Customer experience (CX) has always been the key focus of every contact center. Whether it is about earning a good market reputation or resolving customer queries, a contact center’s success highly depends on how well it treats its customers. However, the aspect that matters the most is how precisely a contact center understands what customer experience is all about.

The first and foremost thing for every contact center to remember is that CX is much more than the customer service. It actually refers to the way in which customers’ think or perceive about a brand, maybe a contact center, based on their overall interactions and experience. This, in turn, has made CX a major factor to drive improved customer retention and acquisition.

Undoubtedly, CX is and will always be a major player that would influence the duration for which a customer stays with your brand. Therefore, as the year 2018 nears its end, it becomes imperative for the contact centers to have a clear understanding of the customer experience trends that will rule the market in 2019. To make this easier, we share with you the list of top five CX trends that every contact center must follow to gain an edge over its competitors in 2019.

1. Connect Customer Experience With A Brand Purpose

The delivery of excellent customer experience will be directly or indirectly related to the brand’s goal or purpose. While many contact centers are already doing this, it will soon become necessary for every contact center to follow this practice. This is because doing so would help drive excellent sales, revenue and customer loyalty towards the brand.

With improved technology and advanced methodology, it would become increasingly convenient for the contact centers to intertwine their aim and purpose into their customer experience strategy. Developing CX platforms internally would also serve as a great trick as the in-house team would be better aware of the platform’s usability, extendibility and ways to deploy it to make its best use.

2. Deliver Content On Larger Screens

With a majority of customers adopting the latest technologies, it has become imperative for the contact centers to stay updated and meet the ever-evolving demands of the market. For instance, the majority of smartphone users today opt to use phones with larger screens. This, in turn, has led to a major shift in the device usage of the target audience. Therefore, using the content that was prepared earlier for a different screen size gets difficult.

As we enter the New Year, it becomes essential for the contact centers to meet the major demand for the larger screen content. While this would allow them to cater to the demand of the target audience, it would also open newer opportunities for mobile advertising. This would be possible owing to the increased dependency of the users on mobile phones instead of any other device.

3. Digital Transformation Will Rule The World

A large number of contact centers are transforming the way they operate and are undergoing a major technological shift. The processes will be automated, unstructured data available through chats and IVR recordings will be transcribed to gain relevant insights, to mention a few.

In a matter of a few months, the culture of contact centers would be completely changed. They would know where to focus on instead of just deriving relevant information from call recordings. The time to utilize smarter and better tools to improve customer experience is approaching soon. Be ready as you would have no time to think and implement the latest technological transformations.

4. Increased Focus On Omni-Channel Service Delivery

With the presence of their customers on multiple channels such as phone, email and chat, the contact center service providers will now be focused more towards delivering an omnichannel customer experience. They would be available with the most suitable resolution for any of the customer query raised via any mode of communication.

Strengthening their presence on different communication channels and making sure that all the customer queries are resolved would be the top priority. This, in turn, would help in ensuring that there is no glitch in the service delivery and the customers are satisfied with the services offered by the contact centers.

5. Robotic Process Automation Will Improve Efficiency

Robotic Process Automation (RPA) is a technology that would enable the automation of repetitive tasks in order to improve efficiency and lower costs. The automation of monotonous tasks would allow more time to the contact center agents and other human resources to engage in other important tasks like innovation, strategy, planning and connecting with the customers.

The biggest advantage of using RPA tools is their ability to customize as per the exact needs and requirements of the clients. This can range from automated voice response, email response to chats. During the coming year, almost every contact center would opt for it as it is cost-effective, fast and can even handle customer queries instantly. Along with this, it will also help in improving the First Call Resolution (FCR) and Average Handle Time (AHT) score of the contact center.

Make An Effort Towards Delivering Improved Customer Experience

The contact centers are well-aware that delivering an enriched customer experience is the key to attain improved customer retention and loyalty score. But, there is still some sort of disconnect between their goals and plan of action. Therefore, it is the utmost priority to keep the two in sync and help the business prosper.

It is not certain that each of these trends will be full-fledged in 2019. But, a few of these will certainly rule the market. Therefore, there is no harm in keeping oneself aware of these trends and be prepared beforehand to stay competitive. Above all, it’s all about delivering a better customer experience by offering them what they would expect to receive.