4 Ways Technology Can Help Increase Customer Engagement

Technology isn’t just changing the day to day of many companies by giving them the tools to be more efficient, it is also changing the way that companies engage with the customer. Prior to the Internet, customer engagement was fairly limited to the traditional forms of advertising and interaction. It used to be safe to assume that a customer made a purchase due to a flyer they received, or a referral from a friend or family.

Now, the definition of customer engagement isn’t static. It’s consistently evolving with the company and consumer due to new trends, technologies, and techniques. The broadest definition would be the interaction between the consumer and business through any channel that the business is on. Thanks to the Internet and technology, consumers can and do interact and engage with companies from anywhere and at anytime, 24/7.

Great customer engagement is not something you can just buy; it is a competitive advantage that can only be earned through continuous improvement and evolution. However, technology is one tool that can help you get there. Here are 4 ways technology can help to increase customer engagement:

1. Technology can help make customer experience more personalized. The new era of technology allows for ‘personalized marketing’. Personalized marketing is advertising to a consumer based on what their interests are – which are collected thanks to Internet cookies and browsing history. Take Amazon for example; if you’ve been searching for headphones for the past 5 minutes, the “recommended for you” section would most likely include headphones. This worked out well for the online retailer as it was able to generate an additional 10% to 30% more revenue. This is not only beneficial for the businesses’ bottom line, but it increases customer engagement. Due to this engagement strategy, 44% of consumers in 2015 started their product searches on Amazon.

Technologies, such as Liferay, allow you to tailor your website to the needs and preferences of each individual with targeted information and segment identification, giving your visitors exactly what they’re looking for. You are able to get a full view of your customers and personalize their experiences from start to finish.

2. Technology can help you to simplify processes. New technologies that compact and simplify complex functions are developed everyday. Implementing these new types of technology, such as a new portal technology, can help to make transactions, searches, or processes more efficient. A great example of this is the new ‘mobile cheque deposit’ feature that mobile banking offers. Prior to the widespread use of this feature, a customer had to deposit the physical cheque at one of the bank’s branches. The mobile cheque deposit feature simplifies the process of physically going to the bank to deposit a cheque to just taking a picture of it, regardless of your distance to the bank. This enhancement in customer experience will also lead to more engagement. Why? The customer is happier that a simple task is convenient and takes significantly less time. These processes could be anything from an online purchase to an email. Another example would be Amazon’s “one-click purchase” This simple improvement increases their engagement by drastically reducing the steps needed to order something which in turn improves the experience and simplifies the process.

The Liferay Digital Experience Platform’s modern interface, built-in features and easy integration helps you create portals that let your customers complete their transactions, access documents and get information online. For example, York University recently implemented Liferay technology to create a Portal for its students. It was flexible enough to implement many features in a fairly simple user interface such as financial account information, personalized exam schedules, and university news. The full case study can be found here.

3. Technology provides you with data to improve the customer experience. Most technology can be monitored in some way through some metric, such as time. Using just the time metric, you can assess what processes take the longest time and improve accordingly. These metrics can be extended to data showing a visitor’s complete journey through the portal or website, or where an individual spends most of their time, which can then provide insight into how to personalize the experience or make it more efficient (relating back to #2). Overall, it can help you improve and evolve the experience to match the buyer journey.

As Steve Jobs once said, “Get closer than ever to your customers. So close that you tell them what they need well before they realize it themselves.” The secret to customer engagement lies in the abilities to know your customers inside and out, predict their wants and needs, and build the entire customer experience around this information. With technologies such as Liferay, you can build a website that allows you to create and track highly targeted marketing campaigns that present the right message to your visitors at the right time, based on social profile, behaviour and browsing history. Taking advantage of this technology will help you to evolve and improve upon the customer experience based on the customer’s behaviour.

4. Technology can be a platform for you to help resolve customers’ problems, and provide convenience and control. Technology shouldn’t just be limited to assisting with the business’ day-to-day processes; it can be extended to help the business communicate with the customer. Recent statistics show that if you resolve a complaint in the customer’s favour, they’re 70% more likely to do business with you again. A online self-service portal keeps your customers engaged with your brand and website and allows you to manage customer relationships in a scalable way. Consider the facts below:

• 91% of survey respondents said they would use an online knowledge base if it were available and tailored to their needs (zendesk)
• 3 out of 4 consumers prefer to solve their customer service issue on their own (aspect)
• 40% of consumers prefer self-service over human contact (The Self-Service Economy)

There is a noticeable shift in consumers’ behaviour, and thanks to this portal technology, you will be able to react. From Omnichannel support to tracking the customers journey throughout to ensure they don’t have to backtrack in support when switching channels.  Overall, self service portals can provide your customers service on their own terms, make online answers easy for customers to find, and provide Omnichannel support.

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Taking advantage of technology, in some of the ways mentioned above, can help lead to great customer engagement, loyalty and retention. If you need help sorting through the many technology options, in order to find the right fit for your business, feel free to contact us!