Expert Insights: Why "Cross Channel" is the Key to Customer Centricity

The following is an excerpt from CMIQ's Executive Report on Multi-Channel Customer Management. In addition to analysis of the challenges, shortcomings and best practices associated with multi-channel customer experience strategy, the report also recaps--and investigates--the findings of CMIQ's exclusive survey of customer service, marketing and IT professionals.

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With customer preference at least relevant to the multi-channel discussion, if not its primary driver, businesses must recognize the reality that as interactions become more complex and communication forums become more varied, that preference could span multiple channels.

When it does, it behooves organizations to assure the customer can move between channels without interruption.

If customers are indeed looking for that seamless journey, they are certainly not receiving it in the status quo.

Even though more than 88.6% of respondents believe such cross-channel communication is at least somewhat important—and 59.1% call it "very important"—only 30.2% are actually making good on that directive in the status quo.

Recognizing the significance of this issue requires nothing more than a basic understanding of percentages. But for further elaboration on why a seamless cross-channel experience is so essential, we asked our panel of customer management experts:

Chris Ezekiel, Creative Virtual – "What if somebody starts a conversation on one channel
and wants to switch to another? Cross-channel interactions, we find, are becoming
increasingly important, especially within the banking, telecoms, travel and retail sectors.
After companies recognize the value of multi-channel they need to ensure their channel
strategy encompasses the scenario of customers moving from one channel to another."

Ian Jacobs, Genesys – "All [multi-channel communication] should appear seamless, just
one face to the customer."

Madelyn Gengelbach – "Once you get going, that type of silo approach to handling
multi-channel will begin to be a burden."

Ryan Hollenbeck, Verint – "Think about [the service experience] as [that of] one customer
and one company."

John Purcell, LogMeIn – "They’ll engage with you in several different ways before they’ll
pick up the phone. If we lose sight of who our customers are, beyond just gender, age,
ethnicity, and home address, we miss the road-signs telling us what they expect, desire,
need."

Ken Osborn, Oracle – "Information must be consistent, you cannot have [agents]
repeating information and preferences must be supported. I think that many companies
have taken the siloed view of channels, and this needs to be more coordinated."

Download the free Executive Report on Multi-Channel Customer Management