An omnichannel experience – consumers expect it and businesses admit they aren’t great at delivering it, so why aren’t they investing in improving it?
True omnichannel experience allows customers to move seamlessly across an organization’s service channels. For example, a customer could begin a transaction in an online chat session, but then transition to phone support midway through. In an omnichannel scenario, the phone agent would know what occurred during the chat session and, with Omnichannel Session Handling, can actually be the same agent that customer was chatting with.
This is perhaps the biggest incongruity we discovered when we analyzed survey results from over 900 contact center decision makers. The surveys were administered as part of NICEinContact’s latest research project, the 2019 NICE inContact Customer Experience (CX) Transformation Benchmark.
Sounds reasonable, and that’s probably why 91% of consumers in a related survey said they expect that from businesses. And the integration needs to go beyond agent-assisted channels to also include self-service. In fact, as adoption of digital self-service channels increases, the urgency to allow seamless movement across any and all channels increases.
According to survey results, however, businesses are a step behind in being able to offer what consumers expect. Only 24% of respondents rated their organization as excellent at delivering a seamless experience. This isn’t so surprising, as getting omnichannel right can be challenging. What is surprising is that only 25% of businesses report plans to invest in new services that would facilitate omnichannel delivery.
Time will tell if this investment approach (or lack thereof) is adjusted, as consumer demand for true digital-first omnichannel intensifies while leading brands continue to set the CX bar by providing it. Will more follow to better compete in the experience economy?
Adapted Source: NICE InContact
Author: Heather Hughes, NICE inContact
