In today’s customer-centric world, customer experience has become a top business priority. In 2016, Gartner predicts almost 90% of companies will compete primarily on the quality of the customer experience. This is a huge increase from 2014 (36%) and 2015 (58%).

With customer expectations constantly on the rise, companies are looking to differentiate themselves from the competition and reduce customer churn. With shrinking budgets and increased support channels to staff, this is no easy task.

Given these barriers, companies need a more efficient way of working. The solution lies in building a better support desk to enable customer agents to do more with less, without sacrificing support quality or customer satisfaction, says Peter Zeinoun of LogMeIn Rescue.

Here are five key tips to delivering a better customer experience:

1. Use the right tool for the job.

The best service desks equip customer agents with the technology to maximise efficiencies while optimising customer satisfaction. Using the right tool for the job improves the customer experience. For example, phone support on its own can be very time consuming and error-prone to get end users to accurately describe what’s wrong with their product. But add in a remote diagnostics or video element and the whole experience is enhanced – troubleshooting is far easier when the agent can view the customer’s device. And with the right support solution, the service desk will be able to automate fixes to routine issues, eliminating the need to reinvent the wheel each time a repeat problem crops up.

2. Keep everything in one place.

Jumping between platforms to gather information to solve a customer support issue is counter-productive and frustrating to agents and end users alike. All the information agents need to support their customers should be at their fingertips. Customer service platforms should be able to integrate with both on-premise and SaaS-based service desk software (e.g. ticketing systems), as well as CRM systems.

3. Keep all lines of communication open.

Today’s digital native expects to interact with organisations in many different ways. They expect that communications through one channel will be automatically leveraged through others. If a customer initially needs support via an online chat, they may receive more detailed information by email. The support desk must offer multiple channels that include not only traditional phone and email contact, but web-based chat, web links, SMS, and social media as well.

4. Don’t let processes stop a ‘wow’ experience.

More than ever, the lines between where support services start and end are fuzzy. With device, software, app, and content proliferation, customers may not understand who to contact to resolve their issues. They shouldn’t have to care whose responsibility it is, just that their issue gets resolved adequately. Consider supporting a non-core device or platform or engaging third-party support resource from a partner to help give the customer that holistic experience. Service desk technology can help facilitate these types of engagements that result in a ‘wow’ experience, and ultimately lead to greater satisfaction and loyalty.

5. Adopt a ‘support-free’ support solution.

The future for customer support is SaaS – software as a service. With a SaaS-based solution, organisations no longer have to spend time and money on managing, upgrading and supporting an application or the on-premise equipment it runs on. There’s no hardware or software to buy and maintain and no software patches. And there’s built-in redundancy and on-demand scalability to boot. When the customer support solution is SaaS, organisations no longer need to ‘support the support tool’ – meaning huge efficiency and productivity gains for the organisation and importantly a more engaged and loyal customer.

The author of this blog is Peter Zeinoun, director of products, LogMeIn Rescue.

About the author:

Peter Zeinoun is the director of products for LogMeIn Rescue, part of LogMeIn’s Customer Engagement Cloud. He is responsible for shaping the vision, product strategy, and overall direction of the Rescue brand, which focuses on providing technicians with an elegant, reliable, cloud-based application for delivering world-class customer service and remote support.

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