Contact centers: creating an omnichannel strategy

By creating a more cohesive agent and customer user experience out of multiple touchpoints, omnichannel services reach the customer where and how they best want to be in contact and allows the agent to interact and gather customer data in an innovative way. 

Keep reading for an in-depth look at why omnichannel for customer service at your contact center is essential. And learn how your contact center can implement omnichannel for customer service through Microsoft Dynamics 365 with Mazars.

Importance of Omnichannel Communication for Contact Centers

Microsoft first introduced Dynamics 365 in 2016 and has built upon its features and functions for customer service, with regular release updates.  

Alongside the iterations of Omnichannel for Customer Service MD365, Contact Centers have implemented additional tools and technology including AI, improved cloud-based data tacking, up-time services, and more. The combined technology advancement efforts have bolstered the need for strategic ideation around of customer retention, agent training, and improved contact center customer service scoring.

The Customer Contact Week Digital Market Study Report: State of Contact Center Technology released in January 2022 highlights that 52% of surveyed contact center companies feel their technology could support the ongoing emergence of remote and hybrid agent workforces induced by the coronavirus pandemic. Balancing this promising statistic, survey respondents still note there are clear opportunities for improvement, with one-fifth of companies feeling unprepared for growth in self-service and agent-led digital interactions.

No matter what technology state you find your contact center in, utilizing Microsoft Dynamic’s Omnichannel for Customer Service can improve your company in two primary ways: customer advocacy and agent empowerment.

Strategic Omnichannel Deployment

The goal of Omnichannel for Customer Service with MD365 is to not have agents doing more work, but doing their work more efficiently. Why? Because customers are being served in a way that meets them where they are and want to be. Mazars contact center specialists see that it takes more than 6 minutes on average to handle each customer ticket from open to close. Either reducing that time down due to efficiency improvements or maximizing this time with the best possible solutions is key. And, having your agents knowing which avenue to pursue can lead to your agents being revenue generators.

Before implementing omnichannel for customer service at your contact center, it’s important to uniquely answer a few key points for your company:

1. What problem will your center solve with these omnichannel touch points?
2. Do your agents know what your customer funnel strategy is? (hint: coordinate with sales and marketing!)
3. How will the success of omnichannel be measured and improved upon?

Working with Mazars to onboard your contact center has never been easier. Mazars Microsoft Practice has the industry breadth and depth, along with Microsoft Solution specialists, needed to quickly implement Microsoft Business Solutions for you and your business.

By providing seamless channel integration, improved productivity, scalability solutions unique to your business, and real-time insights to hit your KPIs, Mazars enterprise for contact center is the right avenue to hit and improve your customer service standards.

List of Omnichannel Services within Microsoft Dynamics 365

It is no surprise that digital engagement volume has ballooned since the start of 2020, increasing customer contact-method volumes through social, live chat, chatbot, and email interactions. Phone is certainly not fallen to the wayside either, companies maintain significant call volume—a baseline service channel for contact centers since the beginning. 

 Mazars works directly with Microsoft and can implement any or all of their omnichannel services:

• Chat
• Voice 
• SMS 
• Social 
• Microsoft Teams

Mazars specializes in the AI component to your customer service outreach and customer data storage. With the right omnichannel strategy, your contact center can use Mazars-based AI recommendations through conversational context and transform reactive processes into proactive intelligence. 

Empowering Contact Center Agents 

The rise of AI is the leading cause for increased training for contact center agents, according to Contact Center Weekly Digital’s January 2022 State of the Market: State of Contact Center Technology report. These findings indicate that agents need to be able to better handle more complex interactions, more analytical and programmatic work, and improving collaboration across departments.   

Mazars has seen this to be true as well. Jeremy Querido, solutions architect at Mazars, shares, “Contact center agents need to have the single pane of glass viewpoint when working with customers. Fragmented data points will not suffice any longer. We need to shift our focus for agents to be proactive instead of reactive so they too can contribute to revenue generation.”

Empowering your contact center agents starts at the base of their role. The problem-solve-repeat cycle can, instead, be upcycled to allow agents to participate in company revenue goals by leading a customer through a service funnel that aids in customer retention, customer add-on service buys, and even gaining net new customers for multiple services/products. Customer tickets are an agent’s baseline, but it doesn’t have to stop there.

By meeting a customer where they are with an omnichannel strategy and providing an agent with new training and elevating their job purpose, your contact center can emerge as market leaders!

Mazars can join you on the journey to better customer service. Not sure where to start? Contact a Mazars Contact Center specialists now.

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