Improved customer service can save up to 4.6 billion dollars for mobile operators

Future Customer Relationship Management (CRM) Trends research suggests that a streamlined ' full channel ' customer Relationship Management (CRM) system could save 4.6 billion of dollars for Western European mobile operators.

The whole channel means that customers can provide consistent and accurate service to customers whether they are in-store, online or through telephone, email, social media or through the operator's brand self-service application. Procurement channels become transparent, for example, transactions can start online, and then as part of a continuous process in the store.

The study, commissioned by Asiainfo and Northstream, seeks to quantify the benefits and challenges of a full channel approach designed to provide a single customer view (SCV) for operator customer service agents across all channels.

The study found that by avoiding duplication of effort, simplifying customer renewals and new customer acquisition processes can significantly reduce the operating costs of customer service. The study also found that increasing the efficiency of marketing, sales and IT operations can further reduce operating costs.

Detailed reports pay particular attention to the impact of social media, while reflecting the increasing number of consumers as an interactive approach. However, the study found that since social media interactions were often not integrated into customer data, operators were neither benefiting from the increasingly popular medium of communication nor using the medium to maximize the number of contacts. Full channel customer relationship management can reverse this situation.

Northstream's research approach is to conduct a series of case studies and expert interviews covering the telecommunications industry and the retail and financial sectors. The most common challenge identified is how to implement the transition. This is a noteworthy issue for enterprises with disparate systems, enterprises that have been formed through mergers over the years, or enterprises that have key legacy systems, products, and services that are patched and protected rather than updated and replaced.

The operators interviewed acknowledged that the current multi-channel CRM approach is not only imperfect, but also causes the customer experience to deteriorate. As customers move across multiple channels, conversations with carriers or service providers are often interrupted.

"Ironically, we found that understanding customers at one end of the service provider became increasingly incomplete because different channels did not share their customer information." For example, a customer's online/self-service transaction or conversation with a call center is not visible to the entity store staff. One of the key benefits of a multi-channel service provider should be to improve customer awareness and information and provide a better personalized experience, "said Northstream chief executive Bengtnordstr?m.

"The operators we interviewed admitted that to improve customer satisfaction, they had to improve the seamless customer experience in all channels." ”

"Research has shown that many complexities and human processes have been added as business models shift from single channel customer interaction to multi-channel customer interaction," said Dr. Andy Tiller, vice president of product marketing in Asia. Full-channel approach can reduce complexity, provide a streamlined process to achieve better customer relationship management, and significantly save enterprise costs. However, this can be done only by implementing a fundamental it transformation that translates into a next-generation customer relationship management architecture with the necessary flexibility. ”

(Responsible editor: Lvguang)