Category: Customer Experience

A luxury good is one where the price paid is much higher than the apparent utility it offers. We pay extra precisely because it’s not a good value. The utility lies in how we and our peers think about it. The scarcity and bling of a luxury good are used to increase our status (in our own eyes and those in our cohort).

And so, a top-end Mercedes isn’t much better at being a car than a Hyundai is, it simply costs more.

As engineering has improved and knock-offs have increased, though, the two-hundred-year tradition of physical luxury goods is fading away.

One thing that’s taking its place is speculation.

An NFT has zero utlitity. It’s simply an entry in the blockchain that shows ownership of something that anyone could see for free.

But that in itself is a sort of luxury.

There are now hundreds of digital NFTs each worth more than a million dollars each. Just like Reddit stocks, they change in value dramatically, they come with a story and they’re fun to talk about with your friends and peers.

And one day, every one of them will be owned by someone who is unable to sell it at a profit.

Speculation is a great hobby if you can afford it, but it shouldn’t be confused with investment.

If you have different customer segments, then you might want to map out the most common journeys your contact center handles, where customers:
Seek information
Get technical support
Buy a product
Make a payment
Schedule deliveries or other interaction
Customer perception of your business or brand is based on any one of these interactions. For instance, a bad chatbot experience might not be salvaged by a fantastic agent interaction—or a frustrated customer might exit the chat and check out a competitor’s website instead. Every single interaction counts toward connecting with customers or disappointing them. It’s important to map out what customers are doing, feeling, and saying at each step so you can identify and fix the moments of friction encountered on their journeys. Source: https://www.niceincontact.com/blog/a-customer-journey-map-template-and-advice-for-todays-digital-first-cx
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We’ve spent 130 years indoctrinating kids with the same structure. Now, as some of us enter a post-lockdown world, I’d like to propose a useful (though some might say radical) way to reimagine the curriculum.

It’s been a century of biology, chemistry, arithmetic, social studies and the rest. So long that the foundational building blocks are seen as a given, unquestioned and unimproved. The very structure of the curriculum actually prevents school from working as it should.

I think that a significant shift is overdue. The one below could work for kids from the age of 6. It doesn’t eliminate the fundamentals of being educated, but it puts them into context. More important, because it’s self-directed and project-based, kids can choose to learn, instead of being forced to.

We’re living in the age of an always-connected universal encyclopedia and instantly updated fact and teaching machine called the Net. This means that it’s more important to want to know the answer and to know how to look it up than it is to have memorized it when we were seven. Given the choice between wasting time and learning, too many people have been brainwashed into thinking that learning is somehow onerous or taxing.

Introducing the modern curriculum

The basic foundation is student-centered, self-directed projects. In service of learning to solve interesting problems and how to lead as well as follow. And to support that, the “courses” are practical tools students can use on their projects.

Statistics–seeing the world around us clearly and understanding nuance, analog results and taxometrics (learning how to sort like with like). Realizing that everyone and everything doesn’t fit into a simple box. Learning to see the danger of false labels and propaganda, and the power of seeing how things are actually distributed.

Games–finite and infinite, poker, algorithms, business structures, interpersonal relationships, negotiation, why they work and when they don’t. We all play them, even when they’re not called games.

Communication–listening and speaking, reading and writing, presentations, critical examination and empathy. Can you read for content? Can you write to be understood? Can you stand up and express yourself, and sit still and listen to someone else who is working to be heard? What happens when we realize that no one is exactly like us?

History and propaganda–what happened and how we talk about it. More why than when. The fundamental currents of human events over time.

Citizenship–Participating, leading, asking and answering good questions. As a voter, but also as a participant in any organization.

Real skills–Hard to measure things like honesty, perseverance, empathy, keeping promises, trust, charisma, curiosity, problem solving and humor.

The scientific method–understanding what we know and figuring out how to discover the next thing. Learning to do the reading and show your work. There’s no point in memorizing the Krebs Cycle.

Programming–thinking in ways that a computer can help you with. From Excel and Photoshop to C++.

