Articles by
Maria Minsker
Remote employees make up a significant chunk of Everlane's customer service team, yet the 67 workers in this group say the company doesn't value them or treat them fairly
Posted December 23, 2019
For most companies, doing much monitoring of agent conversations isn't realistically scalable. But San Francisco- and India-based startup Observe.AI, which just scored a round of Series A funding, is working to change that, offering companies machine learning-based call analytics that are easy to scale.
Posted December 13, 2019
Kustomer has secured a slate of highly recognizable brands as customers in the past few years, including Sweetgreen, ThirdLove, Ring, Glossier, Rent the Runway, Away, Glovo, and UNTUCKit. Now, the company has secured another $60 million in funding, bringing its total to nearly $174 million.
Posted December 06, 2019
According to one study, the market size is projected to grow from $2.6 billion in 2019 to $9.4 billion by 2024, a rate of 29.7 percent. A separate study found that the market is expected to grow 24 percent during 2018-2022.
Posted November 22, 2019
Despite the early success, including many more subscribers than analysts anticipated, the launch of Disney Plus wasn't without flaws. Here are the three biggest customer service mistakes the company made during launch week. (Featured on DestinationCRM.com.)
Posted November 18, 2019
In one move, the company continued to charge for a channel that had been blacked out for two months, and in another, it switched some customers over to a pricier plan without informing them first.
Posted November 11, 2019
New research suggests that by 2030, 69 percent of decisions made during customer interactions will be made by machines rather than humans.
Posted October 25, 2019
Restaurants are used to dealing with negative Yelp reviews from disgruntled customers, but Outback Steakhouse is taking steps to mitigate the problem, using artificial intelligence, before its customers can head to Yelp.
Posted October 18, 2019
Here's how these companies showed off their customer service (and social media) savvy. (Featured on DestinationCRM.com.)
Posted October 11, 2019
It's been some time that JetBlue has been working with customer service start-up Gladly to improve its support operations on the ground and cut down service call times, but now, the airline is working with Gladly to take its customer service level up a notch in the sky as well.
Posted October 04, 2019
The company is now in hot water after customers—including some high-profile ones—began complaining that their orders were late, missing, or not filled correctly.
Posted September 27, 2019
Earlier this week, employees at Amazon shared that the company was planning to eliminate its "Virtual Customer Service Reserves" customer service program, but word of mouth caused a change of heart for the company.
Posted September 20, 2019
The fast food giant has signed a deal to acquire the Israeli-founded customer service automation start-up Apprente, which offers AI and voice-based conversational technology developed especially for use in loud environments.
Posted September 13, 2019
Spirit is one of the lowest-ranking airlines for passenger satisfaction, ranking last out of 10 carriers. But the company is taking measures to improve customer service, including the introduction of support via WhatsApp.
Posted September 10, 2019
The conversational AI vendor recently expanded to Silicon Valley, and the funding will help the company grow globally and partly be used to attract more U.S. customers.
Posted August 23, 2019
Microsoft has announced that Dynamics 365 Customer Service Insights is now available in more than 39 new languages, with new language models for improved AI insights also now available for public preview.
Posted August 09, 2019
Quiq works by integrating multiple messaging tools into businesses' websites and apps, including SMS, Apple Messages, Twitter, Facebook Messenger, web chat, Kik, and Google's RCS-based RBM.
Posted August 02, 2019
Stonly, a French startup, is bucking the chatbot trend by working to make self-service more intuitive through interactive guides.
Posted July 19, 2019
It's virtually impossible to improve customer service without consistent feedback—that's the philosophy that Kair Käsper and Martin Kõiva have brought to Klaus, an Estonian "conversation review" startup that has just disclosed $1.9 million in seed funding from Swedish VC firm Creandum.
Posted July 12, 2019
Despite the many changes currently influencing the food service industry, the overall customer satisfaction score inched down only slightly to 78.9, dropping by less than 1 percent.
Posted June 28, 2019
Last weekend was a tough one for Target, as its registers crashed nationwide. Nevertheless, the retailer handled the crisis effectively, demonstrating three lessons in crisis management.
Posted June 21, 2019
The solution pulls in data from different service channels and apps to deliver customer service on a single platform, enabling agents to bring greater context to customer relationships.
Posted May 31, 2019
Problems arise when the capabilities that chatbot vendors promise to deliver just aren't there, or require too much involvement from internal IT teams.
