Several agents sit in a customer service centre
7.6.2023

Being even closer to customers with self-service apps

It cannot be stressed often enough how important it is to gather customer feedback. Customer feedback and general personal contact with customers is instrumental in providing excellent customer service. The use of self-service apps, with which customers can easily help themselves with technical problems, does not necessarily mean that contact with customers is completely cut off. Quite the opposite. In this article, we take a closer look at how the use of self-service apps in customer service creates new contact channels and makes personal contact with customers even more excellent!

Telecommunications and insurance companies as well as financial institutions are among the industries most frequently contacted. These companies are therefore faced with the challenge of being able to deal with all customer concerns as quickly as possible and at the same time also being able to resolve them with complete satisfaction.

Interpersonal communication and feedback often fall by the wayside due to time constraints. Around 87% of all consumers feel that the quality of customer service is a decisive factor in their purchasing decisions (source: Kundenservice des Jahres - New Customer Service Study) and more than 90% of consumers say that the quality of customer support influences the overall brand image.

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Intelligent self-service solutions are modern communication channels

The creation of new digital contact options becomes particularly important when technical problems become increasingly complex and concerns need to be resolved as quickly as possible. Companies are therefore increasingly relying on self-service solutions. Through them, companies have the possibility to communicate with their customers in real-time, in addition to functions such as independent problem analysis, viewing data, contracts and invoices, and more.

It doesn't matter whether you play out targeted promotions via the app or ask customers for an opinion - in all cases, a mobile app will engage your customers and make them engage with your business.

Use newly gained time capacities for closer customer contact

At the same time, self-service apps can relieve customer service staff of a lot of work due to the independent technical problem analysis and troubleshooting. Your staff can dedicate the new capacities they have gained to providing even better, personalised customer service.

Be even closer to your customers and get feedback

Use your self-service app for your customer service not only to fix technical problems. Because you can also pay more attention to your customers after the problem has been successfully analysed and solved. After a certain time, make sure that the problem has not reoccurred.

In addition, get an overview of the current situation in the customer's home network, offer them even better offers and services, possibly react to past incidents and get important customer feedback, for example via surveys or a placed feedback form. This will provide you with detailed information about any potential for improvement in your customer service. Your customers may want to tell you something, for example a rating, a suggestion or possibly even a complaint - use a central contact channel and become even better at what you already offer your customers!

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Conclusion

Seamlessly integrated, user-friendly contact channels such as self-service apps ensure a high level of customer satisfaction (customer experience), and the very good employee experience should not be overlooked either. The relief of the service hotline and the newly gained free time capacities promote outstanding communication and create opportunities for customer communication to revolve much less around dealing with technical problems and much more personal topics such as customer feedback, contract updates, bonuses, gifts and much more.

Focusing on the use and further development of digital communication channels and at the same time ensuring even better quality in customer service is indispensable today. The use of a One App strategy is the key to successful customer retention.

Cynthia Loos