Credit, Collections & Insolvency News
We are living in a world where we are so connected that it can be annoying and even overwhelming. The amount of time we all spend on our phones is shocking a 2019 survey found people generally spend an average of three hours and 15 minutes on their phones every day, with the top 20% of smartphone users spending upwards of four and a half hours. As consumers, we are doing more and more on digital platforms and being exposed to lots of technology that make our lives a little easier, well in most cases.
With so much distraction it can be challenging to connect with customers, especially if you work in credit and collections. But over the past few years, there’s been somewhat of a sea change, the phone just isn’t what it used to be. Customers are responding less and less to the phone and the only way to succeed now is to lean into the paradigm. Look to engage with them in non-voice-to-voice conversations like conversational messaging that relies on the channels customers are primarily using i.e., SMS, WhatsApp, etc.
So, what has changed?
The rise of conversational interactions
…that is what has changed. Chatbots burst onto the scene and into most people’s consciousness in 2016 with a huge fanfare with analyst’s predicting the end of contact centre and everything being managed by bots, (ok probably a little bit too optimistic from some quarters). Others were more realistic. Chris Messina’s now-famous article ‘2016 will be the year of Conversational Commerce’ is where Chris first introduced the notion of businesses using asynchronous messaging, chat and voice, collectively known as conversational interfaces to communicate with customers. From that point of view, things have never been the same.
Messaging is where it is at
Messaging has grown exponentially. People message one another nearly 30 times more on messaging channels such as WhatsApp than they did on SMS. WhatsApp is just one channel, but their messaging growth from the start of 2019 to date is an example of the shift; going from 70 billion messages a day to 100 billion messages today, these are mind-bending numbers.
To put it simply “We don’t phone anymore”. The heads are down around the room, thumb-typing on smartphones as we respond to friends, family, our sports groups, and even some of the companies we buy from. With messengers, you are in control. That is why in credit and collections we have witnessed more and more customers willing to have those difficult conversations about money.
With asynchronous messaging customers can take the time to respond when it is right for them. Two customer messages one of our clients received tells its own story:
“SMS is really better for me always scared to talk on the phone in a situation like this”
“I must say it is easier to communicate this way as I am always at work which makes it difficult to talk on the phone”
Automation with Bots are mainstream, you just might not have noticed
Four years ago very few people had experienced any type of chatbot engagement. Most of us didn’t even know what they were. That has changed. Chatbots are a part of our daily lives. We don’t bat an eyelid now of we have a bot respond when we are ordering food. When you click on that webchat button on a website… that’s, well, that’s a chatbot too. It is probably one of the main innovations in customer self-service technology in the last number of years, yet we still think of it as “new”.
When it comes to messaging customers about payments and overdue accounts the use of automated chatbots bring a lot to the table. Not only do customers feel comfortable and engaged, but the engagement and efficiency gains for business are instant, our customer feedback is messaging is 3 – 5 times more effective at engaging their customers about the debts.
Movement restrictions forced customers to do more on digital platforms. There is an increasing desire for conversations that enable us to interact more naturally. Simple single-purpose bots were a good place to start but users and companies soon find themselves feeling a level of frustration and wanting to do more. This is where AI-powered chatbots come to the fore. Adding in natural language understanding and machine learning with a whole host of smart tools ensures that we can do more within each customer interaction. It understands if we have all the information we need to move to the next part of the service; it understands what our account details area and it guides the customer to a positive outcome.
What about humans?
Like everything in life conversations can get complicated. Deploying a bot to completely automate collections payments is not going to deliver the results every time. People get confused about choices, people get bored with systems, people have unique situations that are hard to design for upfront. Software alone can’t always discern context, but people are excellent at asking other people questions.
Every contact process should be able to blend bots and human agents seamlessly. Once an agent has done their part, they can then hand it back to the automated conversation to continue with the next part of the journey. If you can give your agents access to tools that help them engage more with the end customer, even better. Bots can even make your agents better with suggested responses and the best next steps.
Leading-edge companies are using bots so that at the right time, higher-value conversations can be routed to skilled agents, which in turn drives better outcomes. Knowing your customers, and which ones need to be responded to quickly, and understanding what information you need to serve them with, is as old as retailing itself. The problem is that we now have more customers than ever before and the standards that they expect are higher than ever.
There are so many elements to good conversational customer engagement ranging from good conversational flow design, exception management to ensure there’s seamless blending between bots and agents and using the right words personalised to each customer and their circumstances ensuring your messages resonate with them.
Chatbots and conversational technology makes it easy for people to engage and as humans we crave convenience, ease of use, and services that help us manage our relationships and commitments to others.
So it’s now time for you to take the next step.
*Mark will be part of a panel discussing Customer Engagement at the forthcoming Online Collections Technology Think Tanks. Join Mark on Thursday 16th September from 9.30 am.