Posted May 17, 2019
As companies increasingly defer customers to self-service and automated channels, there's a cohort of customers that may not benefit from this approach—anxious ones.
Posted May 10, 2019
The system offers small businesses a low-cost customer service agent that helps block spam calls, provide callers with basic information about the business, and help customers with basic tasks such as appointment booking or order placing via text-backs.
Posted May 06, 2019
There are already plenty of tasks that Alexa can do for users, but now there's one more—Alexa device owners can now use an audio command to contact the customer service department of Amazon's e-book company, Audible.
Posted April 29, 2019
Samsung's smart appliances require customer service providers to have a new skill set and be knowledgeable about servicing not only hardware but also software.
Posted April 22, 2019
Google and Salesforce aren't exactly strangers. The two have been working together since 2017 on various projects. But while most of their partnerships have been centered on sales and marketing activities, the companies are now doubling down on customer service.
Posted April 12, 2019
With its latest round of funding, the vendor sets out to tackle the task of unifying back-end business tools, including Salesforce, Google Drive, Slack, and others, and then extracting data from these channels to make it available as soon as an agent needs access to it.
Posted April 05, 2019
Consumers and businesses that have trouble reaching Facebook for customer support may be surprised to find out that a possible reason for the delay is because the customer service team is busy solving issues for priority customers—employees' friends.
Posted March 29, 2019
Multichannel customer service provider Conversocial has acquired customer service automation platform Assist in an effort to offer a hybrid customer service tool that integrates agents' and bots' capabilities.
Posted March 22, 2019
But chatbot-based customer service provider Zingle envisions text messaging as a primary customer service channel, not a temporary solution.
Posted March 18, 2019
The artificial intelligence-powered text messaging system enables customers to communicate with the provider even if their initial call to a Sprint store goes unanswered.
Posted March 08, 2019
In a new study, a majority of consumers say that customer service quality is a major factor in their shopping decisions.
Posted February 15, 2019
Based in Denmark, customer service provider Dixa is setting out to build a "customer friendship-based" service platform that brings the same level of communication that consumers use to interact with each other to brand interactions.
Posted February 08, 2019
In the America's Best Customer Service 2019 report compiled by Newsweek and Statista, Chick-fil-A beat out runner-up Sonic and Arby's, which came up third.
Posted February 01, 2019
The messaging app is rolling out three new features for brands to use through their desktop—quick replies, labels, and chat list filtering.
Posted January 25, 2019
One customer of the pet supplies e-retailer got a pleasant surprise when she left a negative review about a product sold on the company's site.
Posted January 18, 2019
The certification is awarded after a selective process and is only given to call centers that rank among the top 10 percent of companies that BenchmarkPortal—a research firm offering benchmarking, certification, training and consulting tools—evaluates.
Posted December 28, 2018
For toy manufacturers like Mattel, a turnaround might be coming thanks to its commitment to customer service in this critical fourth quarter.
Posted December 21, 2018
TechSee's AI-based video service leverages a combination of computer vision, augmented reality, and users' smartphone cameras to deliver tech support to customers.
Posted December 14, 2018
The company's new holiday campaign is all about putting a positive spin on customer service during the busiest time of year.
Posted December 07, 2018
It turns out that live chats have a hidden feature that customers may not be aware of—agents can see what they're typing before they hit enter.
Posted November 30, 2018
Credit unions have traditionally been known for delivering personalized customer service, but they're not keeping pace with technology.
Posted November 16, 2018
The Community Platform provides a forum for customers to connect with fellow users, experts, and developers.
Posted November 09, 2018
New research reveals that there's a reason why some customers are able to get through to agents at call centers faster than others. It comes down to a 'customer score,' a calculation of how valuable that customer is to the business.
Posted November 02, 2018
Largely flying under the radar, artificial intelligence-powered customer service platform Afiniti has quietly raised $130 million in series D funding for its technology, which uses AI and behavioral pairing to connect customer callers and agents.
Posted October 26, 2018
The airline estimates that 40 percent of the calls received can easily be handled via text, so the new service will now likely alleviate pressure on its customer service line.
Posted October 19, 2018
Once a coveted, respected retailer, today Sears is a brand on the brink of bankruptcy, with empty shelves across many locations—and customer service is a big part of the problem, customers and experts agree.
