digital channel usage among Millennials at 53% and Generation Z at 67%3.

A vast majority of companies have yet to integrate multiple communica-tion channels with the customer journey. Often, companies start off with a voice channel, adding on other touchpoints in a detached, piecemeal manner. These efforts lack an overarching customer engage-ment strategy to ensure a seamless experience across multichannels, resulting in lower customer satisfac-tion scores and, potentially, custom-er attrition.

When customers transition from one channel to the next, their history and context do not move with them.

In fact, customers cited having to repeat information multiple times, inadequate and inconsistent data, system outage/failure, and lack of consistent support in channels of communication as the top five operational issues affecting CX ratings of contact centers4.

To date, only 46% of contact centers surveyed stated that they have fully integrated their interaction chan-nels, with the figure likely to reach 60% in the next two years, register-ing a 30% growth5.

The trend toward a fully integrated omnichannel experience is likely to encourage enterprises to reevaluate their outsourcing contracts, challenging contact center providers to deliver unified customer engage-ment and customer experience. Such transformation could drive contact centers to become more flexible, agile, and responsive.

3Teleperformance Customer Experience Lab (CX Lab) Survey, Global, 20174Operational Customer Experience Issues in the Contact Center, Frost & Sullivan, Global, 20165End User Priorities for Customer Engagement, Frost & Sullivan, Global, 2017

4

Voice remains an integral component of customer engagement, particularly for more complex interactions that require human assistance.

46%

43%

9%2%

60%

35%

5%

Integration of Contact Center Channels forOmnichannel Customer Experience, 2017 & 2019F

Source: End User Priorities for Customer Engagement, Frost & Sullivan, Global, 2017

Don’t know

Not at all integrated

Partially integrated

Mostly integrated

Fully integratedCurrent, 2017 Future, 2019

In 2017, digital channels accounted for 50% of

customer service interactions, and are

expected to surge in the near term, likely driven by the high digital channel usage among

Millennials at 53% and Generation Z at 67%.

5

Without question, the convenience and prompt response rate of self-service interactions are more appealing to customers. However, recent studies suggest that digital interactions alone are not enough to boost CX. Voice remains an integral component of customer engage-ment, particularly for more complex interactions that require human assistance.

Achieving superior customer expe-riences rely heavily on an organiza-tion’s ability to offer customers live service support in near real-time seamlessly alongside other chan-nels of their choice. The next phase of the omnichannel evolution will involve greater integration of human interaction and digital chan-nels as more organizations realize the business rewards of customer experience.

The following trends are set to dominate CX in the digital era.

7

Priorities for Customer Engagement: Current & Future Plans for Interaction Channel Support

AI and Analytics: Enablers, not Disruptors02

In just over a decade, the contact center has rapidly evolved from merely offering customers a toll-free number to call for support, to becoming an important customer engagement hub. Technology is taking CX to the next level by integrating AI, machine learning, and advanced voice analytics tools for faster resolution of customer issues and to provide personalized services.

The proliferation of smartphones and other portable devices, primarily driven by consumer preference for digital-first engagement, is redefin-ing the way businesses engage with their customers. Hyper-connected consumers today prefer self-service options before contacting a business because they want a rapid response and near real-time resolution. For brands, this involves evolving from “choose from this information” to providing accurate, context-driven answers with one click.

Contact centers are increasingly deploying AI-enabled technologies to manage repetitive, low-skilled tasks. This initiative is to boost the efficiency and productivity of agents while supporting them in gaining a better under-standing of customer behavior and how best to resolve an issue. Intelligent Virtual Assistants (IVAs) and chatbots are humanizing web self-service by responding to customer questions and anticipating their needs (i.e., based on user preferences, context, available services). IVAs serve to filter the inbound communication, by automating responses to simpler requests while routing the more complex ones to a live agent, passing the content and context along with the customer and improv-ing their performance. Emotionally intelligent bots (EmoBots) can potentially understand a customer’s emotional state in real-time and deliver appropriate support — all while maintaining the context of conversations.

In the End User Priorities for Customer Engagement survey6, organizations chose virtual assistant voice (47%) and virtual assistant web chat (44%) as two of the top three applications targeted for the largest investment in the next two years.

The same survey also revealed that 23% of respondents have replaced over 20% of customer service repre-sentatives with AI-powered robots. This trend is likely to continue over the next two years, with participants indicating plans to replace another 34% of agents with automated solutions.

Contact centers are leveraging analytics capabilities from basic metrics, such as first-call resolution and average handle time, to interac-tion analytics that show not only customer history, but also follow the customer journey leading to a more holistic view of the engagement. Sophisticated speech and text analytics also enable organizations and contact centers to determine customer behavioral patterns, prospects, and preferences.

