Prepare for the Proactive CXM of the Future

Today, enterprises are struggling to keep up with the ways consumers are accessing their products, through physical and digital channels. CXM (Customer Experience Management) often remains siloed within the organization, in marketing and customer service. It tends to remain reactive — dealing with problems presented to them instead of identifying progressive strategies that create a positive experience. So, according to Jayakrishnan Sasidharan, vice president & Global Head, Business Collaboration, Content and Customer Experience, for Wipro Business Applications Services, enterprises must prepare for the next generation of CXM, which integrates consumers, retailers and suppliers

By 2018, the next generation CXM will be proactive and engage the entire organization. It will strive to understand what customers are thinking and provide a consistent brand experience in all available channels.  According to Sasidharan, CXM in the future is about “channel independence.” Customers will use the channel of their choice to interact with the brand.

CXM adoption has been siloed, on a single channel focusing on product-based interactions and with customers. Recently, it has evolved to incorporate multiple channels and mature from being transactional to being interactive. But, many organizations have not transformed their customer experience.

“The next generation CXM will put customers first to drive customer satisfaction. It will engage them proactively before the product is purchased, and long afterward, to understand what they are thinking and create market-relevant products,” he said.

In fact, Sasidharan sees four trends that global enterprises are grappling with and how digital advances will affect the next generation of CXM including:

Engaging the customer proactively. Enterprises want to move closer to the customer with interactions that occur before the product is consumed. Future CXM will make that engagement event-driven and pull from every aspect of the organization.

Context-aware customer interactions with geo-location intelligence built into devices. Instead of an enterprise partnering with a specific app or adopting a specific solution, future CXM solutions could call for a sustained interaction with context-aware solutions within every interaction.

Immersive interactions.  Users gain control over how content is delivered, whether through touch, gesture, 3D visualization, voice-enabled biometric, or something not yet invented. In the next five years, he expects immersive interactions to be incorporated in home entertainment devices, in-vehicle devices, and increasingly smart mobile devices.

The multi-channel of the future. Even as new channels have emerged or replaced traditional points of sale, customer interactions remain siloed. By 2018, multi-channel for enterprises will transition to an omni-channel experience, meaning customers can browse through product information on any medium while conversing with friends on social media.

By the next five years, Sasidharan envisions a repeatable CXM maturity model that implies that an enterprise has synchronized CXM and IT strategies with an integrated roadmap — supported by an integrated training and communication plan. The key to reaching this repeatable stage is to pursue a CXM strategy across the enterprise, not one for every channel. So, enterprises must create original products and services; ensure integration across all stakeholders; change business models beyond silo solutions to enhance customer experience; and invest in digital technologies that integrate digital marketing, operations and digital commerce.

These days, companies are recognizing that digitally savvy customers can become influencers in their own social media circles. An integrated CXM strategy will give enterprises the ability to create a repeatable customer experience that can be adapted to future digital evolutions.

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