Posted October 12, 2018
Chatbots have a big role to play in the future of customer service, and Google knows it. Earlier this week, the company acquired Onward, a start-up whose primary product is an chat tool for businesses.
Posted October 05, 2018
Only 16 percent of agents find that systems and tools actually help them handle customer issues, and even fewer—just 12 percent—say tools simplify their day-to-day work.
Posted September 28, 2018
Earlier this summer, Facebook introduced a new WhatsApp Business API in an effort to enable businesses to communicate with consumers using the Facebook-owned messaging app. Now, companies including Uber, Netflix, and about 100 others are leveraging the API to deliver customer service via the app.
Posted September 14, 2018
In an effort to offer new services to users, such as fraud alerts, Facebook is seeking access to users' banking data and has asked large U.S. banks to share detailed financial information about their customers, including card transactions and checking-account balances.
Posted September 07, 2018
Loyalty programs may be big drivers of engagement in some industries, but they're not as important as customer service when it comes to the travel space, a new study from Think with Google, Google's marketing data and research group, and Greenberg Research revealed.
Posted August 31, 2018
A start-up with roots in the United States and India, Observe.AI just secured $8 million in funding to continue developing its artificial intelligence-powered call center system.
Posted August 24, 2018
T-Mobile is on a mission to reinvent its approach to customer service, relying less on IVR and chatbots and more on dedicated customer support teams.
Posted August 17, 2018
Google's enterprise customers will get access to customer service representatives and true contact center-based support—at least when it comes to Google Maps and Google's cloud product.
Posted August 10, 2018
For the 16th time, the carrier beat out all of its competitors, posting a record-setting score for the second year in a row.
Posted August 03, 2018
Paid television provider Dish is now inviting customers to message the company via the Apple app.
Posted July 27, 2018
Etihad Airways is enabling its top customers to message it via WhatsApp, handing out the number at the premium check-in desk at Abu Dhabi International Airport.
Posted July 20, 2018
Valassis Digital is aiming to expand what chatbots are capable of by having its bot provide in-depth support throughout the car buying process.
Posted June 29, 2018
Walmart recently filed a patent to bring drones to its stores and bridge the gap between searching for items on a mobile device and actually locating them in Walmart's massive physical stores.
Posted June 25, 2018
For customer service software newcomer Kustomer, the goal is to eliminate silos and provide a more holistic customer support offering. The company just secured $26 million in Series B funding to make that happen.
Posted June 15, 2018
In a survey of more than 7,500 consumers, advisory firm KPMG identified the top firms when it comes to providing a great service experience.
Posted June 08, 2018
Despite delays and other airline-related travel challenges, consumers are actually pretty satisfied with the aviation industry these days, according to the latest North American Customer Satisfaction Study out from J.D. Power, which was released earlier this week.
Posted June 01, 2018
Amazon has recently taken a tough stance on customers that return items to the e-commerce giant too frequently. How do customers feel about it? Here's a sampling. (Featured on DestinationCRM.com.)
Posted May 25, 2018
Zendesk bundled its existing customer support solutions under one omnichannel umbrella, combining its Support, Guide, Chat and Talk tools into the Zendesk Suite.
Posted May 17, 2018
Customer service professionals are passionate about providing customers with effective support, but many consider the technology they have to rely on to be an obstacle, according to a survey by Dimensional Research.
Posted May 10, 2018
At its annual F8 developer conference this week, Facebook announced some key updates to Messenger, which it has increasingly positioned as a tool for companies to connect with consumers, primarily for customer service.
Posted May 04, 2018
With recent pet-related problems in the news and rising ticket prices, airlines have seen their customer satisfaction drop by 2.7 percent year over year to a score of 73 on a scale of 0 to 100, according to the American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI) 2018 Travel Report.
Posted April 27, 2018
T-Mobile is the latest brand to become an Apple Business Chat partner, which means the company will now offer customer support via Apple's Business Chat tool. For consumers, this development spells convenience—now, they can use the iMessage app on their iPhones or iPads to connect with T-Mobile customer service representatives.
Posted April 20, 2018
Delta Air Lines and Sears aren't too happy with their customer service provider right now—due to [24]7.ai's security breach last fall, hundreds of thousands of users' data may have been compromised, and the vendor hasn't confirmed or denied whether other companies have been affected as well.