Art–expressing yourself with passion and consistency and a point of view. Not because it’s your job, but because you can and because it matters. Appreciating the art that has come before and creating your own, in whatever form that takes.

Decision-making–using the rest of the skills above to make better choices.

Meta-cognition–thinking about thinking, creating habits with intention.

Here’s my question: If you could work for someone who had these skills, developed over the course of a decade or more of public school, would you want to? What about working next to them, or having them work for you? Or dating them? Or living next door or voting for them?

If this is what we need and what we value, why aren’t we teaching it?

Last week, I shared the first part of a discussion with the man behind the Dubai Holding One App: Neetan Chopra – the Chief Technology Officer of Dubai Holding. The main topic of our conversation was the innovative aspect of the app. As mentioned in the previous article, this is one of the rare digital…
The post Building a culture of innovation: an insightful conversation with Neetan Chopra (Part II) appeared first on Customer Experience Magazine.

When customers call your customer service line, greeting them with a friendly and easy-to-navigate interactive voice response system is a standard in call center software.
This is often the first stage in a customer service journey, so making your welcome greeting and routing accessible and intuitive is a key aspect to your call center functionality. It’s also a chance to set the bar for overall customer satisfaction. With all that said, writing a strong call center IVR script doesn’t need to feel like a mountainous task.
The Contact Center Playbook for Improving Customer Satisfaction
What is IVR?
Interactive Voice Response (IVR) is the process of routing callers to specific live agents or departments by asking for input based on pre-recorded messages. Modern IVR software functionality can require manual keypad input or voice response, which can steer the caller towards the best live agent or department to resolve their issue.
The most common first stage in any IVR system is commonly “Press 1 for service in English, Presione 2 para servicio en español”, while additional menu options could help to clarify the reason that the customer is calling or account information. IVR systems can be completely customized to be as simple or as multi-layered as your business requires.
What is Call Routing in a Contact Center?
The benefits of IVR
Having an IVR menu that collects valuable information at every stage gives both the customer and your agent context on their call driver, leading to quicker response times; better first contact resolution; prioritized high-value callers; as well as the functionality of a self service experience so that customers can retrieve their account information and do basic tasks without needing to be routed to an agent.

DID YOU KNOW?
According to a recent Zendesk survey, around 42% of customers say their definition of bad support is when they get stuck in an automated system that makes it hard to reach an agent.

What makes a great call center IVR script?
You don’t have to be a professional script writer to create a great call center IVR script, but you will want to know your customers inside and out to be sure that you’re offering a call center menu that truly makes their customer experience easier. The below steps will ensure you can prevent frustration with an IVR menu that works for you.
It keeps the customer experience at the forefront.
A great IVR menu is easy-to-navigate, with logical steps in the process related to your product. For some companies, this means a multi-level IVR with many steps before accurately routing to the correct agent or department. However, a high number of levels in your IVR can also lead to abandonment rates or zeroing out, where callers smash the zero button to skip the IVR menu and speak to a live agent.
It collects valuable information.
Whether simply account information or authentication steps, getting these steps out of the way early before connecting to a live agent helps ensure that the customer can receive immediate support.
A word of warning: customers report having to repeat information is one of the most frustrating parts of a support experience. When writing your IVR script, be sure to consider the entire experience and remove unnecessary burden from your customers.

DID YOU KNOW?
Visual IVR is a tool that connects your digital channels to your call center. It provides IVR menu options for users on your website or mobile app. Plus, businesses can set up pre-screening questions and escalate to a live agent before they connect with the user via scheduled call-back.

