New and Upcoming Trends in Customer Experience in 2020

We have all observed that the expectations of our customers are growing exponentially, and even though business growth technology and tools are helping companies to facilitate its CX (Customer Experience) strategies, nevertheless without human touch our consumers and our employees both are vulnerable to poaching.

Therefore keeping abreast with the nine trends that have been monitored and observed by the TCFCR (The Center For Client Retention) here are certain predictions of the upcoming trends in CX to help your business thrive in 2020 and beyond for maximizing revenue growth:

A Proactive Workforce To Provide Exceptional Customer Experiences

We have known this for years that happy employees are one of the biggest keys to delivering an exceptional CX, however, it is also true that it is hard to retain our best people in such a competitive labor market.

Now while high compensation can be regarded as a strong inducement, nevertheless it is no panacea.

This is because according to the experts in workforce management at Strategic Consulting, it has been observed that Millennial(s) which is the largest generation in the present U.S labor force, are demanding a more engaged workplace.

Moreover, Millennial(s) of this modern era want to work for organizations that are ethical and are will to invest in business growth technology solutions to enhance the experience of their employees.

Hence as per the present trend owners of companies must look for increasing their investments in AI (Artificial Intelligence) and business growth technology like easy to use CRM platforms which are designed to reduce busy-work and let employees find time to focus on the customers and also create financial wellness programs for the employees to decrease stress and increase productivity leading to consistent revenue growth.

Put Super-fans to Work for Your Brand

Consumers shopping on social media platforms want instant gratification and accurate, fast information from the advertisers, however, how can a brand respond 24/8 without sacrificing its human touch?

Chatdesk which is a Tech firm has found an apt solution to this issue whereby they suggest businesses to recruit “super-fans” like stay-at-home parents, students and others who are passionate about your brand to offer after-hour support to the consumers of your offerings.

This is because applying this strategy brands can very fast augment customer support affordably with the help of engaged human agents who can be paid on a per-ticket basis.

With technology at their disposal, “super-fans” can not only select answers from pre-approved responses but they can also use technological enhancements to connect them with AI to generate personalized messages that can dramatically boost conversions.

Therefore in 2020 and beyond ‘super-fans” can motivate the growth of your businesses’ customer-base and promote your brand and so putting them to work-works.

Structural Decentralization Provides Better CX Outcomes

The tradition of customer experience being solely owned by a CXO (Chief Experience Officer) or CMO (Chief Marketing Officer) are steadily graduating to an end.

This is because presently CX is affected by every single department (be it customer-facing or not) as businesses are fast realizing the requirement for inter-departmental customer experience teams and accountability that is spread across all staffing functions.

Now this concept goes well-beyond Amazon’s model of bringing in an empty chair to meetings to symbolize the customer with the idea of empowering the employees to do what is best for the customers by decentralizing the way we communicate nowadays and rewarding those employees those that challenge the status quo.

According to a report published by iPerceptions (a CX management company), it has been noted that experience-driven businesses have in the recent years have enjoyed average annual revenue growth of more than 15 percent compared to less than 11 percent for other firms.

This shows that as more businesses are restructuring their organizations to include CX objectives and goals in their workflows and processes in everyone’s roles, in 2020 and beyond businesses will watch for a rising top rate of growth as well as find an ever-widening gap between companies that ‘get it’ and those that do not, as it has also been predicted that by 2023 more than 51 percent of marketing organizations is expected to decentralize their marketing operations a trend that will affect corporate marketing departments starting this forthcoming year.

Voice-Enabled Shopping Expands Rapidly

According to a press release by OC&C Strategy Consultants, it has been projected that U.S voice commercial sales are predicted to reach $40 billion by 2022.

This is because it has been found that voice assistance conveys more personality and warmth and so we will certainly see this shift into higher gears in the years to come as businesses and brands will rapidly expand their ‘voice-commerce’ options to let consumers buy products through voice shopping before picking up at the local store.

