The days of a single consumer channel are long gone. Today, the customer journey is defined by an omnichannel shopping experience that allows consumers to choose when, how, and how often they interact with companies. But an omnichannel experience isn’t just about creating a more convenient shopping experience by meeting customers where they are—it’s also smart business. In 2020, U.S. omnichannel consumption grew by 50%, and nearly half of all consumer goods purchases were made via e-commerce.¹ While the pandemic contributed to that rise, it is also a result of the shift to a digitally-driven shopping experience. Even as the world began to open up, industries across regions continued to experience an average 20% growth in “fully digital” users in the six months ending in April 2021, continuing the growth experienced during the pandemic.² With the ability to shop across multiple sales channels, including online, social, mobile, and brick and mortar stores, contact centers need to support consumers through a seamless and holistic shopping experience that’s channel agnostic.

The omnichannel contact center

In the past, the customer journey was led by the person a shopper met when walking into a store. Today, the journey can be customer initiated, beginning when an order is placed online or through a mobile app. A confirmation email continues the journey and creates opportunities for additional customer engagement—and a positive customer experience. This includes inquiries about shipping dates, the status of a return or exchange, questions about assembly, and more. When a customer continues to engage along that journey—through a phone call, live online chat or chatbot, or email—they want an experience that builds upon a previous interaction. Unfortunately, more than half of customers say they have to re-explain their issues when they call for help or an answer.³ The omnichannel contact center needs to follow customers throughout their journey, ensuring that communication is cumulative, regardless of the channel utilized, to ease the burden on customers and create a consistent and seamless experience in real time.

Enabling a more efficient, real-time contact center experience

The very nature of the digital customer journey creates contact center complexity. Multiple communication channels, disparate systems. and escalating customer demands put even more pressure on agents to provide answers faster and with less friction. It’s no wonder 63% of agents say it’s difficult to balance speed and quality in today’s contact center environment.⁴ And, even as digital continues to play an increasing role in the customer journey, 89% of consumers say the phone will always have a customer service role.⁵ Unlike text, email, or web channels, the voice channel can make gathering data especially challenging in situations that require agent responses in real time. Examples:

• Identifying when a customer brings up a competitive offer so the agent can suggest an alternative that may excite the caller
• Recognizing opportunities to recommend a new product based on information gleaned during an interaction, such as a customer who calls to ensure their credit card will work on a honeymoon trip who may also need home or life insurance after their wedding

So how can contact centers transform to meet the needs of omnichannel consumers and meet customers along their digital journey? By implementing a solution that supports:

• Real-time capabilities that put information and customer context at the agent’s fingertips fast to enable better informed and more responsive service at the point of contact
• Increased self service that enables customers to get answers, updates, and access anywhere, anytime
• Automation that can help an agent identify who the caller is, what their journey has been up until that point, and, if there have been actions taken, what the customer is likely calling about—before an agent engages with them.

Gridspace is transforming the modern contact center

Gridspace helps solve the challenges facing today’s omnichannel contact centers with solutions that enable agents to react to customers in real time, free up agent capacity with automation, and drive up performance with actionable and accurate data. Now you can have an omnichannel contact solution that:

• Provides real-time visibility into each and every interaction.
• Resolves calls with live agent guidance.
• Reduces handle time with smart triage.
• Authenticates agents and callers through an entire call.
• Automates the discovery of emerging issues and trends.

And, our integrations with third-party systems, such as CRM platforms, bring data into various channels and present it effectively so it improves customer experience and the digital customer journey.

• 1. The Nielsen Company, Nielsen Omnichannel Shopping Fundamentals, September 2020.
• 2. Hajiro, N, Hjartar K, Jenkins P, Vieira B, What’s next for digital consumers, McKinsey Digital, May 2021.
• 3-5. Salesforce Research, State of Service, 4th Edition, 2020.