Migrating to a multi-channel world

Clive Longbottom, service director for independent analyst group Quocirca, notes that both customer service and marketing have been heavily impacted by the recent digitisation of consumer behaviour, and both need to make improvements to their technology as a result: “For customer services IT focus has been based around the contact centre. This was effective when operations were limited to blended marketing as the only channels were paper-based mail, telephones and perhaps a few email, but cannot cope with the new multi-channel world,” Longbottom said.

“The problem has been that, as all these digital channels such as email, web chat and social media, have been added to traditional means of communications, organisations have been forced to reinvent and enhance technology solutions so they can stay on top of the new environments.”

This view was echoed by a new report from the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU), which notes that forward-looking organisations have woken up to the fact that the extent of this revolution in customer behaviour cannot be ignored by customer services and marketing, and these functions are ramping up their technology programmes accordingly.

The research, Customer service, marketing and technology: mastering the customer journey, is based on a Europe-wide survey of 272 senior Europe-based managers, including 37 senior customer service executives and 34 senior marketing executives. It reveals that respondents agree that a general shift is already underway. Some 61% of customer service and marketing professionals expect to have slightly or significantly greater control over technology decisions that affect their department in the next two to three years.

Moving towards increased technological autonomy with cloud solutions

Of the two functions, customer service respondents were found to be more confident of getting greater control of technology than their counterparts in marketing. In customer service, 67% expect to have more influence over the next two to three years, compared to 54% of respondents in marketing. Executives and senior managers in these functions believe that increased technological autonomy will give them more effective access to new systems, so making them more responsive to customer requirements.

There are many factors driving this change. Firstly, the customer service and marketing departments are becoming more tech savvy. When asked if technology expertise among staff in their business unit was growing, 78% agreed or strongly agreed.

Cloud computing is identified as the technology that most customer services leaders (59%) responding to the EIU survey said is changing the way they work, making it more significant than any other technology. The report points out that this result reflects the fact that some of the longest-established Software as a Service (SaaS) offerings targeted this function. For marketing executives, however, the technology focus was different. Mobile computing was found to be top of mind in this function by “a ide margin”. In fact mobile was quoted by almost two-thirds (61%) of respondents, while second place for senior marketing leaders came social media (50%), with e-commerce and big data tying for third place (both scoring 42%). Somewhat surprisingly digital marketing was rated of relatively low importance by this segment, cited by only 36% of respondents - but still ahead of cloud computing, which was voted for by just 33%.

“The prevalence of cloud-based tools in the customer service arena, where day-to-day management tasks are largely handled by a third-party provider, may explain why respondents from that function express the most confidence in their own ability to manage technology: 85% said they were at least somewhat confident about managing technology themselves, compared to 75% in marketing,” the EIU report pointed out.

Maintaining good relationships between marketing, customer service and IT

But, even as the customer service and marketing functions take more control over their IT, the EIU noted that the move to cloud solutions is accompanied by “highly positive” sentiments about the service the departments receive from IT. When asked whether the IT department was able to provide them with the technology they need, 82% agreed or strongly agreed. Marketing trailed slightly behind customer service in this respect, with 69% in agreement.

The technological solution to these challenges centres on big data analytics and data management, according to Longbottom: “Organisations now really do need proper big data analytics deployed in today’s digital world to see how all the data sources across these multiple channels including telephone, email, web chat, social media all fit together. Customers are harder to track as they have multiple digital identities including email addresses, multiple telephone numbers, Twitter handles. All these need to all be matched together to create a full picture of a customer.”

Leveraging data management solutions

Given the digital nature of the majority of today’s customer interactions, the EIU research agreed both customer service and marketing professionals see the value of having data management and analysis capabilities within their own departments: when asked which capabilities they need inhouse, 49% pointed to data management. However, the study added the caveat that this process of mapping and analysing the digital customer’s journey is recognised as a “huge data challenge”.

However, when asked by the EIU about the downsides to their business unit having more control over technology, data-related issues figured prominently. Poor integration of departmental applications is the chief concern, cited by 45% of respondents, while deterioration of data quality was cited by 42%. In order to address these concerns respondents indicated that they were increasingly relying on their respective IT departments. The EIU noted that, evidently, the growing autonomy of customer service and marketing will not leave the IT department out of work as there are numerous leaders from those units who are happy to leave these key technology processes in the remit of their peers in IT.

In light of these factors it is becoming increasingly apparent that the relationship between marketing, customer service and IT is becoming closer. As the migration to cloud-based solutions gains traction, increased collaboration with IT will become progressively more important as both customer services and marketing attempt to refine their technology solutions to enhance digital interaction with consumers across the range of different channels that are being used by today’s digital consumers.

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How Marketing and Customer Service are Engaging with Digital Customers

Thanks to digital technologies such as social media and smartphone, today’s customers are demanding and opinionated. They expect businesses to react to their needs quickly, and are equally quick to share their views if disappointed.

