5 Technologies Designed To Enhance Customer Experience

According to the 2020 Digital Marketing Trends Report by Econsultancy and Adobe, the most exciting opportunity for most businesses in 2020 is customer experience (or CX).

Well, it should not come as a surprise to many.

According to American Express, 86% of customers are willing to pay more for a better experience.

And recent studies by the Temkin Group found that companies that earn $1 billion annually can expect to earn an additional $700 million within 3 years of investing in customer service.

If you look at it closely, that’s a 70% increase in revenue within 36 months!

So, to put it out simply:

Companies who are able to execute top-notch customer experience will achieve higher customer satisfaction rates, reduced customer seethe, and increased revenues.

And now with the advent and amplification of technology, it has become easier for enterprises to leverage it in enhancing customer experience.

Want to know how?

Here are 5 innovative ideas to improve customer experience with the help of technology:

1.) Conversational AI:

Have you interacted with a chatbot before? What do you know about them?

They’re basic response machines where one types a keyword required to receive the appropriate response. In short, they are conversational AIs.

Conversational AI is a form of technology that creates speech-based assistants and enables greeted engagement and interaction with customers across platforms. The growing importance of conversational AI is increasing as chatbots and voice bots are becoming a crucial part of many companies’ customer relationship management strategy.

Companies that utilize conversational AI into their systems amass a competitive edge over their rivals that are unable to garner quick and easy customer experience. AI-enabled chatbots and virtual agents assist customers directly via applications, devices, or channels helping them to get the answers they need without any difficulty.

Moreover, by the end of 2020, it is predicted that 40% of users will primarily interact with applications and websites that support conversational AIs. And by 2022, 20% of all customer service will be handled by these conversational agents.

2.) Location-Based Marketing:

Location-based marketing allows you to target your customers at a more meticulous and personal level with online and offline messaging based on the customer’s physical location. By employing location-based data, you will be able to notify your customers when they are near a store, an event, and send them highly personalized or relevant messages in real-time. This is also called geo-location marketing.

When you have access to your prospects’ age, occupation, interests, shopping history, etc., you can easily fuse this data with their location and come up with compelling messages that drive engagement and increase customer satisfaction. For example, when BMW UK used the location as a contact to generate awareness of the company’s new 7 series model, it was able to achieve an expansion rate that sat 3% above the industry benchmark. (Source: Digital Marketing Academy)

3.) Virtual Reality:

Virtual reality has been creating a lot of hype over these years. The reason? The fact that the idea behind VR is so fresh and has the ability to alter our perception of seeing things.

There is no doubt about the fact that it holds the capability to redefine customer experience as well.

Breaking all the old-hedged stereotypes, virtual reality takes users on a roller-coaster ride of experiencing things like never before. Used extensively in different sectors, VR enhances the customer experience by providing innovative ways of putting out products and services in front of your customers.  Employed by a number of brands to enhance customer experience VR can immerse consumers providing them with rich experiences of a product or service. It captures the attention and imagination of a consumer that no other technology can do.

Popular brands have already started using VR to improve customer experience. For example, at IKEA,  customers can explore various possibilities for their kitchen design (colors, dimensions, etc.) – all with an app and a VR headset.

They no longer have to wait for the full-design to stack up in order to see how it really looks like. VR provides them with an idea of the design beforehand so they can make recommendations for the changes or improvements before it’s too late.

4.) Internet Of Things (IoT):

The meaning of the Internet of Things is fairly simple, yet most people get confused about what the actual definition is.

To put it simply, it means taking all the things (from simple sensors to smartphones and wearables) in the world and connecting them to the internet.

According to Business Insider, there will be more than 64 billion IoT devices installed around the world by 2026, with companies and consumers spending nearly $15 trillion on IoT devices, solutions, and supporting systems.

IoT solutions can help businesses take customer experience to a whole different level with the following ways:

• Providing Insights. IoT collects and processes insights in real-time which provides detailed information about the customer behaviour and device performance. This type of information can be highly useful in improving efficiency, creating more robust products, and creating more personalized offerings.
• Better Customer Service. IoT enabled devices to help you interact with your customers in ways you would not even have thought of! By implementing smart sensors on vehicles or packages to track the shipment and uncomplicated transaction process for customers – there are various ways IoT helps in improving customer service.

Devices such as FitBit is an ideal example of an IoT enabled device. Since it is fundamentally linked with the internet, customers can use built-in voice assistant, Alexa, to perform various tasks which in turn inspires new audiences to purchase FitBit. To put it simply, FitBit has helped the brand to collect data about their customers and engage them in a better way.

5.) Blockchain:

Too often, Blockchain has been associated with cryptocurrency, Bitcoin. What you may not know is that Blockchain goes beyond that.

It has the potential to revolutionize businesses in a way you may not even think of – especially with improving customer experience.

One of blockchain’s key features includes the ability of the data to be transparent. Since the technology heavily relies on visibility of transferred data, this can help foster trust among consumers (For example, there will be transparency and security in the transactions that the existing systems fail to implement correctly.) This creates increased brand loyalty and customer engagement.

Conclusion:

Delivering a great customer experience for your business is as important as attracting new customers.

The better the experience a customer has, the better reviews and responses your business will get.

In order to give your customers the best experience, you need to amplify these technological advancements if you haven’t already. Almost every business today is benefiting from using these technologies whether it is by improving efficiency, productivity or growing customers. What is your excuse?