Redefining Customer Engagement in a Mobile-First World
Many companies and organizations have finally seemed to grasp how important customer service is to their business and have taken steps to improve their customer engagement. Companies are starting to take advantage of the myriad solutions available to them to enhance their customer service—email management, agent desktop, knowledge management and others.
Just as these companies are getting a handle on today’s customer engagement strategies, they will soon have to make another adjustment. If companies wish to retain current customers and attract new ones, they must shift their focus from traditional customer service to mobile customer engagement.
The Growth of Mobile
Consumers are embracing the ease and convenience of anytime, anywhere access to the Internet from their mobile devices. According to statistics by CTIA—The Wireless Association, mobile use is predicted to grow rapidly in the next few years.
- By the end of 2014, mobile subscribers are expected to reach 7 billion users, almost the equal to the world’s total population, with 75% of users residing in developing economies.
- By the end of 2019, total mobile subscriptions are expected to grow to 9.3 billion. Global broadband subscriptions surpassed 2 billion in 2013, and are expected to grow by four times to 8 billion by 2019.
- Increasing by nearly 50% from 2013, Americans will have 34 million mobile broadband devices by the end of 2015. In 2014, consumers using smartphones to shop online represent 29% of all visits to commerce websites, a 42.7% increase from 2013.
- Commerce transactions completed via mobile phones and tablets are expected to rise to $114 billion in 2014, with two-thirds of purchases occurring via tablets.
- Sales via mobile phones or tablets will comprise 54 percent of the total $414 billion in ecommerce sales expected in 2018, reaching more than $223 billion.
Mobile-Only Access
Mobile is also expected to grow because, for some consumers, that is the only way they can access the Internet.
“The majority of constituents now have mobile phones, and oftentimes that’s their only access to the Internet,” said Calvin Rhodes, CIO for the state of Georgia in an interview with Government Technology magazine.
And Georgia is not alone. According to the CDC, 39.4% of US homes report having at least one wireless device and no landline telephone. Approximately 38% of adults (99 million) and 45.4% of children (33 million) live in wireless-only homes.
State-level estimates from the National Health Interview Survey, 2012, an analysis conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, found that Arkansas has one of the highest percentages of wireless-only households (at 49%). The fact that nearly half of the state’s population does not have a landline and gets online primarily through mobile devices was a major driver of Arkansas’ mobile-first strategy.
One of the driving factors behind the growth of mobile use is the ease of access to your favorite things online, such as movies and TV shows. Current 4G LTE networks allow for quick downloads of songs, albums and other entertainment. However, companies, such as Samsung, are currently exploring the possibility of 5G, which is estimated to be 1,000 times faster than current 4G LTE4. Being able to download an entire movie on your phone or tablet instantly could lead to even greater mobile adoption.
The Rise of Geolocation
As consumers continue to use their mobile devices for online shopping, finding the closest restaurant or looking up product information, companies are starting to use this information to their benefit by the process of geolocation.
When customers use their mobile devices to look up directions or search for stores, companies can use that information to send targeted offers to a customer’s mobile device, letting them know of specials in the stores closest to them.
In addition, a company’s mobile strategy needs to not only think about the customer, but also the employee. Mobile use in the workplace is also expected to add to the growth in mobile, with companies and organizations making use of mobile workers, field workers, store floor employees and others.
With a cohesive mobile employee strategy as part of your overall mobile strategy, employees can be more productive by performing a variety of actions while out of the office. Users can easily access their assigned cases and browse relevant high-level information on their cases. Users can open a case and see a list of possible case actions relevant to the type of case. Field workers can view existing notes and photos, add notes and photos, reassign the case to another queue or close the case. They can also plot their cases on a map, and determine how far they are located from current case locations.
Field employees can get real-time updates, and check their cases upon arrival at the service location to see if the case or work order is still in effect. If the case was closed while the employee was in transit, the employee can move on to his next assignment or the user can browse a list of available cases and choose to take an unassigned case.
All of this expected growth means that companies must prepare for this new mobile reality. Just as customers are embracing shopping from their mobile devices, they are also expecting to receive customer service on these same devices.
Soon, customers will expect that all of the key engagement channels are also available on a mobile device—email, social media, Web, chat, co-browse, virtual agents and even voice.
Customer engagement will also continue to transform to where it begins and ends on a mobile device. Omnichannel will expand to mean omnidevice, where an interaction begins, for example, on text chat on a mobile phone but will move to a different device, such a tablet, so video chat and co-browse can be executed on a larger screen. And, companies must also begin preparing for new forms of wearable mobile devices, such as iWatch, Fitbit, Google Glass and others that are coming soon.
Mobile-first appears to be here to stay. Companies must adapt to this new mobile reality to survive and thrive.
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