How use data to improve customer service

Kristina: InMoment suggests that brands aren’t using data correctly in customer service – why is that?

Kristi Knight, CMO, InMoment: There’s so much more that goes into the customer experience than the marketing teams control: service and support, in-store browsing and purchase, and actually using the product or service itself. There are a variety of ways to understand customer sentiment and motivations at those touchpoints. One of the most valuable tools to dig deeper, which is likely least understood and valued by marketers, is the rich unstructured data in Voice of Customer.

Voice of Customer (VoC) data includes direct feedback (what customers tell you via surveys, online chats, web forms, etc.), indirect (what they say about you to others, like posts in their own social channels), and inferred (the digital footprints customers leave when interacting online). Unstructured data like open-ended written and audio comments, social posts, agent notes, community posts and even video feedback, provide rich data infused with emotional impact.

Kristina: How can brands determine which insights are key to improving the customer experience?

Kristi: Think like a customer and be honest. There are some metrics that primarily serve marketers and our brand. They help us understand the types of channels, content, campaigns, messages and even product mix that sell more and do so more efficiently. Those are helpful.

Then there are the insights that get to the “why?” Why did customers give you a terrible review? Why a four instead of a five? Why don’t they return after the first visit? Why are sales dropping in a particular region? Why do customers browse your website, but rarely complete a checkout?

Kristina: How does knowing the Voice of the Customer help?

Kristi: Voice of Customer is designed to get to the root of that question, and in turn reveal what, where and how we can make improvements – from our customers’ perspective. One of the most valuable types of VoC data is the unstructured data found in comments, reviews and social posts, and video feedback. Think of this data as an always-on focus group, where we hear, see and understand how our customers really feel about their experiences with our brands and why. Vendor partners can help collect, analyze and report this data just like any other data, draw out trends, prioritize insights and get to the root of problems in real time.

Kristina: What can brands do to use this data to strengthen their brand?

Kristi: Used right, this treasure trove of customer data can greatly enhance our ability to understand whether our brand promise aligns with customer expectations, what differentiates our brand, how to most effectively approach them, as well as the “why” behind these insights to help us prioritize and target action. Beyond marketing, this data contains insights to improve the customer experience at other customer touchpoints. When we “own” customer experience, it is our responsibility to be both a consumer of this data to enrich our own understanding of our customers and a distributor to our colleagues across the organization.