Posted April 06, 2018
At its TrailheaDX 2018 developer conference last week, Salesforce.com unveiled its new Integration Cloud, a solution that promises to more efficiently bring together systems, devices, and various data sources, and Lightning Flow tool, which aims to eliminate much of the friction associated with process automation.
Posted April 02, 2018
According to a new study, consumers are opting to use technology to help them throughout the purchase process, and they don't want to interact with store associates unless they need help.
Posted March 22, 2018
The new capabilities, including IVAs and chabots, are the first AI rollouts since the company acquired AI technology provider Next IT last year.
Posted March 16, 2018
Dialpad, a cloud-based communications provider, has launched Call Center, a solution that eliminates much of the complexity involved with implementing traditional call centers and makes them accessible to small and midsize businesses.
Posted March 09, 2018
Earlier this week, Facebook introduced Messenger 2.3, the latest version of the Messenger platform, which includes updates to customer chat tools and the quick-reply feature. The platform now also offers advanced customization tools for more targeted customer support.
Posted March 02, 2018
Earlier this week, the social network announced that starting on March 23, 2018, apps that integrate with Twitter to schedule and automate tweets will need to prevent bulk messaging or face "enforcement action." Yesterday, it announced "adaptive rate limits" so that companies using Twitter for customer service won't be penalized.
Posted February 23, 2018
L.L. Bean sent many of its customers into a frenzy last week, when the company announced that it was changing its lifelong guarantee policy, which allowed customers to bring back items whenever they wanted, with no expiration date on returns.
Posted February 16, 2018
Salesforce has announced that it will invest $2 billion in Canada over the next five years, taking its customer service and CRM solutions to the United States' northern neighbor.
Posted February 09, 2018
Cryptocurrency exchange company Coinbase has been one of the biggest players in the space, but scaling customer service has become a growing challenge. The company may be at a turning point, however, with the hiring of a veteran executive to oversee customer service operations.
Posted February 02, 2018
IBM and Salesforce have announced that they will be combining their artificial intelligence offerings to enhance customer service capabilities when it comes to automating the process of interpreting and handling customer service calls and chats.
Posted January 26, 2018
When it comes to delivering customer service during a time of crisis, customers don't want polite apologies and sympathy—they want fast solutions, new research suggests.
Posted January 19, 2018
Cloud-based customer engagement solution provider eGain has announced an integration with Facebook Messenger. Moving forward, it will enable consumers to initiate support chats with businesses that use eGain for customer service through the companies' Facebook pages via Facebook Messenger.
Posted January 12, 2018
Nuance Communications has debuted an artificial intelligence-powered cognitive arbitrator, which will connect and integrate virtual assistants with third-party service providers through an interface that works across the automotive, smart-home, and Internet of Things (IoT) spaces.
Posted January 05, 2018
Another year has gone by, and while some companies spent 2017 delivering excellent customer service, others have stumbled. (Featured on DestinationCRM.com.)
Posted December 29, 2017
After landing in hot water with developers after restricting third-party apps, Twitter is undoing the damage with the introduction of the Account Activity API.
Posted December 26, 2017
More than 80 percent of consumers say businesses are either meeting or exceeding their customer service expectations, according to the 2017 Customer Service Barometer study conducted by American Express, up from 67 percent back in 2014.
Posted December 16, 2017
Uber is testing a new customer support feature, but it's not for everyone. As first reported by TechCrunch, Uber is rolling out priority, 24/7 support capability for what seems to be a group of its top customers. The support programs include a hotline as well as an in-app feature, and specially trained experts will staff both channels at all hours of the day.
Posted November 17, 2017
Facebook is doubling down on its commitment to becoming a customer service player, updating its Messenger platform to version 2.2 this week. One of the key updates includes a chat plug-in, which enables brands to embed a Messenger bot directly onto their website.
Posted November 09, 2017
A new Google Chrome extension, Deskun, is bringing customer service and support task management right into Gmail. The new tool promises to streamline communications by enabling customer support teams to tackle customer emails as well as incoming messages from multiple social channels directly within Gmail.
Posted November 06, 2017
Vidyard is leveraging the Salesforce Service Cloud to foray into the customer service space with Vidyard for Support, a solution that enables customer support teams to resolve customer issues using video content.
Posted October 27, 2017
The Pega Platform just got an update to its customer service application, including a number of new artificial intelligence features aimed at shortening how long it takes agents to resolve requests, cut down on errors, and boost customer satisfaction while freeing up agents' time to work on complex requests.
