Enhancing agent-assisted customer support with social communities
In the past six months leading contact-center technology vendors have begun the process of creating practical ways to incorporate social media into their offerings. Most of the work aims to help enterprises monitor and engage with customers by using social networks, but this level of social engagement provides only limited benefits for customers that do not use social networks. This research outlines ways in which enterprises could use social communities to better serve customers through traditional channels in their contact centers. Enterprises looking to derive added benefits from their social efforts should consider integrating their branded social communities and their contact-center knowledge-management processes.
Executive summary
In a nutshell
Ovum view
Social channels only benefit social users
Vendor strategies focus on social networks
Indirect benefits of social strategies
Deflect contacts
Social could improve the customer experience for everyone
Two main approaches to capitalizing on social support
Labor-focused approaches to socially assisted customer service
Agents need structure and permission to search
Technology-focused approaches to socially-assisted customer service
Process-focused assists to technology
Some assembly required - integrating CRM with social presence
Build-versus-buy-versus-partner problem
Customer-interaction technology vendors will combine social communities and contacts centers, but how?
RightNow Technologies and HiveLive
Genesys and InQuira and Lithium
Lithium and Scout Labs
The wild cards
In a nutshell
Ovum view
Social channels only benefit social users
Vendor strategies focus on social networks
Indirect benefits of social strategies
Deflect contacts
Social could improve the customer experience for everyone
Two main approaches to capitalizing on social support
Labor-focused approaches to socially assisted customer service
Agents need structure and permission to search
Technology-focused approaches to socially-assisted customer service
Process-focused assists to technology
Some assembly required - integrating CRM with social presence
Build-versus-buy-versus-partner problem
Customer-interaction technology vendors will combine social communities and contacts centers, but how?
RightNow Technologies and HiveLive
Genesys and InQuira and Lithium
Lithium and Scout Labs
The wild cards
LIST OF FIGURES
Figure 1: Four-pronged approach to incorporate social media into contact centers
Figure 2: The full spectrum of social from support to innovation
Figure 3: The social customer’s identity from an enterprise perspective
Figure 1: Four-pronged approach to incorporate social media into contact centers
Figure 2: The full spectrum of social from support to innovation
Figure 3: The social customer’s identity from an enterprise perspective