The most wonderful time of the year is here, and we cannot keep calm! The air is filled with holiday cheer, and there’s much to be thankful for. Homes are decorated, and Christmas trees, with their elaborate ornamentation, are showstoppers. Pretty lights everywhere bring out the holiday mood. Likewise, great music reminds everyone to shake a leg and get into the groove. Memories are created when people come together to exchange gifts, feast, unwind, and make merry.
The holiday season is intrinsically linked with gifting and pleasantly surprising loved ones. When people come together to exchange gifts, feast, unwind, and make merry, it elates us. That’s why this is considered the perfect time for retail shopping.
In the US, Europe, and most other countries, the holiday season commences in November and concludes in the first week of January. It includes Halloween, Thanksgiving, Black Friday, Cyber Monday, Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, St. Stephen's Day/Boxing Day, New Year's Eve, and New Year's Day. However, the shopping season starts much earlier.
Economics of the holidays
Holiday retail sales have grown steadily worldwide. Surveys indicate most shoppers prefer buying gifts from September to avoid a rush.
Today's consumers are more likely to select online stores when shopping for gifts for their loved ones and participate in the eCommerce growth story.
Tapping in consumer anticipation and excitement of the holiday season, businesses acknowledge that the festive season is unlike any other time of year and it’s important to be prepared for anything and everything. During this time, companies make customer satisfaction their number one priority.
Right from discovery to post-purchase, customers’ engagement and interaction with your brand’s touchpoints influence their overall experience. Personalized shopping experiences backed by transparent deals and frictionless servicedesk interactions make them happy.
Retail and service industries function on the axiom that customer experience gives businesses a competitive edge and provides an opportunity to create loyal consumers.
Also Read: Proven Methods To Empower Customer Support Teams
The holiday season arrives with new sets of challenges in customer service. More shoppers mean more pressure on your service desk to deliver a frictionless experience.
Service delivery challenges
Your help desk's track record of prompt responses to service requests may be affected by spikes in calls and messages during the peak season. Not to forget that one bad interaction in the customer journey can lead to churn and propagate negative word of mouth.
Buying rush leads to increased lead times. It puts pressure on a system that’s already reeling under supply chain shortages, travel bans, and lockdowns.
The global eCommerce industry has witnessed a 23% year-on-year growth, and by 2040, an estimated 95% of all purchases will be made via digital shopping channels. In today’s highly competitive retail landscape, having a powerful customer experience (CX) strategy will give businesses a winning advantage.
After careful analysis of the peak shopping season and buyer persona, your next course of action in the quest for consumer loyalty and customer engagement can be explained with the following quote from renowned American speaker and sales guru Zig Ziglar
— "You don’t have to be great to start, but you have to start to be great.”
The following checklist on how to wow your customers will help you play to your strengths and learn from shortcomings while designing a successful customer experience strategy.
Know your customers
Gain insights into your customers. Understand their needs. Identify and target the correct customer segment. All these will help you in the long run with streamlined and targeted advertising, better conversions, reduced marketing expenditure, increased return on ad spend (ROAS), and better return on investment (ROI).
Notable shopper profiles based on commonly exhibited traits include Traditional Christmas Shoppers, Brand Loyalists, Connected Shoppers, Impulse Buyers, and Experiential Shoppers.
Promise what you can deliver
Clearly state what consumers can expect from you and explain how you are able to satisfy their needs. Communicate to them clearly as to what sets you apart from your competitors. What benefits do you offer over your peers that result in overall customer satisfaction?
Map your customer journey
Build a clear roadmap of your customer journey. Be objective and mention every single detail — from expected behavior to unexpected outcomes across all touchpoints during their brand journey. Understand their pain points and empathize with them. Respect their point of view and see for yourself how your brand is perceived.
Measure customer engagement
How do you plan to measure customer experience and engagement with your brand? How frequently do you plan to analyze and evaluate CX? Select appropriate metrics and benchmarks to measure customers’ engagement levels with your business.
Analyze customer feedback
Don’t get carried away by your business’ ideals and assume you are providing great customer service. Conduct timely surveys. Request consumer feedback. Select appropriate metrics and benchmarks to measure customers’ engagement levels with your business. And finally, work on the shortcomings.
Customers tend to be vocal on social media. Invest in the right tools and practice social listening to elevate client servicing standards. When obtained correctly, feedback can be a treasure trove of insights, paving the way for your teams’ necessary course correction.
Also Read: This Christmas, Let ThinkOwl Be Your Santa!
Empower your service teams
Keep your agents happy and ever-ready with important case-related information before they commence the ticket resolution process. Ensure more work gets done with the least amount of allocated resources. Assure agents of a proper workload balance across the organization through less manual intervention on mundane issues. Automate repetitive tasks. Let agents work on pressing issues while an AI-powered service desk keeps your customer support system on track.
Intelligent support across channels
Helpdesk software that provides multi-channel support, an intuitive customer self-service portal, real-time analytics, and a rich knowledge base, helps to deliver personalized support.
Consumers today are generally pleased with the integration of social media, product discovery, payments, and shopping. To give them the requisite support, you should manage all customer conversations intelligently with one unified platform. You can also facilitate customers' contact with businesses via the platforms they use.
Scale your servicedesk
A helpdesk software must be scalable to meet client requirements. It should be 100% customizable to continue using the solution that helps you achieve business goals. Integration with third-party applications lets you manage everything with a single software by fetching or exporting data back and forth between applications.
Until now, you have seen the importance of formulating a goal-oriented CX strategy for your service teams. Let's get acquainted with the important tenets and the procedure to create such a strategy.
Ensure seamless case management
Managing service requests, responding to consumer inquiries, and delivering exceptional customer experience during peak shopping season becomes an achievable target.
When service teams are empowered with a sound CX strategy and aided by ThinkOwl’s AI-powered service desk software, consumers get treated to a brand experience that satisfies their needs, which is consistent across channels.
Consumers won’t be the only ones enjoying themselves this holiday season. Basking in the glory of providing meaningful service and ensuring complete customer satisfaction - your agents, too, can be part of the festivities.
With ThinkOwl helpdesk software, you can be sure of taking your customer service to great heights. ThinkOwl helps your customer service with:
- The fastest response times
- Highest possible automation
- Intuitive operability
ThinkOwl makes it possible for service teams to work on auto-pilot while staying on course.
Reduce AHT, let AI do your routine work, sort incoming tickets from across multiple channels, and route them to appropriate desks, according to the topic and urgency. Improve customer communication with thoughtful contextual messages and save time.
Common features of a Servicedesk
- Virtual Customer Assistant fills in for live agents and intelligently guides customers towards case resolution.
- Email Management Tool categorizes all emails intelligently and transfers them to the right service agents using its built-in AI engine.
- Content Tools support service agents with intelligent responses, and customizable fields to collect critical customer data.
- The AI Wizard learns from live agents and provides smart suggestions for efficient case management.
This Holiday season, don’t just deliver great CX (customer experience). Rather, let your agents and customers make the most out of the festivities as you get ready to deliver a happy Holiday Experience.
What are you waiting for? Unbox Happiness this Holiday Season with ThinkOwl.
To learn more about how ThinkOwl can help your service agents deliver a smile to your customers' faces, sign up for a 30-day free trial.