Posted October 25, 2017
According to new research from visual IVR technology provider CallVu, 63 percent of calls handled by support agents involve simple requests, like account balance, transaction information, and other basic questions.
Posted October 13, 2017
The French company just secured $2.5 million in funding from Nine Capital and EQT ventures and has 10 enterprise clients so far.
Posted October 09, 2017
A lack of transparency with AI solutions can be problematic, but Pegasystems' T-Switch aims to mitigate the issue by giving organizations more control over their AI engagements.
Posted September 29, 2017
While some airlines have recently landed in hot water for less-than-ideal customer service, others, including Hawaiian and JetBlue, are paying attention to customer woes.
Posted August 11, 2017
Call intelligence company Invoca has introduced Signal AI, an artificial intelligence solution that leverages machine learning to gather insights from call center conversations with customers and feed them back to different organizational teams.
Posted August 08, 2017
The latest version of its CRM suite aims to deliver faster performance and eliminate some of the lag associated with legacy CRM tools.
Posted July 14, 2017
It's no secret that consumers want to be able to check in, choose their seats, and handle other pre-travel tasks via an app, but according to research from Helpshift, 89 percent of travelers said they'd want to use a customer support feature in an airline app while flying as well.
Posted July 07, 2017
In this year's ACSI report, quick-service restaurants had higher customer satisfaction scores than full-service restaurants for the first time.
Posted June 23, 2017
IBM and LiveEngage are debuting an enterprise solution that integrates Watson-powered bots with human agents. The platform leverages IBM's Watson Virtual Agent technology and LivePerson's LiveEngage platform to enable brands to support bot conversations that can smoothly transition to conversation with live agents through a brand app, SMS, Facebook Messenger, or the brand's mobile site.
Posted June 16, 2017
Just a week after debuting intelligence assistant Nina's on the Amazon Alexa platform, the company is adding virtual assistant and asynchronous chat innovations to its Digital Engagement Platform.
Posted June 12, 2017
Speech technology provider Nuance Communications has announced it will soon bring its artificial intelligence-powered assistant Nina to Amazon Alexa, giving Nina users another channel through which to provide customer support.
Posted June 02, 2017
Thanks to the integration, mobile customer service provider Helpshift is now embedded in Salesforce and makes use of Salesforce's case management, omnichannel routing, and knowledge base management capabilities. The move is a response to pleas from users for access to CRM data in an effort to improve customer interactions.
Posted May 26, 2017
Verizon Enterprise Solutions has launched Visual Interactive Calling, a tool that enables consumers to tap a button in an app and connect directly to a live agent. The technology is for banks, retailers, airlines, travel and hospitality firms, and any other type of business that provides live support.
Posted May 19, 2017
Back in 2015, one in every 2,000 calls into a call center was fraudulent, but in 2016, that rate grew to one in every 937 calls, according to telecommunications security and research company Pindrop Lab's 2017 Call Center Fraud Report. The change represents a 113 percent increase in fraud year over year, according to Pindrop, and every fraudulent call represents a loss of roughly $0.58 for the business.
Posted May 12, 2017
To say that United Airlines has been in hot water recently is an understatement. Now, United Airlines has rolled out 10 new customer service policies in response to some of the recent incidents, but one customer service expert argues they're simply not enough.
Posted April 28, 2017
Among customer service platform provider Zendesk's claims to fame are the company's embeddables—software development kits (SDKs) for Web and mobile environments that enable elements of customer service to be easily added to online customer experiences. Now the company is taking its solutions to app development platform Fabric (which Google recently acquired from Twitter) with a Zendesk kit that includes these embeddable solutions.
Posted April 21, 2017
Chatbots are promising, but many of them simply don't add business value from a customer service perspective—yet. With the introduction today of the Pega Intelligence Virtual Assistant, Pegasystems is setting out to accelerate the process by offering artificial intelligence extenders for platforms including Facebook, Slack, and others.
Posted April 18, 2017
Call center analytics company Invoca just secured $30 million in series D funding, with Morgan Stanley Alternative Investment Partners as the lead investor. The company has been making waves recently, appointing a new CEO in July and possibly preparing for an IPO, Techcrunch reports. According to Kyle Christensen, senior vice president at Invoca, it's an important time for the company, and not just because of what's going on internally.
