Consumer expectations are constantly changing and personalized customer service interactions are more important than ever. Customers want to feel understood and know that the business they’re interacting with is dedicated to helping them resolve their issues and meet their individual needs.
In 2022 and beyond, personalized customer experience can happen at scale by leveraging data with software solutions powered by artificial intelligence (AI) and enabling customer service agents with the right tools. Statistics show that consumers want personalization, and they want businesses to be using their information and data to improve support. Here are a few stats you should know about:
- 71% of consumers expect personalized experience from companies
- 76% of consumers are frustrated when they do not get personalized experiences
- 60% of millennials are willing to provide personal information if it means better experiences
Customer relationship management focused on improving customer interactions with personalization benefits everyone involved, especially loyal customers you want to retain. In this piece we will discuss changing customer expectations and the benefits of personalized customer service
What is Personalized Customer Service?
Personalized customer service means providing customer support and interactions that show you remember who your customers are—businesses can provide personalized customer service by collecting and documenting customer data and information and then leverage that data in support interactions.
Personalized service tailors specific customer information and data to take into account a customers’ customer life cycle with your business. This means that with today’s tools, businesses are able to provide support agents with enough customer data from past interactions – and the current interaction – to better support that individual.
Why Do Customers Want Personalized Service?
Personalized customer service impacts customer loyalty and retention, when businesses put more effort into the customer experience they offer they’ll see reductions in customer churn and increases in customer satisfaction. Personalization also has the power to bring in potential customers who are interested in your product or service. In fact, 80% of consumers will make a purchase from a brand that offers personalized experiences versus one that does not.
On top of that, having a personalized customer engagement strategy has helped 97% of marketers report quantifiable boosts to business outcomes. Individualized experience and personalization in customer service matters because it helps retain customers.
How To Provide Personalized Customer Service
Providing personalized customer service requires customer service teams to focus on improving both their customer experience (CX) and their agent experience (AX). The tactics and strategies teams put in place will enable customer service reps to deliver high-quality and effective support. Here are 4 strategies companies can use to provide personalization in their support interactions.
Provide Support for the Entire Customer Journey
In order to provide personalization throughout support interactions, teams need to create processes that provide support for the entire customer journey and that help at every customer touch point. You can do this by meeting customers where they’re at on the channels they prefer with omnichannel support, offering a robust self serve method that serves the company’s customer service strategy, and taking customer feedback for both good and bad experiences.
These days, customers aren’t always going directly to your website to seek support, which shows the importance of an omnichannel approach. Often, customers are asking questions on social media or via email or even texts. People want various options for support and they want to know that no matter where they go looking for help, they’ll be met with consistent interactions.
Teams can create consistency with customers on a personal level by using artificial intelligence that learns from your customers’ data in order to help provide agents with the information they need to create great experiences. This includes understanding customer behaviors on all channels and at every touchpoint.
Leverage Data to Provide Personalized Service
Data is the name of the game when it comes to personalization in customer service, and with 80% of customers being willing to provide their information if it’s meant to improve their experience, there is so much data to work with.
Think of the amount of information your company collects on the daily—names, emails, phone numbers, locations, credit card information, CSAT surveys, NPS surveys, the data is endless. Companies looking to improve their CX need to leverage this data to provide personalization, whether this is through omnichannel support or through leveraging AI that makes the process simpler.
With the help of AI teams have an artificial agent who can process more, learn more, do more, and keep up with more than a human customer service agent. Artificial intelligence can provide insight into where companies can improve their customer experience to provide better personalized service.
Provide Agents With Knowledge
If there is one thing customers expect it’s knowledge; knowledge on your website about your products or services and knowledge from your customer support representatives about who the customer is, what they’re in need of, and how they can help them. By providing agents with the full context of a support ticket—meaning the customer’s name, their issue, and if they’ve been in contact about this before—support teams further enable personalization by providing the agents with the information they need to let customers feel heard and understood in their support interactions.
Increase Engagement
Customers want knowledge, and they want it fast.n fact, they expect it. A Hubspot survey found that receiving an immediate response in support is important to 90% of customers. Businesses must be on a mission to increase engagement with customers and the best way to go about this is by improving personalization with the help of AI tools.
With the help of AI, teams can reduce response times by automating the most repetitive parts of support and implement 24/7 support which will improve CX and make it possible to deliver information at all times of the day to anyone seeking support from anywhere in the world. Increased support hours plus the ability to personalize those interactions will increase engagement and customer loyalty.
The Next Evolution of Personalized Content
All throughout the customer journey, consumers leave breadcrumbs of information and data about themselves. As businesses build relationships with their customers, they need to find the most effective and efficient way to utilize that data to promote and maintain healthy relationships with their customers.
Many companies are in the middle of a digital transformation that is being led by AI solutions and technology. AI for customer support is being used to create the next evolution of personalized content for customers by integrating with a company’s CRM and agent helpdesks to take in data that will help improve customer experience.
Businesses are leveraging AI to improve support processes in a few ways. Some of the biggest pain points in customer support have to do with lack of information, long wait times, and an inability to find resolutions quickly. AI for customer support helps with automating redundant tasks such as ticket labeling and routing, improving self serve options by creating a central location for information retrieval, assisting agents in closing cases faster by providing them with the relevant customer information, and by helping uncover gaps in knowledge and agent help.
With the help of AI support teams have seen up to 77% reduction in first time response (FRT), up to 59% increase in self-service rate (SSR), up to 90+ average CSAT, and so much more.
If you’re interested in seeing the power of AI for your teams, reach out below.
Frequently Asked Questions About Personalized Customer Service
What Are Personalized Customer Service Examples?
Personalized customer service happens when businesses fully leverage customer data and information in order to customize interactions with specific details that pertain to the individual customer support need. Examples of personalized customer service can include:
- Using a customer’s first and last name in a greeting
- Relaying a customer’s support issue to the customer when passed to an agent
- Reviewing a customer’s history with a business before a support interaction
- Offering various support channels to allow customers to find information where they want
- Creating a path for omnichannel support for information to be passed along
There are many things teams can do to transition to delivering personalized support and they can be done with the help of AI for customer service.
Why Is Personalized Customer Service Important?
Personalized customer service is important because it helps increase customer retention and customer satisfaction which reduces churn. When companies are willing to implement strategies and tools that can increase personalization they show their customers that they are investing in them and their needs. When customers know they’ll be amazed with your consistently high-quality customer experience, they’ll stay loyal.
What Does Personalized Service Mean?
Personalized customer service means providing customer support and interactions that show you know who your customers are and are willing to assist them and their specific, individual needs. Companies can provide personalized customer service by collecting and documenting customer data and then leveraging that data in support with AI.
