Delivering products and services to the customers of today in a way that best suits them has become a top priority of today’s telecom C-suite. But as customer journeys become increasingly complex and expectations surge, enhancing customer experiences is no longer straightforward.
Read on to know why customer experience has become so crucial and the role technologies play in driving better engagement.
Customer experience has become a competitive differentiator for the telecom sector
In this customer-centric era, enterprises are increasingly recognizing that their businesses must prioritize customer needs.
Customer loyalty is no longer dependent on brand value, product capabilities, or low prices as much as it is on quality of service. As the telecom industry evolves with new trends, norms, and standards, customer experience has become a crucial factor for telecom success.
With users increasingly working from home, they demand high uptime, reliability, and availability of networks. They are quick to change operators if they are not satisfied with the quality or level of service offered. Catering to customer needs offers telecom providers opportunities to meet expectations, deliver services promptly, and preempt challenges affecting customer satisfaction.
Building cutting-edge telecom products, optimizing services, and providing positive customer experiences enable telcos to enhance customer loyalty. A good customer experience also ensures significant economic and strategic advantages for telecom providers. They open doors to better cross-sell and upsell opportunities while introducing new streams of revenue for the business. In the long run, a good customer experience translates into happier customers, better margins, and a stronger market position.
But there are many challenges telecom providers encounter along the way
A high-quality customer experience guarantees better customer loyalty and retention. But for telecom providers, continuously acclimatizing to new and higher expectations from users streaming their favorite TV series on online streaming platforms isn’t easy. With any time, anywhere access and connectivity becoming a requisite, there are many challenges telecom providers encounter along the way:
- Addressing security challenges: With telecom customers extremely susceptible to modern-day frauds and attacks, the many shortcomings in enterprise data security initiatives put customer experience at risk. As social engineering threats become increasingly prevalent, the absence of robust fraud detection solutions makes addressing security concerns a huge challenge.
- Driving omnichannel consistency: Another challenge telecom providers face in enhancing customer experience is enabling and sustaining omnichannel consistency. With telecom customers using an array of channels for collaboration, work, and entertainment purposes, it becomes difficult to achieve faster, safer, and smarter communication.
- Meeting regulatory requirements: The inability of telecom providers to meet evolving regulatory and compliance requirements also impacts the customer experience in the long run. Lack of authentication or tracking makes it difficult to prevent regulatory oversights during communications. At the same time, telcos face a tough time identifying unethical practices by telemarketers and/or recording their activities.
How modern technologies come together to make the customer experience better
New technologies facilitate seamless and consistent telecom customer journeys, allowing for personalized experiences and interactions across multiple channels.
Let’s look at 5 such technologies that can enable telcos to increase agility and provide the intuitive experiences that their customers have become accustomed to:
- Automation: Automation offers several ways to boost omnichannel engagement and customer experience. Automating error-prone, mundane, and repetitive tasks can enable telecom providers to focus on strategic initiatives that improve customer acquisition and loyalty rates. From streamlining and tracking conversions to automating customer responses – technology works wonders to remove friction points and nurture relationships. In a February 2022 survey of global marketers, 43% cited improved customer experience as the top advantage of marketing automation.
- Data analytics: Data analytics can play a huge role in personalizing customer experiences. According to a report, 90% of executives worldwide leverage data analytics to enhance their customer experience. In-depth customer analytics across social media interactions, past behavior, and current sentiments can enable telecom providers to identify the latest trends and expectations. By knowing what customers love, analytics can empower telcos to build the right products, offer the right services, and craft the right experiences. In the long run, this can help enhance customer lifecycle journeys for the best upselling and cross-selling experiences.
- Digital document processing: The use of digital technologies for document processing can streamline the customer onboarding process. Instead of manually entering customer details into digital systems, telecom providers can make use of processing systems to feed and process customer information. This can enable quicker and more accurate information retrieval from customer forms. Intelligent character and pattern recognition using machine learning can further make the customer onboarding process smart, effective, and error-free.
- Security: Embracing security solutions that are powerful without being intrusive will also go a long way in enhancing customer satisfaction. With the right security controls in place, providers can address evolving security challenges while keeping their voice channel and messaging environments secure. For instance, state-of-the-art fraud detection and analytics systems allow telecom providers to validate numbers, route calls, and prevent unauthorized access to sensitive data. This can also help them protect their network subscribers, proactively track frauds, and eliminate threats in time.
- Blockchain: Blockchain technology is a great way for telcos to authenticate and track events to prevent regulatory oversights during communications. The technology can be used to identify telemarketers and record their activity across channels. Blockchain can also make audits simple and allow for real-time consent management – thus scrubbing unsolicited commercial communications (UCC) across messaging networks.
For telecom providers, engaging and seamless customer experiences provide the greatest potential to increase profits. If you want to shape the modern telecom landscape, you must integrate technology into your business operations and build the right foundation of quality, efficiency, and security.