Posted April 14, 2017
Just a few months after revamping its Direct Messages, Twitter added a new feature to the offering: the location request feature, enabling businesses to ask customers they're conversing with to share their location via direct message.
Posted April 07, 2017
Chatbots on Messenger may be a breakthrough for customer service on Facebook, but they're far from perfect. For the time being, they're hard to find via search, and for many companies, the functionality is limited. Still, there are already some brands that are getting it right. Here are five companies delivering solid service through the emerging channel.
Posted March 24, 2017
Amazon has a reputation for continually innovating to make the service experience better and easier for customers. Soon other companies may be able to quite literally borrow from Amazon's playbook, as the e-commerce giant is rumored to be developing a suite of cloud-based call center tools based on its own proprietary call center technology.
Posted March 17, 2017
Customer engagement platform provider Pegasystems has added artificial intelligence-powered capabilities to its CRM solution, Pega CRM. The new tools are built to improve customer service agent performance by pulling insight from desktop solutions that agents rely on and identifying any processes that slow down daily activities.
Posted March 03, 2017
Twitter has become a staple part of many companies' customer service strategies because it provided an easy route for getting in touch with businesses directly. With the introduction of chatbots and automated responses, however, companies run the risk of losing that level of authenticity. But now, Twitter is updating its direct messaging with Custom Profiles, enabling brands to differentiate automated responses from human responses during interactions with customers.
Posted February 24, 2017
Most consumers have come to expect being able to reach a company's customer service team by phone, so what happens when a company offers no dedicated service line? In Facebook's case, this spells trouble. According to firsthand research conducted by NPR reporter Aarti Shahani, conducting a Google search for "Facebook Customer Service" does indeed produce a number to call, except that number is fake and leads callers right into the hands of scammers.
Posted February 17, 2017
Chipotle CEO Steve Ells is making good on his promise to improve the company's customer service by implementing a new compensation system for its employees: Moving forward, employees will be paid based on how effectively they deliver customer service.
Posted February 10, 2017
Apple and IBM teamed up to build mobile apps for the enterprise back in 2014, and now United Airlines is finally getting ready to roll out some customer service apps that show off the fruits of their labor. United Airlines announced on Thursday that the company is working with both IBM and Apple on several apps designed for the 50,000 iPhone and iPads that its employees currently use.
Posted February 03, 2017
According to Salesforce.com's annual State of Service survey, customer service is no longer an afterthought for companies, meant only to support the business after the important part—the sale—was already complete. Increasingly, customer service is becoming a central component of the company's strategy and initiative. More than 68 percent of the service teams surveyed say they're the ones leading customer experience efforts.
Posted January 27, 2017
Your goal should be to turn customers into advocates, says the service guru and author in his new book, Kaleidoscope: Delivering Innovative Service That Sparkles.
Posted January 13, 2017
This year will be the "year of purpose," according to customer experience research firm Temkin Group. Though many trends have carried over from last year, the differentiating factor in 2017 will be maturation. "There are not a lot of new things on the list because the story this year will be adoption and operationalization. Companies aren't playing around with emerging tools anymore—they're using mature and powerful technologies," says Bruce Temkin, managing partner at Temkin Group.
Posted January 06, 2017
According to findings from the 2016 Consumer Experience Index survey by Aspect, 44 percent of shoppers prefer to use chatbots rather than speak to a live agent, assuming that the automated assistant is capable of handling the request. Forty percent of those surveyed also said that assuming the quality of the experience and privacy are preserved, they would like to use services such as Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, and Snapchat to communicate with companies; this is up from 33 percent last year.
Posted December 16, 2016
At a Barclay's investors conference earlier this week, Chipotle founder and co-CEO Steve Ells admitted the company has underperformed in customer service, with roughly half of its 2,100 restaurants receiving C grades for service. Ells explained that after the company's recent E. coli contamination crisis, Chipotle shifted its focus to food safety and neglected service. To turn this around, Ells said Chipotle is devoting "laserlike" attention to the situation, retraining employees and making customer service a key priority again.
Posted December 09, 2016
It's no secret that when used effectively, social customer service can work wonders for companies. It's cost-effective and has the potential to directly link companies with their customers. But according to a recent report on the state of social customer service, from social customer service provider Conversocial, there's still a long journey ahead before customers fully trust social media as a primary channel for support.