As contact centers move toward greater automation, it is necessary for enterprises to evaluate the effec-tiveness of their customer interac-tions and AI-based solutions. The quality of communication remains critical, underscoring the impor-tance of voice interaction.

After all, the best responses are pointless if they cannot be under-stood or heard. Enterprises consid-ering AI technologies for their contact center first need to ensure they proactively manage voice quali-ty.

Against this backdrop, the intelligentheadset is going to become pivotal for superior customer interactions. Plantronics is now able to gather customer service insights at the communication endpoint, i.e., the headset.

Its cloud-based Plantronics Manager Pro software solution allows contact center managers to capture data relating to voice interactions and headset usage patterns. The offering includes software-as-a-service solutions for insight-driven analytics on call summary data, call duration, noise exposure, and the ratio of agent to customer speech. This new Plantronics technology enables contact centers to remotely track device deployments, configurations, and push-out updates, providing greater IT visibility and cost savings.

6 End User Priorities for Customer Engagement, Frost & Sullivan, Global, 20176

Source: End User Priorities for Customer Engagement, Frost & Sullivan, Global, 2017

7

Web

Virtual Assistant Voice

Virtual Assistant Text Chat

Video Kiosks

Video

Social Media

Proactive Outbound

Mobile Customer Care

Messaging Bot (e.g., Facebook, WeChat)

Live Agent Voice

Internet of Things (IoT)

Interactive Voice Response (IVR)

Email

Chatbot (Interactive Text Response)

Chat

Support today Plan to support over the next two years No plans to support over the next two years

84.4% 13.7% 1.9%

46.0% 46.5% 7.5%

48.8% 44.3% 6.8%

38.2% 49.3% 12.5%

56.6% 36.6% 6.8%

79.5% 17.5% 3.1%

57.3% 36.1% 6.6%

72.4% 24.3% 3.3%

68.6% 24.8% 6.6%

71.7% 24.5% 3.8%

59.7% 33.0% 7.3%

54.5% 39.2% 6.4%

88.2% 10.8% 0.9%

53.1% 40.6% 6.4%

82.8% 15.6% 1.7%

31.0%

30.7%

30.1%

26.7%

26.1%

25.5%

25.5%

24.8%

19.0%

17.8%

16.9%

13.2%

A recent global survey of key decision-makers from organizations looking to outsource pointed out performance-based pricing, value-add technology solutions, and functional expertise as the top three factors influencing their decision in choosing outsourcing partners8.

8

Voice-based services remain at the forefront of the contact center indus-try. Nearly 56% of respondents cited voice as their primary interaction channel9. One reason for its contin-ued popularity is that people still prefer human interaction to resolve complex issues as self-service appli-cations increasingly address simpler, routine tasks.

By leveraging new technologies, the contact center outsourcing market is moving toward a more intelligent combination of agent-assisted voice and automated services.

Top Three Factors Influencing Respondents’ Decision inSelecting a Contact Center Outsourcing Provider

8End User Priorities for Customer Engagement, Frost & Sullivan, Global, 20179Teleperformance Customer Experience Lab (CX Lab) Survey, Global, 2017

7Represents outsourcer revenues from multiple fulfillment models (onshore, nearshore, offshore, home-agent, automated and technology-enabled fulfillment) 9

Striking a Balance in Outsourcing 03

Customer experience is a significant brand differentiator for organiza-tions globally, with many increasing-ly outsourcing these services. Market dynamics are changing quickly. Forward-looking organiza-tions consider outsourcing as a competitive strategy to increase efficiency, accelerate innovation, and reduce business risks.

The focus on CX is driving an increase in the recruitment of a skilled talent pool in the region and technology deployment in the customer care delivery model.

Contact center outsourcing providers are deploying omnichannel models that leverage automation and advanced analytics. These models offer customers a consistent experi-ence within and between all channels, and gain a single view of the customers based on their purchasing behavior and preferences.

Contact center outsourcers, in particular, should not ignore the value of human interaction in integrating customer needs with new technologies as leverage for a positive omnichannel experience. They need to ensure clear, prompt communication to enhance the customer experience.

In the past three decades, growth in the contact center outsourcing market has been at varying states of adoption and maturity. Frost & Sullivan expects Asia-Pacific to register the highest growth (CAGR of 6.7%), followed by North America (CAGR of 4.4%).

To meet customer demands for morepersonalized services, organizationsare also shifting focus from cost-driven offshore models to engaging onshore outsourcing providers to be closer to their clients, respond quickly to their demands, and reduce operational risks.