It’s optimized for self-serve routing.
Self serve routing gives your customers the ability to access basic information on their own. This in usually in the form of pre-recorded information on commonly asked questions, like your locations, business hours, return policy, or even current promotions. This setup frees your agents to deal with more complex queries.
This is a great feature to have, so if you do, be sure your script indicates a clear pathway to self-serve options. Callers should be crystal clear on their options between self-serve and connecting with a support agent.
It includes call-back options.
Long wait times? Giving your customers the option to schedule a call-back instead of sitting on hold allows them to not only go about their day, but reduces the stress of waiting in the process. This is a great option to include in your IVR to prevent caller frustration while still keeping their place in the queue.
If your phone system has this feature, your IVR script should include an offer for a call-back to a customer during an appropriate time in their journey. If you don’t have call-backs, consider a cloud-based solution like Fonolo, which is super quick to set up, scales easily with your business, and works with any existing phone system (no upgrades required!).
The ROI of Call-Backs for Your Call Center
Tips for creating your IVR script
What are your main call drivers? What teams do you have established in your call center? Are some agents better suited to deal with specific calls, or do they work as generalists handling all inquiries?
The way that your customers interact with your team, and the way your team is set up will determine the flow of your call center IVR menu. While you’ll want to consider the above functionalities in your call center script, there are some tips that you should also remember in order to get the most out of your menu and messaging:

Remember to have pre-recorded messages after each stage of menu selection. Any hold music you play should be quiet and inoffensive.
When recording your messages, consider opting for in-house recordings over automated voices for a more personalized experience. Use natural language in a conversational tone so customers feel more at ease.
Include answers to frequently asked questions right in your welcome greeting. Get feedback from your front-line team to make sure you’ve covered your bases.
Make sure to add KPIs around your IVR to your reporting & consistently check that your script remains easy to navigate and up-to-date by regularly testing numerous call flow scenarios yourself.

However you create your call center IVR script and menu, always keep your customers front of mind by putting yourself in their shoes to ensure that you’re offering an intuitive customer journey and you’ll have happy customers and therefore happy agents.The post Blog first appeared on Fonolo.

The virtual office skeptic says, “we can’t go fully remote, because the serendipity of personal connection is too important.” The theory goes that watercooler conversations and elevator encounters add up to an emotional bond. Add to that the happy coincidence of overhearing a conversation where you have something to add or seeing something on a colleague’s screen, and the case is made for bringing people back to a building.

Of course, what it overlooks is that in any building with more than 200 square feet of space, you’re only bumping into a tiny fraction of the people who work there. If they’re on another floor, or across the street, they might as well be in another country for all the serendipity that happens.

[I recently talked with a CEO who was incensed by the stories (hyped by the media) of people who had finagled their way to two full-time jobs while working remotely. Apparently, if you spend a lot of time managing your calendar, faking your zoom calls and living in fear, you can get away with it for a while. Perhaps one in a thousand workers pulls this off. Better to worry about embezzlers, I think, because if someone is focused enough to pull off the two-job trick, they’re probably aware that all of this energy is better spent in other ways. But I digress…]

The real challenge of remote work isn’t that it somehow erases the mysterious serendipity of magical office collisions. The problem is that making connections digitally requires enrollment and effort. If we do it with intent, it actually works better.

We can collaborate in real-time on shared documents with people we’d never be able to meet face to face.

We can have a six-minute impromptu brainstorming session and have it transcribed to a shared doc–anytime we have the guts to invite the right people to the right platform and say ‘go’.

We can share a screen when we get stuck, and we can share it not with the closest person, but with the best person.

And yes, we can deliberately take five minutes off to have a one on one conversation with someone at work about nothing in particular.

The real magic of connections at the office was that we were having these connections without trying. It’s not that they were better, it’s that they were effortless.

But they didn’t work for everyone in the same way. They often reinforced status roles and privilege. They were unevenly distributed and didn’t usually appear when we needed them. All of which added up to a new layer of stress for many people.

No, we’re not sharing donuts. But if we put in the effort, we can share more than that.

