How to meet the expectations of modern consumers

Table of contents

Here, there and everywhere

Keep it consistent with an omnichannel strategy

Ease into omnichannel with call centre solutions

Supporting your customer interactions

Your customers today expect seamless, consistent interactions across all your business touchpoints. Providing these joined-up experiences on all channels show consumers you understand them and, in turn, can lead to loyal, satisfied customers.

An omnichannel customer service, integrating multiple communication channels, enables the experiences customers expect – and SMEs can achieve this through Contact Centre as a Service (CCaaS).

Here, there and everywhere

When you think about your touchpoints with customers, it’s unlikely that just one single channel comes to mind. Phone, email, chat, social media and even in person, you customers can get in contact with you in more ways than ever before.

As a business, you may have your own preferred way to communicate – and your customers will have their own. Each individual is different, but studies suggest that different generations have their own trends:

• Boomers are most likely to use live phone calls (94%)
• Gen X and Millennials are most likely to use email and live chat
• But only 34% of Gen X would use social platforms compared to 59% of Millennials
• Gen Z is most comfortable contacting customer care across all touchpoints – social media (57%), live chat (74%), email (75%) and live phone (71%)

More importantly, you’ll have your own data that reveals preferences among your customer base. And this analysis and insight is crucial to meeting changing customer expectations.

What are the best ways to communicate with customers?

Customer preferences are always changing, so there won’t ever be one best way to communicate. The ideal scenario is one where you have the resilience to adapt. This requires a solution in place that allows you to deliver personalised communications across the key channels your customers are using today.

Whichever channels you use to stay in touch with them, they’ll expect a seamless, joined-up experience across them all. By integrating the touchpoints with an omnichannel experience, you’ll be better placed to align messaging, speed up the customer journey and ensure they have simple, streamlined access to relevant information.

Keep it consistent with an omnichannel strategy

So, what’s omnichannel?

Well, omnichannel customer service is a strategy where multiple communication channels, like voice, chat, email, social media and SMS, are integrated to provide customers with a seamless and consistent experience. Customer data and interactions are shared across these channels, so all communications can align and they receive a personalised service for greater customer satisfaction.

How can I build an omnichannel strategy?

Cloud contact centres are a smart next step into exploring and embracing an omnichannel approach, enabling customers and agents to engage through email, video, text, instant messaging and social media – instantly.

With multi-channel capabilities, it’s easier for audiences to contact you, and it ensures you can quickly identify and personalise each interaction through a single, consolidated view of the customer. This then helps you to build and maintain meaningful relationships.

Ease into omnichannel with call centre solutions

What benefits can small businesses get from CCaaS?

Scalable and flexible

CCaaS allows small businesses to easily scale operations up or down based on demand, without the need for large upfront investments in infrastructure. You can add users, channels, or features as your business grows, giving you flexibility without the complexity.

AI enabled

With built-in AI capabilities like virtual agents, sentiment analysis and smart routing, CCaaS platforms help automate routine tasks and support agents in real time. This not only boosts productivity but also enables smarter, faster customer interactions.

Better CX

Small businesses are empowered to deliver a more consistent, seamless customer experience across channels with CCaaS. By centralising communications and customer data, agents can resolve issues faster and with greater context.

Greater accessibility and speed

Cloud-based CCaaS solutions can be accessed from anywhere, making it easier for remote or hybrid teams to stay connected. Fast setup and minimal hardware requirements mean you can get up and running quickly while maintaining high performance and reliability.

How can I prepare my customer services teams?

High customer expectations mean it’s important to empower your agents to have meaningful customer interactions. AI integrations in your communication platform can support with this, with AI and automation revolutionising contact centre technology to help agents answer queries with ease.

Supporting your customer interactions

How can a small business get started with a contact centre?

One of the most important factors in your business growth is happy customers. And Focus Group can help you deliver on that with our call centre solutions.

With our support and expertise in this fast-moving digital environment, you can be confident that you’ll find the right call centre solution to suit your business needs. We offer a wide range of leading contact centre platforms, designed to support all the communication channels the modern consumer expects.