Showing posts with label customer service. Show all posts
Showing posts with label customer service. Show all posts

Friday, 11 October 2013

The benefits of effective enterprise communications: Part 2

This is the second and last installment in a series of posts about the benefits of effective enterprise communications. In today's post we will look at the importance of external communications and the difference mobile communication services can make.
 
Enterprises must communicate with people and systems external to the organisation – customers, suppliers, partners and other stakeholders. Its absence, or done poorly, can have a negative impact on the performance of the enterprise.

As touched upon in part 1, mobility is also adding another layer of complexity to enterprise communications. People move around. Fact. This makes them less accessible and more difficult to reach. By recognising and addressing this dependency on mobility, enterprises are able to perform better as they are able to communicate with people on the move, whether it’s a customer travelling on the bus or a supplier away from their desk at a meeting.

Mobile communications enable enterprises to reach more people and in turn, they are more likely to respond to messages. Think about it. When was the last time you did not have your mobile phone within 5 feet of you? We live in a society where more than half of people in the UK say they suffer from ‘nomophobia’ – the fear of being out of contact with mobile phones such as no signal and dead battery. For businesses, this is great as it means people are more accessible as they have their mobile in sight and studies show SMS messages have read rates as high as 97%. 

Communicating effectively with customers is an essential part of all businesses. The Department of Health published figures last year showing a total of 5.5 million missed patient appointments across the UK, potentially causing delays of treatment to others and wasting taxpayers' money. However, communicating with customers through text messaging has helped reduce the number of missed appointments. Records show that between April and December 2011 missed appointments fell by over 12,000 compared to the same period the year before.

NewVoiceMedia found UK businesses stand to lose a huge £12 billion every year as a result of poor customer service. Customer service was rated as the biggest influencer in customer loyalty by 34% of consumers. Enterprise (text) messaging can be used by customer service centers to increase efficiency and responsiveness as it reduces waiting times leading to higher customer loyalty and retention rates as well as reducing staff and resources required.

Logistics companies can also use enterprise (text) messaging to inform customers of the status of their deliveries. Such communication not only gives customers a greater certainty over the order, but it can also significantly improve the management of the logistics chain, since the logistics firm can give a more detailed time frame for the delivery. This reduces the number of failed delivery attempts which from the carrier’s perspective wastes both time and shelf/van space and from the customer’s perspective improves the overall experience.

Read part 1 to find out about the importance of effective internal communications or learn more about how businesses are using mobile communications services by visiting our case studies.

For further information regarding HSL Mobile, visit us at:

follow us on LinkedIn, @hslmobile, Facebook or Google+

or call us on +44 (0)1506 605 260

or email us at sales@hslmobile.com

Thursday, 22 August 2013

Energy companies enhance customer service through mobile

With fuel poverty in the UK reaching all time highs, households continue to look for the best deal available in the market. However, it's extremely important that utility companies do not forget about customer service as this can be a key differentiator from the competition as well as an effective route to building customer loyalty and retaining customers.

 
Many utility companies have been criticised for customer service and recent Which? research revealed that only 6 out of 16 energy suppliers had an average waiting time of less than 2 minutes with one provider having an average waiting time of 17 minutes and 5 seconds. I imagine most people would be gritting their teeth if they had been on hold for this long and seeing red. One of the most frustrating experiences customers have is being left on hold and waiting for their call to be answered.

When it comes to valuing customers, Which? also found that providers were slower to answer calls from existing customer than new prospective customers. I suspect many people will not be surprised to hear this as when it comes to valuing existing customers from energy suppliers, expectations are pretty low.

Which? executive director, Richard Lloyd, stated: “If energy companies want to restore trust in the industry they must work harder to make people feel confident that customer service is a top priority, and stop putting sales over service.”

How can mobile help utility companies enhance customer service?

Mobile can be an effective way to reduce the number of calls made to customer service departments, helping improve call answer times and reduce the number of irate customers. For example, SMS can be used for sending information regarding outages ensuring that when customer service is affected, they are notified immediately and are kept updated as to when the outage is expected to be fixed. This helps greatly reduce the number of calls made to customer service departments, as well as managing expectations of customers.

Another way of strengthening the customer relationship is by keeping utility customers updated as to when an engineer will be arriving at their premises. It can be very frustrating having to sit in the house unable to go out as you are unsure of when the engineer will be expected to arrive.

SMS messages can also be used for sending general customer information such as details about usage and billing as well as helping customers stay informed and in control of their accounts. Even better, by sending details about energy usage allows customers to monitor and reduce their consumption, leading to more content customers.

Severn Trent Water has recently become the first utility supplier to provide non-Direct Debit customers with the ability to pay bills via a mobile payment application - Barclays Pingit. This helps customers pay bills simply and easily, helping improve the customer experience even further.

Mobile is certainly helping utility companies strengthen customer relationships in a variety of ways. Find out how energy suppliers can use mobile communications to build customer trust or read our Utilities section to find out more.

For further information regarding HSL Mobile, visit us at:

follow us on LinkedIn, @hslmobile, Facebook or Google+

or call us on +44 (0)1506 605 260

or email us at sales@hslmobile.com