Competition in retail has never been harder – and the pace of change is ever accelerating. Just as traditional bricks and mortar shops have evolved to have a web presence, they are now faced with the challenge of integrating other new channels, such as social commerce and mobile into their strategies.While social commerce is still in its infancy, customers are increasingly looking to interac...
Whatever sector you are in successfully managing customer service across multiple channels is a key differentiator in today’s competitive business environment. Customers want the ability to contact you – and get answers to their questions – whether they are using the web, email, phone or social media. And they want these answers to be delivered quickly or they will simply go else...
As they operate in a highly regulated environment, many banks and financial services companies have been wary of becoming involved in social media. There has been a real fear that a throwaway tweet could be seen as endorsing a product when it isn’t the right fit for a particular customer, leading to potential misselling claims and action by regulators.However when handled properly the benefi...
In the past the UK utility industry has had a poor reputation for customer service. This has led to tough action from regulator Ofgem, for example fining npower £2 million and British Gas £2.5m for mishandling customer complaints in 2011.This week the government launched a new raft of planned measures that will tighten protection for consumers even further. These include direct compens...
Whatever industry you are in, customer service revolves around providing fast, accurate answers to customer queries. However ensuring that your agents have the up to date information needed to deliver these answers can be difficult, as it is scattered across multiple IT systems, stored in physical folders or even kept in agents’ heads. The key to delivering excellent customer...
In today’s business climate, increasing efficiency while still delivering great service is the central aim of leading organisations. Balancing these two demands can be difficult, but by implementing an Eptica-based knowledge management system, the NHS Business Services Authority (NHSBSA) has achieved both cost savings and improved customer service levels.NHSBSA’s Sherlock project uses ...
In tough times, customer service can be the best way of giving companies a competitive advantage. That was the theme of this year’s Institute of Customer Service (ICS) Conference, which took place yesterday at the London Marriott Hotel in Grosvenor Square. Speakers from government, including Norman Lamb MP, minister for employment relations, consumer and postal affairs, joined companies such...
Social media opens up a whole new way of communicating with customers. However companies need to understand that it is fundamentally different to other channels. Social media is much more of a two way conversation and, as it is held in public, the world can see the results. So while many companies have moved onto social media and are using it for customer service, what is vital is how engaged...
When it comes to poor customer service, companies selling financial products, from insurance to bank accounts never seem to be out of the news. Hot on the heels of record payouts for the misselling of Payment Protection Insurance (PPI), card and identity protection company CPP is being investigated by the Financial Services Authority (FSA) for ‘alleged failings in sales calls’.Against ...
Organisations across the world are now embracing social media, realising that it provides an immensely powerful, completely new customer channel. However social media has some big differences to many traditional channels – it is an open conversation that can spread news and comments incredibly quickly to a huge number of people around the world.But who within an organisation is responsible f...