7 Best Practices for Elevating the Customer Experience with Unified Communications (UC/CX)

In today’s rapidly evolving business and technology landscapes, delivering exceptional customer experience (CX) is crucial for companies of all sizes and industries. For many organizations, the challenge lies in effectively managing customer interactions across multiple touchpoints while maintaining consistency and quality, and without creating an unwieldy technology environment.  

Unified Communications (UC) and Customer Experience (CX) technologies have emerged as a powerful solution to revolutionize CX, enabling businesses to meet and exceed customer expectations in innovative ways never before possible. In this post, I’ll explore how IT professionals can leverage UC/CX to enhance their customer experience strategies to drive growth and loyalty while streamlining operations. 

The Growing Importance of Customer Experience (CX) Across Industries

Recent studies highlight the critical role of CX in business success and underscore the need for organizations to prioritize CX as a key differentiator:

• 81% of companies view CX as a competitive differentiator.¹
• Organizations that lead in customer experience outperform laggards by nearly 80% in revenue growth.²
• 73% of customers point to experience as an important factor in their purchasing decisions.¹

These statistics paint a clear picture: customer experience is no longer a luxury but a necessity. The impact of CX on a company’s bottom line is undeniable, with customer-centric businesses being 60% more profitable than their non-customer-centric counterparts. Moreover, brands that provide a positive customer experience earn an estimated 5.7 times more revenue than competitors who fall short, and it’s estimated that 64% of customers will switch to a competing brand after just one bad experience.³

Best Practices for Leveraging UC to Enhance Customer Experience (CX)

1. Implement Omnichannel Communication

Modern customers fully expect to engage with businesses on their terms, no matter what industry you’re in. The consumer/retail world has set a new bar for business interaction, making a robust UC/CX solution essential to allowing customers to change channels effortlessly and on demand.

Actionable Steps to Implement:

• Assess your current communication channels and identify gaps.
• Choose a UC/CX platform that supports omnichannel integration (e.g., Vonage, Dialpad, Nextiva, Microsoft Teams, Cisco, RingCentral, and others).
• Develop a phased implementation plan, starting with core channels, to minimize business disruption.
• Train your staff on the new system and establish best practices for channel management.
• Consider leveraging an expert partner in your platform evaluation process to mitigate risk.

2. Utilize AI-Powered Chatbots and Virtual Assistants (Where Feasible)

AI-powered assistants can handle routine inquiries, freeing up human agents to focus on more complex customer needs. This not only improves response times but also enhances the overall customer experience. That said, be aware that in some industries and use cases, chatbots may not be appropriate, or may cause customer confusion or dissatisfaction. Here again, leveraging a UC/CX expert partner may help identify when, where, and how chatbots will be a benefit versus a risk.

Actionable Steps to Implement:

• Identify common customer queries that can be automated.
• Select an AI chatbot platform that integrates with your UC/CX system (e.g., IBM Watson, Google Dialogflow, or Amazon Lex).
• Design conversation flows and train the AI model with your company’s data.
• Implement a feedback loop to continuously improve the chatbot’s performance and usability.

3. Leverage Advanced Analytics for Personalization

By harnessing the power of data analytics within your UC/CX platform, you can gain valuable insights into customer preferences and behaviors. This information allows you to tailor your communication approach, resulting in more meaningful and effective customer interactions.

Actionable Steps to Implement:

• Define key performance indicators (KPIs) for customer interactions.
• Implement analytics tools within your UC/CX platform (e.g., Cisco Webex Contact Center Analytics or Genesys Cloud CX Insights).
• Set up custom dashboards based on priority KPIs to monitor real-time and historical data.
• Use predictive analytics to anticipate customer needs and personalize interactions.⁴

4. Implement Video Conferencing for Enhanced Engagement

If you haven’t boarded this bus already, it may be time to begin leveraging video meetings which can significantly improve customer engagement, especially in complex scenarios or high-value interactions. They allow for more personal connections, better understanding of non-verbal cues, and more effective problem-solving sessions.

Actionable Steps to Implement:

• Choose a video conferencing solution that integrates with your UC/CX platform (e.g., Zoom, Microsoft Teams, or Cisco Webex).
• Ensure your network infrastructure can support high-quality video calls.
• Train your staff in best practices for conducting effective video meetings when appropriate.
• Offer customers the option to schedule video calls for complex issues or consultations to improve engagement, communication, and speed resolution outcomes.

5. Utilize Screen Sharing and Co-browsing Features

These features enable your support team to guide customers through complex processes, demonstrate product features, or troubleshoot issues more effectively. This visual approach can greatly enhance customer understanding and satisfaction. Using co-browsing, the support agent can see the customer’s screen and guide them through filling out complex fields, highlighting where to click, and explaining terms in real time without taking control of the customer’s device.

Actionable Steps to Implement:

• Select a UC/CX platform with robust screen sharing and co-browsing capabilities.
• Develop guidelines for when and how to use these features during customer interactions.
• Train your support team on the effective use of visual aids during calls.
• Implement security measures to protect sensitive information during screen-sharing sessions.

6. Implement Contact Center Integration

This integration enables seamless escalation of customer issues from self-service channels to live agents, ensuring a smooth transition and preserving context throughout the customer journey.

Actionable Steps to Implement:

• Choose a contact center solution that integrates with your UC/CX platform (e.g., Five9, Zoom, Dialpad, Genesys Cloud CX, NICE CXone Mpower, and others).
• Map out customer journey touchpoints and identify integration opportunities.
• Implement skills-based routing to direct customers to the most appropriate agent.
• Set up unified reporting and analytics across UC/CX and contact center platforms for an integrated view of operations, and to pinpoint areas for specific troubleshooting when needed.

7. Leverage Presence Information for Improved Responsiveness

Presence information allows for more efficient call routing and quicker response times. This feature ensures that customers are connected with the right person as quickly as possible, reducing wait times and improving overall satisfaction.

For example, presence information can reduce wait times and improve satisfaction by identifying an existing customer with an urgent technical issue and then immediately routing the call to the correct technician for faster resolution.

Actionable Steps to Implement:

• Configure presence settings within your UC/CX platform to accurately reflect employee availability and support escalation protocols.
• Develop guidelines for updating presence status and handling customer inquiries.
• Implement intelligent routing based on presence information and agent skills.
• Use presence data to optimize staffing levels and improve overall responsiveness.

In the end…

As customer expectations continue to evolve across industries, businesses should adapt their CX strategies to stay competitive. Unified Communications technologies offer a powerful set of tools to enhance customer interactions, streamline communication processes, and deliver personalized experiences at scale. It also empowers businesses to create more meaningful, lasting relationships with customers, driving loyalty and business growth in an increasingly competitive world.

For IT professionals responsible for UC/CX technologies, the key to success lies not just in adopting these technologies, but in strategically integrating them into the overall CX strategy. As you embark on this journey of transformation, consider partnering with experienced technology solution providers who can guide you through the implementation process and help you maximize the value of your UC/CX investments.

Let’s talk

Discover how Unified Communications can drive growth and loyalty. Contact us at (800) 544-8877 to elevate your CX strategy today!