Nagendra Kumar

Today, we are on the brink of a major transition in customer care. The way in which customers prefer to interact with companies is changing substantially, and businesses of all sizes are challenged with providing customer care in the manner in which customers wish to be served. This provision goes beyond the traditional “multichannel contact center” and into the realm of Customer Collaboration.

Also read: Ban on pesky calls, bulk SMS postponed indefinetly

Customer Collaboration combines traditional contact center technology and processes with important additions in critical areas to enable business organizations build deeper relationships with their customers, strengthen loyalty and generate additional revenue. It empowers organizations to move from the largely reactive mode of traditional call centers and embrace a much more proactive engagement model with customers. Simply put, Customer Collaboration creates customer intimacy and delivers business value.

Customer Collaboration solutions can incorporate social media customer care, network-based multimedia capture and recording, new agent desktop paradigms, and focused video solutions.

Also read: Retail banks continue to resist social media

The social web
The explosion of the social web—Twitter, Facebook, YouTube— has empowered people to engage in an increasing number of online conversations and interactions where consumers  talk about the companies with which they do business. Sometimes they say good things, and sometimes they complain. Organizations can incorporate the ability to capture, analyze, and prioritize customer conversations originating in the social web and assign the most relevant interactions into the workflow of customer care representatives. This brings order to chaotic conversations and helps businesses respond in an organized and measureable way. With a sensible migration path, businesses that embark upon social media customer service reap significant benefits and move steadily to higher levels.

Based on how they respond to social media conversations, companies may be divided into:

Level 1 companies: Silent when it comes to social media. They only listen.

Level 2 companies: Use social media to put out the same messages they communicate on advertising channels. Customers who try to reach out to these companies on social media are ignored.

Also read: A buzz in the social media cup