Australians have long been disillusioned with their telco companies. One study found that 22% of Australians consider their telcos all the same. This is despite massive competition between telcos over pricing and quality.
So how can telcos improve their customer experience and stand out from the competition?
Use Analytics
Innovative companies have already begun making the most of the huge amounts of data at their disposal. One great way to actively improve the customer experience? Customer journey analytics. This robust view of individual customers allows sales, marketing, and other customer-facing teams to make precise, data-driven decisions. This cuts down on wasted resources and guesswork so you can get it right the first time.
Journey mapping allows you to benefit from in-depth data points. Since each customer journey can include multiple touch points and hundreds of thousands of data points, this aggregated view means you can easily pinpoint problem areas.
Work with OTT Players
The telecommunications industry is losing billions to over-the-top players like Facebook, WhatsApp, Viber, and FaceTime. Telcos must realise that revenue from SMS and calling is unlikely to return anytime soon and pivot accordingly.
This rise of OTTs will continue to increase the amount of data consumers will need, and this is an excellent opportunity for telcos to compete based on unique data packages.
WhatsApp, Skype, Netflix, Facebook, and Google have all made billions by piggybacking off the telco industry’s existing infrastructure. Telcos responded by slowing speeds, limiting access, and trying to create competing services. Since that strategy hasn’t exactly worked well, the goal should be to collaborate and cooperate instead.
In the United States, U.S cable provider Comcast has partnered with Netflix. The deal will mean that Comcast users will have a massive increase in streaming speeds (up to 30% faster). Instead of fighting OTT players, telcos can work with them to offer improved customer experience and ensure mutual success.
Offer Multichannel Support
No one wants to spend half an hour on hold to their telco company, particularly when they only have a quick question. It’s essential that telcos have a strong online presence so customers can quickly and easily get their problems resolved. Customers should be able to contact you through social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter, phone, email, and live chat.
Most customers expect 24/7 support, which is why it can be worth looking into Chatbots which can take care of basic questions and issues outside of office hours.
Be Proactive
In today’s world, where customers expect to be constantly connected, loss of internet access or a wireless connection can ruin their day. Telcos should invest in alerts and warnings when customers will soon reach their data limits. This is especially important for people who have shared plans and may not be aware of how much data everyone else has used.
Since telcos have real-time data at their fingertips, they should be sharing this with their customers. By proactively reaching out to customers before they call in, they’ll avoid disgruntled calls and messages. Another great way to use all this data? Inform customers of other plans that may be better for their needs. By leveraging data to find out which products and services customers need, telcos can advise which packages will give them the most bang for their buck.
This should be timely- if a customer is watching a video on their phone and runs out of data, an immediate message with an offer to fix the issue will greatly improve their customer experience.
If you’re aiming to improve your customer experience, you’re probably well aware that outages and disruptions are one of the worst experiences for customers. Get in touch to learn how you can move to an off-grid solution and significantly increase uptime for your customers.