Now, during these calls, customers can even engage this app in conversation asking for advice on choosing the right product as we are finding consumers are slowly growing increasingly at ease interacting and shopping via voice commands which will in 2020 lead to boosted availability of products across myriad new voice-enabled platforms.

Social Media 2.0

A basic Twitter or Facebook account when it comes to interacting with customers is no longer enough as consumers in 2019 are increasing their use of social media, and therefore brands and businesses in 2020 must keep up to this trend by adding new support channels and continue refining as to how they must use their established tools.

According to a study published by Conversocial (a provider of social customer service), it has been estimated that more than 87 percent of businesses will utilize Twitter DM and more than 51 percent will use Facebook Messenger in 2020 to connect with their prospects and customers.

However to get fixated on these options is no recipe for success as in the same study it has also been mentioned that 79 percent of companies in the next 12 months are planning to implement WhatsApp and 94 percent of organizations WeChat as there are also channels that offer tremendous value across sales, marketing and customer support functions.

Therefore it is predicted that businesses, as we head towards 2020, will be eager to exploit the latest inventions in social media as modern consumers expect any new platform to offer accessible and reliable customer-focused service from Day One.

CSAT Surveys and Analytics Make the Perfect Marriage

After years of serious debating whether CES (Customer Effort Score), NPS (Net Promoter Score) or CSAT (Customer Satisfaction Score) is the best metric for gauging CX, businesses are coming to realize that it takes more than just one method or number to determine success and business growth.

Moreover, even the father of NPS, Frederick Reichheld, is forecasting text and data analytics as to the new way for uncovering customer sentiment and satisfaction.

Therefore it is best not to count on just Artificial Intelligence as a one-size-fits-all customer experiance solution since without the right follow-up surveys the complete effects of certain transactions cannot be truthfully assessed without additional steps.

Nevertheless, this must also be remembered that businesses should never ask their customers to document their satisfaction if they do not have a mechanism in place to satisfy their customers in a timely manner.

Customer Experience is Determined by Best-in-Class Companies

Best-in-class organizations like Amazon, Apple, Nordstrom, and others drive consumer expectations no matter what might be the size of our business of the type of offering that we sell nowadays.

However, as we enter 2020, it is predicted that companies that strive to understand how expectations of the customers are developed will soon realize that modern customers just do not care about policies and logistical limitations and so consumers expect the same level of interaction and care whether they are shopping in a local flower boutique or online at Amazon.

In other words in 2020 just developing CX strategies based around what our direct competitors are offering is no more sufficient as businesses must emulate irrespective of its size ‘only the best-in-class CX’ for the consumers of their offerings.

The Internet of Things (IoT) is the New Frontier

It has been found in an industry report by Fortune Business Insights that presently more than 14.2 billion IoT devices are connected in 2019, which is predicted to outgrow 25 billion by 2025.

Now, this explosion of connectivity provides brands with the opportunity need to boost their customer experience as never before, as by 2020 we will be producing an annual data volume of more than 45,000 exabytes, which is predicted to vastly improve personalization of our interactions through AI and machine learning.

Nevertheless, even though one victim of data sharing is, of course, our privacy, it is predicted that businesses will increase their security of customer data through stronger technologies like blockchain and robust strategies as data security and privacy will be one of the greatest concerns for businesses in building exceptional CX programs while remaining extremely cautious and vigilant in every step of their journey.

Takeaway

Hence to conclude while there are still many businesses that continue to confuse customer service with customer experience a.k.a CX, it must be understood that customer service which is a critical element for any business tends to be transactional but customer experience, on the other hand, begins with the very first touch-point where marking entices the customer to engage, and therefore CX is a never-ending process that is relationship-driven with periodic road markers to activate, nourish and inspire customer to reengage with brands since in 2020 consumers want romance and not one-night stands.

Therefore, in the year to come ensure that your brand’s CX strategy delivers trust, hope, and intimacy that helps in building strong relationships as it is true that consumer expectations will keep rising, and it is only building strong relationships that will help you to combat your competition next year and so businesses that are able to navigate these TCFCR’s 2020 trends will remain as the winners over the next decade.