Winning the customer service rush during the holiday season

By Mark Abramowitz, SVP Marketing, Service Cloud at Salesforce

This holiday shopping season has been unlike no other as retailers faced new challenges, resulting in reimagined digital campaigns for Black Friday and innovative fulfillment solutions. Despite all the challenges and unknowns the pandemic created, the holiday shopping period has so far been a success, with global digital sales spikes of 30% on Black Friday and 18% on Cyber Monday compared to 2019, according to Cyber Week insights from Salesforce*. 

With these major shopping days behind us, some may understandably feel inclined to exhale just a bit, even if the holiday isn’t over. However, retailers should know we’re just now entering the second half of an unprecedented season: the customer service rush.

The customer service rush is nothing new. It happens every year during this time, but like the challenges retailers faced selling goods, they now find an equal challenge in helping their customers with questions, returns, and exchanges. In today’s competitive retail landscape, excellent customer service has become a competitive advantage - something that can set you apart, create brand affinity with customers and help you grow.

Salesforce just released its fourth State of Service report, which shows the challenges customer service professionals have faced this year, including surges in inquiries, transformations to distributed workforces, and new technology adoption to handle the increased demand. It also offers two clear strategies that have emerged during the pandemic to help businesses deal with an onslaught of enquiries across all channels: flexibility and a clear artificial intelligence (AI) strategy.

Businesses that have these two ingredients will not only find success this holiday season but will be better prepared to handle challenges in another year of uncertainty in 2021.

Flexible customer service will win customers

The pandemic has shown that customer service departments need to be more flexible with policies and enable agents to handle the complex issues customers are facing. A May survey found that flexibility was the top quality customers were looking for in service departments during the pandemic. With fewer storefront workers resulting in an increase in remote enquiries, customers are calling in with more ambiguous problems.

But even as the pandemic uproots norms across retail, customer expectations continue to evolve. Complex problems may require more complicated enquiry routing, but a full 83% percent of customers globally expect to interact with someone immediately when they contact a company, and 82% expect to solve complex problems by talking to one person, according to a related study of consumers and business buyers. To meet this expectation, flexible policies - for example, removing a managerial approval process for a return - allows companies to streamline processes and spend more time handling inquiries with empathy and care.

This flexible mindset can also be extended to the workforce to create practical solutions to handle the increased demand. However, challenges to customer service during the pandemic have shown the need for solutions that require more than just additional headcount.

As we look to 2021, with no expectation that customer service enquiries will slow down, fully prepared companies will have their agents working alongside AI tools for the best results.

A cohesive AI strategy enables flexibility

Three-quarters of global service professionals surveyed said managing case volume has become more challenging during the pandemic and 63% of global agents say it’s difficult to balance speed and quality. When implemented alongside agents, AI can help scale customer service organisations, providing the tools needed to handle increased case volumes and complex enquiries.

There has been much buzz around the use of AI in customer service, but we’re just now seeing the long-term benefits it provides. About 58% of global decision-makers say their organisation has a fully defined AI strategy — up from 39% in 2018. That near half-and-half breakdown may be the difference this season.

For the holiday, I’m not talking about any super complex AI either. More flexible customer service policies means less time for agents to do routine tasks - enter in data on the customer, look back at previous purchases, etc.

Here is where AI tools can step in. Automating routine tasks and getting them out of time-consuming spreadsheets helps agents focus on more important issues. The report uncovered that 77% of global agents agree that automating certain tasks allows them to focus on more complex work. AI can also help call centers optimise and scale efficiently. It ensures organisations are properly staffed and can develop better scheduling plans based on individual company needs. It can help you prepare for surges and account for employee time off. 

When a call centre is optimised and properly staffed, the quality of life for your agents’ increases. There’s less worry about being overwhelmed by enquiries and more time spent on the tasks at hand.

This combination of automating routine tasks and optimising the workforce enables the types of flexible policies customers have become accustomed to during this year.

Winning the rush

The customer service rush has already started. As your organisation handles enquiries this season, it’s worth asking yourself, “could we be more flexible?” and “could we use AI to help us scale?” If the answer is yes, consider the tools you will need to enable that flexibility and scalability. It could be the difference between winning customer loyalty and missing out on new opportunities.

*Black Friday is the Friday during the US Thanksgiving weekend. In 2020 it fell on 27 November. While other countries do not celebrate Thanksgiving, Black Friday has become a global sales phenomenon. Cyber Monday is the Monday after Thanksgiving, and fell on 30 November 2020. Cyber Week is the week beginning Cyber Monday, when retailers continue to offer discounts for some days after Cyber Monday.