Frost & Sullivan expects Asia-Pacific to register the highest growth (CAGR of 6.7%), followed by North America (CAGR of 4.4%).

Contact Center Outsourcing Market Revenue7 by Region US$ billion, 2015–2019F

26.0

17.1

24.127.1

17.6

25.728.2

18.2

27.529.5

18.8

29.330.8

19.4

31.2

Source: Frost & Sullivan

2015 2016 2017F 2018F 2019F

NA

EMEA

APAC

Performance-based Pricing

Value-added Technology Solutions

Functional Expertise

Industry Vertical Expertise

Multichannel Customer Experience

Security Certifications and Capabilities

Language Skills

Lowest-cost Provider

Nearshore Footprint/Capabilities

Domestic Footprint/Capabilities

Track Record of MeetingSLAs and KPIs

Offshore Footprint/Capabilities

56%

38%

15%

11%

9%

7%

7%

6%

4%

2%

2%

10Teleperformance Customer Experience Lab (CX Lab) Survey, Global, 201710 11End User Priorities for Customer Engagement, Frost & Sullivan, Global, 2017 11

Voice as a CX Imperative

Nearly 70% of global contact centers have

reported an increase in the number of voice calls

over the past 12 months, with more than 56%

experiencing a rise in average talk time. This trend underscores the

importance of voice interactions in

strengthening CX.

A connected customer journey frequently spans multiple channels – including the Internet, web chat, social media, and phone. Despite the availability of various channels, a customer’s connected journey often ends up on the phone with live agents to handle more complex queries or conduct troubleshooting.

Usage of Channels in the Past 12 months to Contact Customer Services10

Voice

Email/Web Form

Chat with Live Agent

Mobile App

Social Media

Click-to-call

SMS

Instant Messaging

Automated Chat

Face-to-face

Video Kiosk/Video Teller/Video Chat

58%58%58%

55%42%

36%40%

38%38%38%

14%11%

14%17%

12%

4%5%

4%4%

4%3%

11%14%

12%

7%

6%10%

7%

4%5%

2%3%

2%

2%

2%1%

4%3%

2%

2%3%

1%0%

4%

4%5%

2%

7%9%9%

6%9%

6%

12%11%

Traditionalist

Baby Boomers

Generation X

Millennials

Generation Z

The complexity and volume of contact center interactions are likely to escalate over the next two years. About 85% of contact centers today foresee interactions becoming more complex, in part, due to the sheer volume of user-generated content and the rising need for customiza-tion. The high level of personaliza-tion is necessary due to the more challenging demands of empowered customers. Over two-thirds of customers expect first-call resolu-tion for their issues, which is more likely to occur through more person-alized interactions.

Being on the frontline of customer services, highly-skilled customer service representatives (CSRs) play a pivotal role in strengthening brand loyalty. Most contact centers realize the need to recruit new agents or train existing ones and leverage analytics to understand customer likes/dislikes, preferences, and buying behavior to offer a more personalized experience.

Agents need to be adept at handling both voice and non-voice channels to gain customer trust and long-term loyalty – essential for high customer retention. In fact, recent studies show that more than half of the contact center executives emphasize having technical and problem-solv-ing skills as necessary to resolving customer issues in the next five years.

CSRs today typically interact with customers across six different chan-nels simultaneously – Facebook, Twitter, chat, email, text message, and voice. For issue resolution, customers surveyed across multiple regions and sectors chose speaking to a live agent via phone as the most efficient means followed by a visit to the stores even if they can access digital channels such as chat, messaging, and social media.

Number of Voice Calls Handled, Global, 2017

Average Talk Time (including holds)11 (minutes)

78.1

20.01.9

69.2

28.22.6

67.8

27.15.1

65.7

28.06.3

APAC Europe LatinAmerica

US

73.3

21.05.7

51.3

43.65.1

49.2

28.8

22.0

53.8

39.27.0

APAC Europe LatinAmerica

US

Decreased

Stayed about the same

Increased

12The State of Communications and Collaboration in the Enterprise:How Companies are Embracing Digital Transformation – An End-user Perspective,Frost & Sullivan, Global, Aug 2016

12 13Operational Customer Experience Issues in the Contact Centre, Frost & Sullivan, Global, 2016 13

The number of organizations using softphones is expected to grow by 20%, while those using business-grade softphones are likely to double in three years.

Contact centers are replacing traditional phones with softphones, reducing hardware expenses and improving call quality as (POTS) plain old telephone service lines transition toward (VOIP) Voice over Internet Protocol systems. Today, contact center applications integrate multiple non-voice channels and softphone systems effectively on a unified agent desktop, enabling agents to work smarter.

