88% of contact centre managers either strongly agree (39%) or agree (49%) that digital channels open new opportunities for contact centres to own the customer experience, according to a new study ‘The State of Customer Experience 2017’, commissioned by West. At the same time, the majority are failing to grasp the opportunity due to outdated technology infrastructures, which prevent them from keeping up with changing customer preferences.

“Contact centres need to consider improving their technology, or risk missing the opportunity to own the customer experience to marketing or sales teams,” said Enda Kenneally, VP of business development.

Today’s customers expect a fast, effective and consistent response, whether they initiate a webchat via the website as part of the buying process, email with a service or billing enquiry, or call the contact centre with a complex issue to resolve. And customers are increasingly demonstrating their preference for digital channels; 88% of contact centre managers in the West study expect digital interaction to overtake voice calls by 2020 or even sooner.

Yet the reality is that, while contact centres can see the opportunity to own the customer experience, they are struggling to put systems in place to deal with the anticipated deluge of digital communication:

• 51% have social media management technology
• 51% have an email contact management system
• 40% have adopted web chat
• 20% have a self-service capability.
• 45% of contact centres can see all previous contacts by a customer on all channels in a single desktop system.

However, the report suggests that the tide may be turning. The study found that investing in technology to improve the customer experience is moving higher up the business agenda, with 57% saying it is a top priority, just behind the need to improve profitability (62%) and considerably ahead of security (37%).

Enda Kenneally, VP of business development at West commented: “The majority of organisations know they need to take a more customer-centric approach and are committed to doing this; however, in many cases their organisational structures continue to hold them back. With digital channels set to overtake voice as consumers’ preferred communication channels, the contact centre has a huge opportunity to act as a hub for all customer communications, bridging the departmental gap between sales, marketing and customer service. Those that seize the opportunity today will have an advantage over their competitors tomorrow.”

To find out more about the research and to download the full report, please click here.

The “State of Customer Experience 2017” report draws on fresh insight from over 200 professionals involved in delivering customer experience to provide a fresh look at the state of the customer experience at the beginning of 2017.

We undertook a survey with 200 managers and decision makers in contact centres across a range of vertical industries, spanning the public and private sectors.

Then, to put the quantitative findings in context and dig deeper into underlying trends and issues, we commissioned a series of focus groups with a broad range of decision makers in a wide diversity of contact centres by industry function and size. Job functions included Contact Centre Owner, CEO, Sales Manager, Customer Experience Manager, Marketing Manager as well as Contact Centre Managers and Team Leaders.