Customer engagement success happens in the moments you share with your customers. So if you’re serious about providing customer experiences that drive true engagement, it’s essential to make every moment count. But every year, enterprises waste a huge engagement opportunity.
Americans will waste 900 million hours waiting on hold this year. That’s the equivalent of more than 32,000 lifetimes. And I’m sure it won’t be hard to convince you that waiting on hold isn’t exactly the most engaging experience. In fact, it’s a great way to convert high value moments into negative value moments that undermine your efforts to engage effectively.
Hold time is a necessary evil, right? Well, not so fast (get it?) Our own digital consumer survey results reveal that 56% of online shoppers expect a phone call to provide the best experience for getting assistance. But that’s not the whole story.
70% of online shoppers would rather do something else
Despite the expectation of a good outcome on the phone, more than 70% of online shoppers would prefer to ask for help in a different channel- especially digital channels like web chat, messaging, mobile apps, mobile web, and social media.
So what’s holding them back (get it?)
Consumers still use the phone as a primary channel to get assistance, but they say it’s not their preference. Consumers today would rather engage in digital channels, and they prefer to engage at their convenience. They don’t want to be chained to the phone from moment you put them on hold until the moment a person gets their issue resolved. Being chained to the phone is a very poor fit with the way digital consumers live their lives, and they’re starting to become aware that they have options.
And that brings us back to the 900 million hours on hold. That's 32,000 times the average human lifespan. If you could get those negative value moments back, how could you turn them into high value moments?
- Offer digital channels for customer assistance
- Invest in the quality of customer experience in digital channels
- Provide an experience that fits a lifestyle of micro-moments
The opportunity is enormous. According to our recent survey, online shoppers will spend more money with businesses that offer digital channels for customer service, so this can directly affect top line growth. Some digital channels can also be less expensive to operate than traditional channels, so you can satisfy customer preferences and lower your costs if you provide an experience that attracts them to those channels.
900 million hours is a lot of micro-moments. Seize the opportunity to own your share of them.
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