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Digital-first strategy key to revolutionising CX


Johannesburg, 16 Aug 2021
Vishal Chopra.
Vishal Chopra.

Changes in customer behaviour and expectations are triggering a re-evaluation of customer experience strategies. Customer preferences are shifting towards brands that offer experiences that are deeply personalised and proactive. To meet this demand and keep operations streamlined, companies are turning to advanced digital technologies with embedded AI. This is proving to be a game-changer in creating experiences that delight customers and ensure their loyalty, which is vital in the highly competitive market. 

This is according to Vishal Chopra, Head of Marketing for APAC and MEA, who was speaking ahead of Freshworks’ first RE:SOLVE summit for digital-first CX, to be extended to South Africa and MEA this month.

“Research shows that the majority of customers prefer brands that offer proactive service and 75% expect customer service representatives to have context. While this may be unsurprising given the changing consumer market, our own research across more than 107 million customer service interactions also reveals that what customers say they want is not always the same as what they value,” says Chopra. “For example, customers value response times more than resolution times, and they are prepared to wait for 10% longer if this will deliver better quality interactions. With up to 70% of sales now coming through support channels, these findings have an impact on both retention and revenue.”

“Clearly, customer satisfaction improves when more channels are available – including live chat on websites, when their concerns are acknowledged and the agent is able to assist satisfactorily with fast and contextualised service,” says Chopra. "With ever-growing contact volumes, customer service teams need more support in delivering on customer expectations. AI and bots should be leveraged to support not just customer-facing interactions, but also to address behind-the-scenes processes such as automatically categorising tickets, onboarding agents and taking over repetitive tasks.”

Forrester says 70% of customers prefer a company’s self-service resources over other high-touch service channels. However, effective self-service demands more than simply keying in a number to select an option. According to Freshworks, low code/no-code AI platforms that help teams build intelligent bot workflows that keep improving can revolutionise the customer experience.

“If the AI platform comes with open APIs that can fetch information from multiple sources, you can arm bots with context to provide personalised responses throughout the customer journey and across the query life cycle. Bots can be deployed to resolve level one queries such as store operating hours, through to the status of orders or refunds, and to supporting customer service agents,” says Chopra. 

RE:SOLVE, APAC & MEA’s biggest summit for digital-first CX, will be held across India, Middle East, Africa, South East Asia, Australia and New Zealand on 26 August 2021. This event will highlight the tools and approaches for impactful digital-first CX, and how market leaders such as MultiChoice and MTN have disrupted CX with a digital-first strategy, to achieve exponential growth for their businesses.

For more information on RE:SOLVE and to register for this event, go to https://bit.ly/ITWxRFW_AR.

Vishal Chopra's Bio:

Vishal Chopra is a seasoned SaaS and B2B marketing leader with experience in generating leads and acquiring business in North America, the Middle East, Africa, and APAC markets. He enjoys the most complex part of his job which is marketing with numbers, particularly those in digital marketing, funnel performance, and regional strategy. In his 15 years in marketing, Vishal has developed numerous winning strategies, successful cross-functional & cross-border teams, and effective programs.

In his current role as Head of Field Marketing, APAC MEA at Freshworks, he owns the strategy and programs to acquire new customers and expand into the current base across four major regions: India, MEA, ASEAN, and ANZ.

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