Posted November 18, 2016
Known for offering top-notch in-store support at its Genius Bars, Apple is rolling out an app to offer iPhone and iPad support directly on the devices. Up until now, support was available on Apple's website, but the introduction of an app makes the experience more user-friendly for iPhone and iPad users. The app offers troubleshooting suggestions, connects customers with agents via phone, and enables live chats between customers and Apple's support team.
Posted November 11, 2016
After securing $55 million from Sequoia Capital India in a round of funding earlier this week, Freshdesk is continuing to expand its solutions beyond customer service. Its recently launched CRM tool, Freshsales, and mobile-first support platform, Hotline, are big areas of excitement and growth at the moment, according to company executives.
Posted November 04, 2016
Customer experience management company Medallia acquired customer feedback capturing technology Kampyle earlier this week and rolled it into Medallia Digital—a combined feedback management and data analytics solution. Together, the two solutions will deliver more omnichannel insight into the customer experience because it will take both offline and online data into account.
Posted October 21, 2016
With rumors swirling about a possible acquisition, Twitter's future is uncertain, but the company's role in enabling brands to deliver customer service remains solid. Earlier this month, Twitter released findings from a customer service study, an effort the company expanded from the airline industry alone to the quick service restaurant and telecom industries as well. The findings revealed that the manner in which customer service is delivered on Twitter plays a significant role in how much consumers spend.
Posted October 14, 2016
Helpshift, a customer service platform for in-app support, is now offering Campaigns, a feature that arms companies with a more proactive approach to in-app customer service. The company already delivers in-app support but is now making it possible for brands to message their customers directly before a specific customer service issues arises. The new tool lives at the intersection of customer service and marketing, Abinash Tripathy, CEO of Helpshift, says.
Posted October 11, 2016
Monday, Oct. 3, marks the start of National Customer Service Week, an initiative that was started by the International Customer Service Association back in 1984. The weeklong dedication to customer service is an opportunity for brands to treat customers to surprises, perks, and other engagements, but the event is about more than just customer appreciation—it should be about employee appreciation as well.
Posted September 30, 2016
Customer service solutions providers Cisco and Salesforce.com announced a strategic alliance earlier this week that brings together their respective customer service solutions. The two companies worked on deep integrations of Cisco's collaboration, Internet of Things, and contact center platforms with Salesforce Sales Cloud, IoT Cloud, and Service Cloud. The goal for both companies is to augment each other's offerings for a more holistic slew of services.
Posted September 23, 2016
Online review platform provider Trustpilot is now integrated with Zendesk, a cloud-based customer service platform provider, in an effort to empower Trustpilot clients with a wider array of customer service tools and technology. Through the integration, a review on Trustpilot automatically generates a customer service ticket in Zendesk so that agents using Zendesk can be immediately alerted and can appropriately respond to the review.
Posted September 16, 2016
In the age of Siri, Cortana, and Echo, the idea of artificial intelligence conjures up a sense of fear not because of how it's been portrayed in science fiction, but because AI may one day pose a very real job threat across a number of professions, including customer service. AI tools can perform certain tasks faster and more efficiently than people, but a recent customer service hiccup from travel planning company Skyscanner serves as a reminder that, however powerful it is, AI won't be a catch-all tool for customer support.
Posted September 09, 2016
In a study by equity insight and analytics provider 24/7 Wall Street and research company Zogby Analytics, Comcast was named one of the worst performers in customer service, while Amazon was named the best. More than 1,500 Americans were asked to evaluate companies across 17 industries.
Posted August 26, 2016
Genesys' app marketplace AppFoundry and developer portal DevFoundry have boasted rapid growth recently, with AppFoundry now offering more than 100 customer experience apps and DevFoundry now supporting more than 250 users. Jim Kraeutler, vice president of the innovation group at Genesys, atributes the growth to the vendor's commitment to educating partners and developers and giving them flexible tools to build solutions.
Posted August 12, 2016
Air travel is hectic—hundreds of flights are cancelled and delayed throughout the country every day, and while some airlines handle these issues with ease, others send customers on an impossible journey to get reimbursed for travel nightmares. Startup AirHelp is working to eliminate some of the customer service hassle associated with air travel by handling the refund or reimbursement process for customers, even filing lawsuits when necessary.