Headsets with active noise cancella-tion technology minimize back-ground noises, blocking out distrac-tions from noisy open office environ-ments and meeting the needs of mobile workers handling calls on the go. Superior audio quality is paramount in voice interactions utilizing voice or video to optimize the duration of the customer interac-tion. Clear audio is also essential for call center agents to minimize the risk of data entry mistakes when speaking to a customer.

Sales transactions and support calls rely heavily on the ability of CSRs to communicate and understand verbal nuances. The quality of communica-tion devices can impact the concen-tration and productivity of CSRs, enable them to automate more straightforward requests easily, offer greater computer-telephony integra-tion, and provide an intuitive system that monitors their performance, thus improving CX.

Contact centers can measure and understand their customers' journey and experience using metrics such as the customer satisfaction score (CSAT) survey, net promoter score (NPS), first-call resolution, and average handle time.

The main reason customers choose the phone for more complicated issues is that they expect thorough and customized answers to their queries. By leveraging contextual information, agents gain customer insights to personalize the interac-tions, improving their productivity and customer satisfaction.

Agents spend an average of 35.8 minutes per hour talking with customers on the phone. Contact center operators need to ensure superior sound quality that mimics face-to-face conversations to provide seamless CX. Ambient noise, dropped calls, and prolonged call waiting response times are key factors adversely impacting the quality of voice interactions at contact centers.

More customer calls are also coming from mobile devices and noisier environments, making it harder for the caller and CSR to hear clearly. There is a need for professional headsets that provide integration with several devices and applica-tions, as well as extend contextual intelligence capabilities to enhance communications between the customer and the agent.

In pursuit of cost-saving and productivity benefits, organizations of all sizes are adopting softphones and UC clients for their communica-tion and collaboration needs as these can be used on any network and device. A Frost & Sullivan survey12 of global IT decision-mak-ers revealed that half of the respon-dents had deployed consumer or business-grade softphones in their organizations.

As the most sought-after communication mode, voice is deemed to have the fastest response rate, accurate and quality information, and ease of interaction.

Customer Interaction Channels & Associated Satisfaction Levels13

Source: End User Priorities for Customer Engagement, Frost & Sullivan, Global, 2017

SocialMedia

Web Chat WebSelf-Service

MobileApplications

Email LiveAgent-Voice

Interaction Channel Supported Level of Channel Satisfaction

42.134.9

30.1

52.6

86.1

26.3

54.157.4 58.4

67.979.9

54.1

The Last Word

Rethink service delivery to develop a holistic digital transformation strategy

Address the demands of empowered, well-informed customers who expect to do business with companies on their terms

Develop an adaptive, scalable, and intelligent infrastructure that allows agents to optimize customer interactions across all channels

Equip agents with the right tools, training, and technology to personalize services and strengthen customer loyalty

Take advantage of softphone systems integrated with other non-voice channels in a single-user interface for agents

Integrate processes, systems, and people, using predictive analytics and journey management to positively impact customer and agent experience

Emphasize the importance of voice as the optimal channel for more complex customer interactions. Investment in high-quality communication devices is essential to enhancing agent-customer interaction, and the customer experience.

Digital transformation is becoming a strategic imperative to creating new business models, transforming customer-brand relationships, and streamlining processes. New technology tools can harness action-able insights enabling organizations to gain a deeper understanding and anticipate customer behaviors and needs. This information allows organizations to personalize interac-tions, creating an experience that is unique to each customer.

Contact centers, in particular, should not ignore the value of human interac-tion in integrating customer needs with new technologies to their competitive advantage. Given the ever-increasing communication options and customer expectations, the evolution of CX will involve greater integration of human interaction and digital channels for a more personalized customer journey.

Organizations embracing the digital opportunity to optimize customer interactions have a considerable potential to successfully transform their brands, retaining existing customers and attracting new ones. Conversely, those that fail to deliver risk losing customers and market share to the competition.

Customers need to be at the center of this transformation, with businesses striving to meet, even exceed, their expectations and investing in develop-ing highly-skilled and knowledgeable agents and digital tools to enhance every customer interaction.

Best practices to consider in delivering a superior customer experience:

1

2

3

5

6

4

7

14 15

Auckland

Bahrain

Bangkok

Beijing

Bengaluru

Bogota

Buenos Aires

Cape Town

Chennai

Colombo

Detroit

Dubai

Frankfurt

Iskandar, Johor Bahru

Istanbul

Jakarta

Kolkata

Kuala Lumpur

London

Manhattan

Mexico City

Miami

Milan

Mumbai

Moscow

New Delhi

Oxford

Paris

Pune

Rockville Centre

San Antonio

Sao Paulo

Seoul

Shanghai

Shenzhen

Silicon Valley

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