Whether you’re an emerging startup or an established business, you don’t need to reinvent the wheel here, a few industry standard metrics will give you a pretty good picture of where your business is heading, if measured regularly. We suggest measuring and tracking the following::
MRR (Monthly Recurring Revenue) – Refers to the number of active users on your platform that’ll be billed each month. MRR helps you predict exactly how much revenue you’ll earn monthly (helpful info for investors too, right?) ARR (Annual Recurring Revenue) – Multiply MRRx12 and you get the Annual Recurring Revenue. As the name suggests, ARR predicts the revenue you’ll generate yearly. Churn Rate – Divide the number of users lost by the number of users at the start period and you get your churn rate. Needless to say, a high churn rate isn’t good for business as it means you’re losing your customers. ARPA/ARPU (Average Revenue per Account/User) – Here you can calculate the average revenue per customer by dividing your MRR with the number of customers. LTV (Customer Lifetime Value) – One of the most important metrics, LTV tells you the average revenue generated by your customer over their entire journey with your business. (Customer revenue x customer lifetime) – cost of acquisition and maintenance will give you your customer lifetime value. Or, you can ‘ARPU/ Customer Churn Rate = LTV’ it. CAC (Customer Acquisition Cost) – CAC tells you the cost to acquire your customer and how much value they bring to your business. Divide your total sales and marketing expenditure by the total number of customers acquired during a specific period and you get your CAC. LTV:CAC Ratio: The metric that predicts whether your marketing efforts will go in vain or not, the LTV:CAC ratio tells you the lifetime value of your customer over the cost of acquiring them. Your customer lifetime value should be three times the cost of customer acquisition. If your LTV:CAC ratio is 3:1, you’re doing your business right.
While these are just some of the metrics, there are a few advanced metrics that narrow down on where and how you can improve your business strategies for optimum growth. Maybe tomorrow I can discuss the advanced stuff with you.
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They’re related.

Management isn’t. Management uses power and authority to get people to do tasks you know can be done. Management is needed, but management is insufficient.

Leadership is voluntary. It’s voluntary to lead and it’s voluntary to follow. If you’re insisting, then you’re managing…

And creativity is the magical human act of doing something that might not work. If you know it’s going to work–then it’s management.

Akimbo (a now-independent B corp that is pioneering cohort-based learning) has proven that creativity and leadership can be learned. They’re learned by doing, not by lectures.

Consider the legendary altMBA, now in its sixth year. The First Priority Application Deadline is tomorrow, September 7th for altMBA’s January 2022 session. Learn to lead by doing the work.

And I’m excited that the fifth session of the Creative’s Workshop, which inspired my book The Practice, begins September 28th. You can sign up and find details at this site. It’s a place to find the others, to share your work and most of all, to learn to see your creative practice in a powerful new way.

Many people return to work with and learn from their peers again and again. Check out what they’re building at Akimbo…

The Rolodex and the Filofax disappeared a while ago, but we’re still not all using the tools that make it easier to coordinate people and time.

I use Calendly to book various kinds of 1 on 1 discussions. I set it up to have access to certain windows in my calendar. Then, I just send the link (for example, to the 15-minute zoom call) and the other person can pick any time that works for them. Done. No back and forth.

I use Streamyard to have conversations with one or two people that can be recorded or broadcast live on social media. This is a great substitute for a live Zoom meeting where you’re asking your entire team to watch a conversation as it happens. By sending them a recording instead, they can watch it at their convenience and even speed it up or watch it again.

I have found that Doodle saves a ton of time when you’re trying to organize five or ten people to a coordinated live meeting or call. Instead of the endless circle of guesses, there’s a simple grid and people vote for what’s workable. It’s still not seamless, but it works.

Shared workspaces like Google Drive and Lucid are a dramatic improvement over sending docs and back and forth. There’s really no comparison.

And Zapier is next-level when it comes to moving information, regularly, from one digital silo to another. It takes a few minutes to set up, but then saves a huge amount of time, allowing you to get back to what you’re really here to do.

Also Figma, which is generally used for laying out websites but is a powerful tool for graphic collaboration. If you’re a Figma nerd, please let me know via this form. Thanks.

Don’t forget Discourse, when you and a group are ready to get serious about developing ideas and discussion in scalable ways.

Cooperation, connection and the power of being in sync is getting more important every day. We do better together.

Then improve it.

Then write something else.

Repeat this process until you have a post.

Then post it.

Then repeat this process.

There’s no such thing as writer’s block. There’s simply a fear of bad writing. Do enough bad writing and some good writing is bound to show up.

And along the way, you will clarify your thinking and strengthen your point of view.

But it begins by simply writing something.