These expectations place considerable pressure on businesses’ marketing and customer service functions. Marketing must engage these demanding customers in a fruitful relationship, while their peers in customer service must be able to issues are dealt with in a timely fashion. And the two functions must work together to ensure that a customer’s “experience” of the organisation is consistently positive.

Unfortunately for companies, customers often have access to more sophisticated mobile, social and cloud technologies than corporate customer service and marketing professionals have on the desk in front of them—and the staff struggling to serve customers are painfully aware of that fact.

In a recent survey conducted by the Economist Intelligence Unit, respondents from the customer service and marketing functions were more likely than their colleagues in other business units to say that today’s consumer technology provides better functionality than the tools that their own IT department provides: 32% of them agree with that statement, while 18% strongly agree.

“There’s a gap here that needs addressing at most companies,” says Jo Causon, chief executive, the Institute of Customer Service.

Faced with this imbalance, many marketing and customer service leaders are getting more involved in technology selection and strategy.

“All this new technology is unleashing marketers’ desire to play and experiment,” says Adrienne Liebenberg, global marketing director, Castrol B2B. “There’s so much data available and so many tools to choose from—and I expect to have a high level of control over most of the tools my marketers use if I’m going to take effective ownership over pricing, insights and customer experience.”

Survey respondents agree that a general shift is already under way: 67% of customer service respondents expect to have more influence over technology decision that affect their department in the next two to three years, 54% of respondents in marketing believing the same.

There are many factors driving this change. First, customer service and marketing departments are acquiring more technological know-how. When asked whether technology expertise among staff in their business unit is growing, 78% agree or strongly agree.

Another factor is the technology itself. Cloud computing has done much to build confidence about technology among customer service and marketing professionals, suggests Ms Liebenberg of Castrol. “The stratospheric rise of cloud-based software-as-a-service [SaaS] tool has meant there is less need to engage with the IT team in the same way that we used to,” she says.

In fact, cloud computing is the technology that most customer service leaders (59%) say is changing the way they work, more than any other technology. That makes sense, given that some of the earliest available and now most established software-as-a-service [SaaS] offerings have been targeted at helping organisations to manage customer care.

[Download PDF to see Graph]

This is not the case among marketing executives, however. Mobile tops their list by a wide margin, cited by 61% of respondents. In second place come social media (50%), with e-commerce and big data tying for third place (42% each).

“Mobile technology is playing a massive role in how we work,” agrees Ms Liebenberg at Castrol. “We have tens of thousands of customers in around 40 countries, and marketing teams scattered all around the world. Mobile capabilities ensure that marketing isn’t restricted to one location, so we have more flexibility in how marketing works in different regions, and also in how we can travel and communicate, as a team, across locations.”

This growing autonomy is not a reaction against the IT department. When asked whether the IT department is able to provide them with the technology they need, 82% of customer service respondents, and 69% from marketing, either agree or strongly agree.

This is good news, as there is plenty of work for chief information officers and IT departments to do, even as marketing and customer service take more control over technology.

“The CIO should of course continue to determine which platform and which systems we use, and how new technologies should connect to the infrastructure we have already and how to manage the service,” says Ms Liebenberg. “The CIO also has to deal with a dazzling array of security, legislation and privacy laws—and I cannot see how marketing could add any real value to those activities.”

Happily, both customer service and marketing respondents believe that collaboration between the IT department and their business unit is improving. In marketing, 81% agree or strongly agree with that statement, while in customer service 77% do so.

They also agree that this collaboration is important. When asked what would help them manage technology better, improved collaboration with the IT department is chosen by 52% of the sample.

Mapping the customer journey

The most important focus for increased collaboration with IT will be on identifying and filling gaps in the customer journey—in other words, figuring out how, when and why, over a range of different channels, some customer journeys falter while others lead to repeated, profitable business.

“I have to create a picture for the organisation of the customer experience, what it actually feels like for customers to do business with us, before I can suggest new investments,” explains Ms Liebenberg.

Given the digital nature of most customer interactions, mapping and analysing the customer journey is a huge data challenge. Both customer service and marketing professionals see the value of having data management and analysis capabilities within their own departments: when asked which capabilities they need in-house, 49% point to data management.

Clearly, though, this is a challenge that neither marketing nor customer service wish to address alone. When asked about the downsides to their business unit having more control over technology, data-related issues figure prominently. Poor integration of departmental applications is the chief concern, cited by 45% of respondents, while deterioration of data quality is cited by 42%.

On one hand, then, customer service and marketing departments are evolving with the customers they serve, and taking more control of the technology they use to engage with them.

At the same time, mapping and managing the digital customer journey is a complex, data-driven process, and customer service and marketing professionals look to IT to provide the technical excellence and data integration knowhow required to make it possible.

Only then will businesses be able to meet customers’ demands for faster, more responsive service, based on a true understanding of their individual buying behaviours, needs and preferences.