Together with salesforce.com, this white paper lays out our strategy for social customer service and the need to realign technology and culture around the idea of becoming "customer obsessed."

1. Social Customer
Service
The Next Battleground
The Agile
Enterprise

2. The Agile
Enterprise
the power of the customer To compete in this new battleground, forward
thinking organizations are looking to align both
Your customers are mobile, connected,
their technologies and their culture around a
and social. They are interacting with your
more social vision of service. They are arming
business in new and powerful ways. They are
employees with tools that allow them to
empowered. This shift means that customer
collaborate across the customer lifecycle, and
service is playing a broader, increasingly
transform every department and customer
critical role in the battle for customer
touch into a high value communication that is
mindshare, share of wallet, and brand value.
“customer obsessed.”
Companies who aren’t building a customer-
centric approach and working to provide the Bluewolf is working with our clients to align
highest quality customer experience are failing their organizations around this powerful shift.
to optimize their business and potentially
putting their organization’s very survival How does one transition from a “cost
in jeopardy. to cover” model for customer service
to one that measures the overall “value
Research points to the importance of investing of service?”
in building a customer service organization
that is agile and able to respond to customer What employee skills and corporate
issues not only with speed, but with thoughtful culture must exist in a customer-
touches that provide that customer with value. centric enterprise?
Customer service is the next battleground
Helping clients answer these broader questions
in which companies must compete in
enables them to fully develop a more social
order to meet and exceed their customers’
approach to customer service.
expectations, or risk them taking their
business elsewhere.
the “value” of service
59% of customers will switch
Traditional customer service metrics measure
brands to receive better service.
time and money in hard and concrete
measures. But these measures, such as first
Up to 85% of your business call resolution and average handle time,
could be lost due to poor
no longer reflect the complete picture of
customer service.
customer service since the traditional phone
channels typically do not—and should not—
73% of customers have spent exist as the single point of service. e-Service
more with a company because technologies are being deployed to offload low
of a history of good customer level service problems, and boost a customer’s
service.
ability to find knowledge and answers directly
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3. themselves, also known as self-service outstanding customer service in a very
Leading organizations are
strategies. But beyond adding e-Service, a fully public forum. They can even turn customers,
combining traditional service
optimized social service strategy is enabled by and their broader network of connections metrics with emerging social
multiple service channels, allowing customers and followers, into powerful advocates support metrics to gain a
a choice to connect with companies where for their company and brand. In this new complete picture of customer
engagement with their brand.
they are, on their terms. world, customer service metrics must
evolve to measure social metrics such as TRADITIONAL CUSTOMER
Customer service is also evolving through
customer sentiment, conversation volume, SERVICE METRICS:
the skilled use of social media monitoring • Satisfaction metrics
likes, retweets, and net promoter score, in
where companies are increasingly listening, • Defection rates
conjunction with more traditional metrics, to
engaging, and responding to customers • First-call resolutions
gain the complete picture.
outside the domain of their service desk. Social • Average handle time
• Agent utilization
media channels can no longer be ignored Another powerful metric for service
• Cost to service customer
for customer service. Not only should they organizations to track and exploit is the
be an essential part of a company’s service ability for your team to cross-sell or up-sell
EMERGING SOCIAL
strategy, but social media monitoring offers customers to new or complementary products. SUPPORT METRICS:
powerful new ways for organizations to identify Turning a service call into a sales opportunity • Customer sentiment
new revenue opportunities, understand how can be tricky. When artfully executed (by • Self service usage
• Cross-sell/up sell rates
customers are connecting with a product or focusing on providing value to your customer),
• Conversation volume
brand, and how to quickly respond to a wide a service call can turn a previous cost center
• Likes, retweets,
range of product or service problems. into revenue generating business and can +1s, etc.
make service agents a hero, both to your • Net promoter score
20% of the Fortune 500’s 100 customer and to the organization.
largest companies engage
with their customers on creating a social service culture
Facebook.
Setting a new vision and metrics around
social service is an important step in
By 2014 refusing to
transforming customer service and enabling
communicate via social
channels will be as
your organization to succeed. But effective
harmful as ignoring execution depends on your organization’s
emails or phone calls ability to realign technology around your
is today. employees, empowering people with both the
tools and culture to service your customers
in new and more powerful ways. No longer
When used effectively, responding to do customer service agents alone own “the
customers through social media channels satisfaction” of customers. Every department
allows companies to take credit for their has a responsibility to the customer.
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4. Departments that used to operate more as Change management is a critical piece of any
individual silos need to collaborate and ensure successful deployment, and impacts the end
the end customer experience is consistent and user adoption of any new technology. Training
positive across marketing, sales, operations, and aligning employees to these powerful
and support. new technologies, and providing a defined
process for them to interact outside of their
3x as many internal departments early and often, is really what
resources are helps set your service strategy apart.
necessary to acquire Engaged, knowledgeable employees
a new customer than consistently deliver a better customer
retain one. experience. This translates directly to a
company’s bottom line, through both cost
Management’s task is to set a customer savings due to lower customer attrition rates,
focused culture in place. This must be backed but also through new sales, from either
up with streamlined business processes and effective cross selling or customers choosing
technologies that allow every employee to to spend additional money with brands that
collaborate around improving the experience provide a consistent, high quality customer
for customers. The processes should remove experience. When employees feel empowered,
barriers, streamline handoffs, and allow they can take ownership over the customer
visibility into how to improve and optimize interactions they have and work to establish a
performance ongoing. deeper customer connection. They can make
your customer more successful and engaged
A strong central CRM, such as Salesforce,
with your organization.
operating across the organization to track
a single system of customer truth, allows
everyone to be on the same page. When Engaged,
supported in customer service by tools such knowledgeable
as Service Cloud, Chatter, and Radian6’s employees deliver
Social Hub, your employees have the tools a better customer
they need to move and route customer
experience and close
information, collaborate and respond quickly
33% more deals.
around solutions, and communicate back to
customers both with speed and accuracy.
When organizations break down departmental
Technology is important. However, without
silos, the entire organization can work together
proper training, technology by itself will
to improve each customer touch point. When
not enable a social service transformation.
employees are engaged and empowered
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5. around a common purpose and given the As a global agile consultancy, Bluewolf
tools and training to streamline their efforts, provides consulting services across the
your organization will be able to propel your customer life cycle, IT resourcing, managed
business forward and compete in the new services and training. Trusted by businesses
social service battleground. in diverse industries, Bluewolf is translating
today’s unique business environment into
opportunities for growth. With Bluewolf,
choosing a partner businesses are able to deliver results that
Companies looking to reap the benefits benefit the customer, the workforce, and the
discussed in this paper should understand that bottom line.
success rests upon not only selecting the right
technology, but also the right partner to help
transform your organization. Business process
expertise and technical competence play an
important role, but of equal importance is
the cultural fit with an organization. When
selecting a consulting partner, be sure that
partner has a proven process to help you
establish your implementation requirements,
time-lines, and cost upfront. Also, look for a
proactive approach that identifies behavioral
and organizational factors that may impact
adoption. A true partner will listen carefully
and have the expertise to build a solution that
maps to your unique organizational challenges
and one that employees will actually use.
about bluewolf
Bluewolf has a dedicated consulting practice
around helping companies transform their
customer service desks. Our proven approach
and methodology help organizations set
their vision, implement that vision through
a combination of technology and business
process, and align their employees and culture
to this change.
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