Many non-tech companies are early in their digital transformation journey. They know they must invest but it can be a daunting endeavor. However, Genesys senior Vice President and GM APAC Assaf Tarnopolsky said it can be a rewarding journey that delivers magical experiences.
Tarnopolsky spoke iTWire about how Genesys customers are transforming their customer experience. Genesys has an enviable position in the ANZ market – it is a well-known platform, with many clients in many sectors, and is a market leader. It has operated for over 30 years, with over 11,000 customers in over 100 countries. In Australia, Genesys has a strong presence in banking, government, telco, retailer, utility, and more. Its clients include Woolworths, Service NSW, Fonterra, TPG, and Vodafone among others.
Typically, Tarnopolsky explains, discussions about customer experience start one or two steps back — “a lot of client conversations are about a holistic digital transformation journey.”
He said the tech industry “may be saturated with these things, but many clients and key categories like banking, government, and retail are ahead of the curve on that digital transformation journey.”
|
|
They know they have to make an investment, but it can be scary, he said. “What should we do, how can we meet customers where they are now, and what are their expectations of us in the ‘new’ era, after COVID,” are some of the questions Tarnopolsky receives, citing world is already talking about a “new era” of customer experience and digital transformation; now with COVID and its impact on the planet, we are in a “brand new era,” he said.
It’s also important, says Tarnopolsky, to understand what you want to gain from digital transformation efforts. A number of organizations equate it with automation, and while there are many great automation tools, the conversation and focus should be more about “how to deliver magical experiences,” he says.
An example, he offers, is a voicebot Genesys implemented for Woolworths. It uses Google Cloud AI and processes “multiple calls,” cross-checking products, tracking orders, and processing refunds.
“It does a lot of things that customers want to do, but they don’t need to talk to a human to do them. This means that the ‘people part’ can be reserved for more complex cases,” he says.
It is a sign of today’s brave new world that customers have pushed organizations into new ways of doing business and thinking about business. For example, a retail organization may expect a certain amount of traffic in a day, and that number falls. However, the interaction didn’t change, it just went online. “The challenges of scaling AI, and doing it in a way that makes sense have been pushed to the fore,” he said.
Having a decent website with some chatbot capabilities may have been enough in the past, but those companies that pivoted to create a great website and great chatbot to solve customer problems when they needed it – “they are the ones who have really stepped up and drawn a silver lining from the dark storm clouds we are facing,” said Tarnopolsky.
The changes that occur are not expected or necessary, but people – customers – are adaptable, and they are happy to serve themselves if given the opportunity. “A lot of value is driven when we give customers the opportunity, and enable the tech, to help them self-serve and solve problems, and have a human behind it,” he said.
And value is the key word there; it should be about value, says Tarnopolsky. “A pitfall is thinking that I can buy some tech, throw it at a problem, and it will solve that problem or save me time and money, and that’s it for me,” he says. “It’s a pitfall to view some of these features and functions as cost savers, not value drivers.”
“The customer experience is truly an experience, and we try to enable our customers to deliver a service and empathetic experiences to their own customers in a profound way that creates trust, stability, and good emotions. This is a strategic need for companies and is a huge value enabler,” he said.
Tarnopolsky explains that he once heard a CX guru say “it’s like walking down an escalator; The customer experience is always at the level of the last bad experience they had so you’re always going up that escalator trying to keep up with the last level” – but “you have to think about that ongoing journey. You should think about value orchestration and value for customers, rather than cost savings.”
The key advice, Tarnopolsky offers, is to “remember automation is not magic. AI needs to be made relevant by delivering empathetic experiences to customers and employees, and recognize that you’re looking for results.”
“Integrate the business deeply to understand what it’s trying to accomplish, so technology is provided and woven into the company’s CX infrastructure to drive these results.”
“CX is really a business necessity and the companies that get it right will stand out from the pack,” says Tarnopolsky.