What is self-care in customer relations?
Empowering customers and prospects is what self-care is all about. With the advent of digital marketing, many of them prefer to find a solution, via a chatbot or dynamic FAQ, without going through a customer service department. Today's business needs to take their new preferences into account to improve the customer experience and relieve call centers.
What is self-care in customer relations? What are its benefits, and what tools are available to companies? Here's our selfcare dossier.
Self-care in customer relations: definition
Self-care is about empowering customers and prospects to take action on their own, to get immediate answers to their queries. To do this, the company gives them access to online resources, digital media and collaborative spaces. Consumers carry out tasks on their own that are considered repetitive or of little added value to customer service. Ideally, there is no need for human intervention, either written or spoken.
Self-care in customer relations responds to new consumer needs. The rise of digitalization in marketing has not only made users more impatient and demanding, it has also facilitated customer attrition. Today, it's very easy to leave an online bank or insurance company and try a new one. Competition is fierce, the consumer is fussy.
Basing customer relationship management on selfcare undeniably improves the customer experience and the efficiency of your services over time.
What are the advantages of self-care?
If self-care has become an essential part of improving the customer experience, it's because it responds to new consumer expectations while improving business productivity. Here are some of the benefits.
Streamline the customer journey
The main advantage of self-care for customers is that it enables them to act with complete autonomy. Online purchasing, account management, problem resolution, immediate information... The customer journey is both optimized and controlled. Users can access a wide range of functionalities and information on the medium of their choice (phone, chatbot, website, mobile application, etc.) to manage their own purchasing process or resolve any problems they may have. This enables them to meet their needs more quickly and maximize customer conversion.
Multi-channel and traceable, self-care solutions also enhance customer knowledge. Information is stored and actions tracked, giving companies the opportunity to improve their customer relations.
Relieve customer service
If customers and prospects get an answer on their own, on a chatbot or mobile app, they don't need to call the company. Self-care tools therefore reduce call volumes and relieve customer support of simple, repetitive requests. With a marketing solution like this, you can handle all requests in record time.
What's more, your customer service department, like your users, will be able to benefit from collective resources. It will be more efficient and responsive. Your advisors will be able to concentrate on complex requests, and offer real added value during exchanges.
Increase customer and employee satisfaction
Many customers hate waiting by the phone for a password. They hate being transferred from department to department, and having to repeat their problem to each new contact.
Self-care solutions in customer relations sweep away frustration by offering relevant and immediate answers. With an information service available 24/7, users save precious time and gain confidence in the company. The customer experience is sure to improve. But that's not all!
Self-care tools also boost employee satisfaction, as they are no longer overloaded with calls and can concentrate on more rewarding tasks.
What customer relationship management tools are available?
Now that you're aware of their advantages, let's find out more about self-care solutions for customer relations. Adapt them to your type of business and customer profile.
The chatbot
A chatbot is a written conversational agent, capable of responding in natural language to a user. This highly intuitive self-care tool provides pre-recorded answers from a database, based on requests made in a dialog box.
The chatbot offers solutions, provides information or guides the consumer on a website to facilitate their purchasing journey.
The callbot
The callbot is a conversational agent that dialogues in natural language with a customer or prospect, verbally over the telephone. Available around the clock, the callbot takes all incoming calls, greets callers, transfers information and guides them to the right person. It can even handle certain requests on its own: making appointments, recovering a password, making a claim, customer complaints. Waiting time is greatly reduced, and processing is efficient.
Dynamic FAQs
A FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) centralizes all the most common questions and answers. It takes the form of a search bar on a site or application. The user enters a keyword and obtains a whole series of questions and answers adapted to his or her request. The FAQ not only helps users find information quickly, but also boosts a website's natural referencing.
Community media
If consumers can't find the answer they're looking for in the FAQ, they can ask their question in a community forum or chat room. This is a platform where users can help each other by sharing their experiences. This digital solution can create a real community for your brand.
