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Here’s a prediction for 2023: CCaaS is dead, long live CX. That’s literally one of the biggest contact center trends for 2023 on our radar.
It may seem dramatic, but that’s the reality of where the market is going, especially after everything we’ve seen in the past year as more companies moved away from CCaaS towards CX solutions.
Here’s more on what we’re seeing in the market right now.
Move Over CCaaS, It’s All About CX
Contact Center as a Service (CCaaS) is an all-in-one solution that helps businesses outsource their contact center operations. From virtual agents to AI automation and intelligent chatbots, CCaaS is all about doing more with less.
Like other service technology solutions, CCaaS has grown over the past few years. A recent study from Fortune Business Insights indicated the CCaaS is currently experiencing lower than anticipated demand compared to pre-pandemic numbers.
So why are businesses focused on a broader CX conversation rather than just CCaaS?
It isn’t about one technology over another. CCaaS is a component of CX.
The reality is that the customer journey has evolved, and more sophisticated solutions are required. Customer Experience (CX) builds on the legacy of contact center, and more recently CCaaS, by looking at the end-to-end experience across all channels.
The pandemic completely changed the face of the contact center. As industry analyst Jon Arnold explains in an article on No Jitter, many markets face intense competition, and they need to evolve beyond providing customer service using CCaaS. The shift is to a holistic approach to CX where customer service is only one piece of the puzzle.
Unlike CCaaS, CX is not just for when the customer has a problem and needs to reach customer service. With CX, any journey your customer has with the organization, from marketing to technical support, needs to be included, and offers organizations to drive value.
As a result, CX is quickly becoming a must-have for businesses of all sizes. (This is exactly why Bridgepointe recently acquired CX consulting services firm PPT Solutions.)
When you look at contact center trends 2023 and this move towards CX, this results from a bigger “appification” trend. Customers now expect seamless conversations with a business that are easily accessible through an app.
Customer experience is no longer just about taking calls or interacting with chat in a contact center. It’s about building better experiences for customers to connect with the company through their preferred medium of communication — whether it be chat, text, or emailing.
More businesses view contact centers as costly endeavors that are unnecessary for most customer touch points. The idea is to focus on helping customers instead of investing in building out a contact center.
CX solutions are also an excellent way for smaller organizations to implement more minor changes that improve customer experience. Organizations that didn’t traditionally have contact centers, either because of cost or because their organization wasn’t large enough to necessitate one, can still implement CX solutions.
Tools like AI analysis of customer reviews and Interactive Voice Response (IVR) are lightweight and easy to implement.
Like all tech solutions, CX is best applied intentionally and takes into account the unique needs of your business.
4 Things to Consider for Your CX in 2023
Before jumping on contact center trends 2023 — like evolving from a CCaaS to a CX approach — your organization should consider these four questions.
#1
Who’s Your Customer?
Technology has enabled customers to contact businesses in many mediums, but it doesn’t mean that all customers view communication the same. Do your clients tend to be older? Younger? What are the ways they usually communicate?
For example, it might not be the best idea to eliminate phone call contact if your customer base struggles to communicate via an app, or text.
#2
What Can You Automate?
The best way to get value from your contact center solutions is to ensure that your technology is automating time-consuming and menial processes. Ask yourselves what processes could be automated.
Look first at automation options based on popular customer requests. For example, if you’re in online retail, your customers might commonly ask, “where is my order?”. CX can automatically send tracking information when a customer asks this question.
#3
What Will You Need in the Future?
One of the biggest draws of CX is that it’s simple and relatively cost-effective to get started. While we don’t recommend purchasing solutions you don’t need, it’s essential to consider your future needs when choosing a CX solution.
Choose a provider that offers functionality beyond what you require today, so you can add to your tech as you grow instead of starting from scratch every few years.
#4
Do You Need Custom Solutions?
How to connect with your customers may seem like a complicated problem that requires custom solutions.
We often see this when speaking to clients as they think their situation is unique.
The good news is that in most cases, their needs fall into one of two categories — service or sales.
Based on what your company does, you’ll want to look for CX solutions that fall into one of these categories. You may be surprised just how useful “out of the box” solutions are without needing costly customization.
Looking ahead to 2023, the market will continue to evolve and change, but of all the contact center trends 2023, CX is here to stay and CCaaS is on the way out.