Digital Engagement Blog

Customer engagement has changed; it’s never going back.  And it’s driving the need for digital transformation.

Like many, your organization may be stuck in the past, relying on old ways to engage with a new type of customer with dramatically different expectations.

It’s OK. That can work...for a little while.  And, it has to; it’s not easy to drive wholesale change across a large organization, especially when it can affect culture, technology, processes, and other things core to the fabric of your organization.

I just returned from a few days at the Shoptalk conference where 3,000 people came to explore nextgen commerce.  I thought I’d share ten takeaways from ShopTalk that look at how digital is disrupting commerce.  I found trends here that will likely impact all industries.

You’ve heard about the Age of the Customer. That’s a customer environment that goes beyond traditional customer care; it is about establishing a context for an enterprise’s consumer-base. As consumers equip themselves with more devices, and those devices connect to each other, consumers create a personal ecosystem, called Digital Context.¹ Gone are the days when consumers are comfortable adapting to preconceived engagement protocols. Today’s the day about engaging with consumers when they want, how they want – their choice trumps the enterprise – and it results in a win-win scenario if done right. That’s Digital Context in a nutshell.

Enterprise contact centers play a key role in digital consumer engagement strategies. Enterprises need first to empower customers, and secondly to ensure that their customer care representatives are able to take up the conversations that have begun via digital channels. They’ll need to understand that these conversations are no longer one-off quick fixes; they’re part of an ongoing effort to build a better and more sustainable relationship with the customer over time, like tiles that make up a larger mosaic.

The complexity of the commerce ecosystem is increasing creating greater risk that some function will create customer friction, struggle or even fail.  As you build the next-gen commerce platform for your business, we believe that it is critical to embed mobile customer care across all functions and over the entire customer journey.

Are you hot for chatbots?  They're certainly heating up the conversation among customer engagement executives these days.  Chatbots have been around since 1994 and have matured to the point that they (maybe) can be used effectively for real business applications.  And now thanks to Facebook announcements and a demo of chatbots the topic is top of mind.  So how do chatbots impact your digital engagement strategy?

Digital engagement is continually evolving and changing. (Well that's an understatement, isn't it?)

And so, if you’re not staying up-to-speed on consumer research, behaviors, and trends, you could be falling further and further behind. But have no worry! Consider these three components in your Digital Engagement strategy, and you'll be able to keep yourself in the fast lane:

These days, the answer to pretty much anything we want is just a tap or click away.  As the Harvard Business Review describes it, we live in a world of micro-moments, frequent moments in which we intensely want or need something such as a particular fact, destination, product, service, or activity; right here, right now.

Throughout the day, we frequently use mobile devices to check the Google Maps app for traffic updates, make a last minute reservation on Open Table for dinner that night, or calling your pharmacy to make sure your prescription is ready. 

Digital engagement is all the rave these days. In CX circles leading all the way to the boardroom, buzzwords like engagement, omni-channel, and transformation are creating bingo winners every nineteen seconds.

You’re a consumer.  I am, too. 

So, let’s say we feel the need to engage with our favorite company.

Raise your hand if you want to be forced to use the phone.

How about forced into email?

What about web chat?

Of course you don’t.

Why?