Over the last few weeks, your inbox and alerts are likely inundated with 2023 CCM and CXM trends. But what does it take to capitalize on the latest recommendations? Top organizations map out objectives as well as a CCM plan that puts these lofty ideas into action.
Beyond your overall communications goals (i.e. brand awareness, new customer acquisition, increased satisfaction, etc.), you need to determine your overall channel strategy and what needs to be in your toolbox, such as the data and insights required to effectively connect with your target audiences. Here are a few more tips to help you build out an effective and actionable CCM/CXM plan for this year.
1. Prioritize customer profiles for segmenting audiences
We all know that customers no longer buy products or services. They buy experiences customized to their precise needs. Therefore, you need to communicate with them at a highly personal level. Personalization requires customer segmentation, which pulls together demographic, psychographic, and other behavioral parameters. With segmentation, you eliminate the guesswork involved in CCM and are positioned to create content that gets customers clicking on your calls to action.
Our highly acclaimed SaaS platform, ONEsuite, allows you to gain a comprehensive 360-degree view of customers, capturing everything from age, gender, location, occupation, etc. to personal health, psychosocial and socioeconomic factors. The insights are unparalleled. When you combine this powerful data, you can deliver more relevant communications at every point in the customer journey.
(Tip: If you haven’t invested in a top-tier CCM platform like ONEsuite yet, consider making it a top priority in your 2023 budget planning.)
2. Open the door to the omnichannel approach
Your CCM plan needs to include multiple channels across multiple touchpoints. This strategy – also known as omnichannel communications – is shown to help you retain an average of 89% of customers in comparison to 33% of businesses with poor omnichannel planning. Having an omnichannel communication strategy in your plan helps you meet your customers where they are while also allowing you to bridge the gap between customers’ online and offline preferences.
An omnichannel communication strategy also removes the silos that often exist between customer touchpoints. That’s why it is important to identify the communication channels that are preferred by customers before thinking of how to implement a clear, consistent experience across those channels.
3. Implement self-service opportunities
Don’t you just love it when you can answer your own questions? Your customers feel the same way.
As we mentioned last month, customers want to resolve their issues independently, allowing them to forego the dreaded and time-consuming customer service calls or emails. However, this strategy requires that you understand your customers – and their pain points – so you can develop comprehensive and pragmatic self-help resources. Effective customer self-help resources include:
- FAQs
- Customer knowledge base
- Video tutorials for product/service enrollment and other action steps
- How-to guides with step-by-step support
Our team recommends revisiting your customer service phone call transcripts or online search queries to help you build effective self-help resources and tools.
4. Measure and monitor customer communications success
You can’t improve what you can’t measure. Hence, it’s essential to implement CCM technology that allows you to identify and track key customer communications metrics like email open rates, click-thru rates (CTR), average response times, customer satisfaction (CSAT) metrics, and more.
These figures should be part of the overall CCM/CXM metrics that you track and report to your C-Suite leadership, board members, etc. Furthermore, any reporting should be used to pivot your strategies and tactics, especially if you’ve only recently implemented a new platform. It may take some time to fine-tune your channels and touchpoints to see quality results.
5. Ask for customer feedback – often!
Customer feedback – good or bad – empowers you to improve your service and customer satisfaction levels. It also helps you:
- Understand how customers feel about your brand
- Discover where the gaps lie in your CCM plan
- Identify shortcomings in your product or service
- Make customers feel more valued by your team
But you can’t just collect feedback. You need to act on it and inform customers of the steps you took (or didn’t take), so they feel more connected to your business and team.
Start 2023 the Smart Way
While global instability and economic uncertainty remain on the horizon, a new year gives your business the opportunity to position itself for success. Navigating through difficult times requires a deep understanding of your customers and their needs. Working with a single, experienced CCM/CXM partner like O’Neil can help you streamline operations, reduce costs and risk, improve the overall customer experience, and position for growth regardless of marketplace conditions.
Contact us for a free 15-minute consult or to preview our ONEsuite CCM platform.
