Digital Transformation Examples & Strategy

Digital Transformation Overview

Imagine a world where your internal systems and processes are a business enabler of speed and agility, not a brick wall that slows you down and makes you climb over.

Imagine a world where your products and services are instinctively aligned to your customer’s wants and needs and in the hands of your customers ahead of your competitors.

Imagine a world where your customers are so delighted by their intuitive experience that their loyalty organically spurs growth and brings in new customers.

We believe those worlds exist, and the genesis is Digital Innovation. Digital Transformation was essential to agility and competitive advantage during the COVID-19 pandemic of 2020. As we advance, Digital Innovation will be the decisive factor of business growth and sustainability.

Digital transformation is an ongoing process to transform and improve business performance by changing the way a company thinks and operates. Digital Innovation is that spark of creativity that leads to leap-frogging development of new technology or innovative applications of existing digital technology that places you ahead of your competition.

Three key areas to look for impactful Digital Innovation are:

1. Internal Processes
2. Products and Services
3. Customer Experience (CX)

Optimization through innovation in Internal Processes often provides savings to fund growth and raise the quality of internal and customer support. But innovation in CX positively and immediately impacts the business, which will be the focus of this article.

Consider this use case of an insurance provider:
The Director of Customer Experience at ABC Insurance imagines a world where:

• Every call is answered in less than 5 seconds, and customers end the call satisfied
• Every call is secure with strong authentication to identify the caller properly
• Callers (if known – your customer) are greeted by name (personalization) and asked the nature of their call based on the most recent transaction conducted, i.e., “Hi Jim, are you calling about order #1234?”
• Callers (if not known – a new prospect) are warmly greeted with “Thank you for calling ABC Insurance. How may I help you today”? enabling the caller to express their intent and be directed immediately to the right resource.
• Agents are fresh, trained on upsell opportunities, tuned in to the customer’s needs, and bring in revenue

But the gut wrenching reality is:

• The average answer time is 2 minutes
• The abandon rate is 16% which equates to 16% opportunity loss
• Authenticating a call takes 2 minutes, frustrating customers – particularly repeat customers – and robbing agents of productive time
• The agent attrition rate is over 35%
• Upsell revenue rate is decreasing

Digital Transformation Strategy

The three stars that need to align to drive Digital Innovation within CX are People, Process, and Platform. However, it starts with People, but it’s not that simple. Innovation is akin to dreaming and imagining a world that doesn’t exist yet.

We often encounter an IVR that was designed many years ago based on the best technology had to offer at that time. Then when we sit down to reengineer an intuitive customer experience based on the vision of the ideal CX we have imagined, we are met with:

“We can’t change that flow; that’s what our customers are used to. They won’t know where to go. They will think they called the wrong number.”

To get past these CX limiting beliefs, New Era advocates for building a team with members from across the organization who can bring a fresh perspective and aren’t weighted down with blinder creating day-to-day fire drills, or limiting beliefs about the way business has always been done. Doing so will bring a positive and fresh perspective where the natural inclination will be to start with “Why”.

• Why does it take us 2 minutes to answer a call?
• Why are hold times so long? If the hold time is really that long, can’t we call them back at their convenience?
• Why is agent turnover so high?
• Why is the most common thing customers call about buried six levels deep in the IVR?
• Why can’t we treat a customer like a customer and personally greet them when they call?
• Why do we have an IVR? Can’t we simply direct our customers directly to where they want to go?
• Why do customers keep “0” ing out?
• Why don’t customers use our chatbot or our app?
• Why does it take 2 minutes to authenticate a caller?
• Why don’t we see higher revenues from our calls?

Digging into the “why” will uncover answers, many that can be addressed with these Digital Transformation examples:

• Long Hold times are majorly contributed to the 2-minute repetitive task of authenticating the user. Implementing a biometric voice tool can both increase security and improve CSAT – taking a 2-minute process down to <15 seconds
• Introducing a natural language call steering IVA allows every call to be answered immediately and directly routed to where it needs to go—no more “0” ing out.
• Agent turnover is high because there is burnout over repetitive tasks and not enough opportunity to do more meaningful revenue generating or problem-solving activities. By addressing the first two bullets above, agents now receive calls that are already authenticated and in their right skill group, making every interaction meaningful and impactful, thereby increasing AX and reducing turnover
• Last but not least, customers hate a multi-level IVR! An Intelligent Virtual Agent using Natural Language leads a customer through an interactive and intuitive satisfying experience, thereby increasing CSAT, revenues, and loyalty.

Simon Sinek, a recognized business optimist, recently posted on LinkedIn (September 7, 2021), “We have to dream. How else will we make a future that does not yet exist?”

If you can imagine it, tools exist that allow you to build it. Go ahead and dream!

New Era Technology Can Help!

If you are interested in learning more about how your organization can benefit from digital transformation, please email us at solutions@neweratech.com.