There’s a common misconception that the sole purpose of automation is improving profitability. While RPA can improve business processes and create a more profitable organization, it offers several benefits for customers as well.
Here’s how RPA can actually improve the customer experience to improve brand loyalty and reduce churn rates.
Reduced Service Wait Times
One of the overarching benefits of incorporating RPA is reducing service wait times. NICE suggests incorporating RPA into call center setups, so customers spend less time on hold by helping agents find solutions faster and providing information prompts to enhance each conversation. This form of hyper-personalization can also help build trust with customers, so they feel like more than a number.
Incorporating RPA also allows companies to create an omnichannel customer service approach while allowing for self-service. Incorporating self-service initiatives lets customers find the information they need quickly without contacting a customer service representative. Automated tools like chatbots can also reduce calls by answering FAQs.
Simplified Feedback Requests
You cannot understate the value of capturing customer feedback. Customers respond well to feeling heard and valued. This feedback can also shape future initiatives and bolster data-driven decision-making to improve the business.
Implementing RPA can help create customer feedback flows that automate requests after an inquiry or call. Companies can use automated feedback requests at various points throughout the customer journey to help pinpoint friction points and identify bottlenecks.
For example, a hotel can request feedback on the booking process, initial impressions of the check-in process and the room, and the overall stay. Implementing an automated flow with time or task triggers makes this data collection process simple and cost-effective.
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Streamlined Onboarding
Some products or services have a learning curve and require client onboarding. This point of the customer journey is crucial for improving customer adoption so they continue to engage with your service. Suppose you offer project management software, which is designed to make an entrepreneur’s life easier. A convoluted onboarding process that makes the initial software setup challenging will make your new customer less likely to stick around.
Creating automated flows and prompts to ease the learning curve of your product will help improve the customer experience, thus improving retention.
Proactive Customer Service
Recently, there’s been a shift from the reactive customer service model to a proactive one. Traditionally, customer service opportunities occurred when a customer experienced an issue and calls for help. With this new model, companies strive to anticipate issues and offer solutions before they occur.
Consider the project management software example. Rather than waiting for an overwhelmed trial customer to reach out for support, proactive customer service would have someone reach out to them to see how they can help. This process can be accomplished with an automated email flow or scheduled prompts to notify a customer service rep when they should be reaching out. Without automation, proactive customer service would be infeasible for most businesses.
Consistency and Scalability
Every company experiences growing pains as it expands and evolves. The key is preventing those growing pains from extending into the customer experience.
Incorporating automated processes helps improve business scalability while creating consistency for customers. The goal is to ensure they have the same quality experience whether you have two customers or two thousand.
Incorporating automated tasks in order processing provides consistent customer service during peak periods, like the Christmas holidays. Consider a company trying to manually print out shipping labels for each order versus one that has an automated system to bulk print at the end of each day. Even the smallest task becomes more arduous on a larger scale; automation can help prevent that issue.
The thought that automated processes take away from the human side of a business is a myth. Incorporating RPA allows your employees to do their jobs better while providing a streamlined customer experience, improving satisfaction on both ends.