Posted August 05, 2016
As brands increasingly strive to provide self-service options for customers to solve straightforward problems quickly and efficiently, contact centers are taking on new roles, becoming an extension of the brand. Here are four reasons why customers still love—and need—contact centers.
Posted July 29, 2016
As Twitter continues to struggle and analysts start to speculate about a possible sale, the company is continuing to roll out features dedicated to the social customer service space. One new tool is designed to let consumers know when a brand is most active based on how quickly it responds to tweets and messages. Another is an updated Featured Tweet capability, which enables brands to pinpoint specific tweets that will remain fixed at the top of their feeds for other users to see immediately.
Posted July 08, 2016
Xerox has announced plans to split into two companies, with one portion remaining as Xerox and the other becoming Conduent, a business process outsourcing company that will offer solutions for customer service as well as other areas.
Posted June 24, 2016
Helpshift's cofounder and CEO, Abinash Tripathy, maintains that omnichannel service is not the answer to customers' growing expectations. As customers increasingly expect faster, more efficient support, the need for more sophisticated self-service support and support through artificial intelligence will grow. With $23 million in funding, Helpshift plans to continue improving its in-app messaging customer service tool by making it more proactive.
Posted June 13, 2016
In an industry often criticized for poor customer satisfaction, T-Mobile rose to the top, beating out competitors AT&T, Verizon, and Sprint in the American Customer Satisfaction Index. On ACSI's 100-point scale, T-Mobile earned 74 points while Verizon and AT&T both earned 71. Though the victory margin is slim, T-Mobile's improvement is noteworthy—the carrier's score grew by 4 points. Sprint was the most-improved carrier, raising its score from 65 to 70 this year, but the company fell behind its three primary competitors overall.
Posted June 03, 2016
To deliver a more seamless cross-device experience for customers, Salesforce.com has introduced Snap-In SDKs for the Web and for mobile devices. The debut of snap-in functionality enables users to quickly add tools such as Cases, Knowledge, Live Chat, SOS, and Tap-to-Call to their mobile and Web apps.
Posted May 27, 2016
Messaging apps such as Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, and WeChat are becoming increasingly popular among consumers, and as the platforms introduce tools for companies, they are also becoming a route for customer support. Live chat has become quite popular as well, with companies deploying proprietary chat or implementing chat solutions from vendors such as Zendesk. But messaging apps and live chat tools have limitations from a customer service standpoint. That's why newcomer LiveNinja just secured $2 million to continue developing a hybrid tool that brings together the best of both.
Posted May 06, 2016
Effective self-service functionality can make a company's customer experience stand out, and solid search capabilities play a key role in ensuring that customers quickly find the resources they need. With the introduction of Coveo's new Sitecore native search app, Coveo for Sitecore Pro Cloud Edition (as well as an on-premises version of the same tool), companies can add context to customers' searches and improve the relevance of the content that is returned in a search.
Posted April 29, 2016
At its developer conference this week, Facebook introduced bots on Messenger, an automated response system for customer support and other e-commerce interactions. The chatbots are powered by Messenger's updated Send and Receive API, which enables the platform to not only support text, but also other types of content such as images and links. Call-to-action buttons will also be available on the updated platform, according to Facebook.
Posted April 15, 2016
After relying on email customer support for six years, Uber is ditching the channel in favor of in-app self-service. As the company expands globally, email is proving to be an unsustainable support route, especially in countries such as India where email is not widely available. The redesigned help function within the app will now replace email and will tackle the most common questions and concerns that riders and drivers have, including giving riders easy access to passenger ratings.
Posted April 08, 2016
Millennials are more likely to file customer complaints than other generations, even Baby Boomers, according to a report from J.D. Power. The study of more than 600,000 consumers revealed that Millennials have a lower tolerance for customer service issues, errors, and delays than Boomers,tend to value effective issue resolution more than their older counterparts, and tend to reward brands that solve customer service challenges with their loyalty.
Posted April 01, 2016
Known for extensive regulations and customer processes, the financial services industry has strict onboarding procedures called Know Your Customer (KYC) that add complexity and time to customer experiences. To streamline the process while ensuring that banks continue to observe all required regulations, Pegasystems today introduced a client lifecycle management (CLM) tool that speeds up the onboarding process.
Posted March 21, 2016
At the Enterprise Connect conference earlier this week, Avaya introduced Zang, a cloud communications platform that supports application development, embeds capabilities from outside solutions such as Salesforce.com, and offers a turnkey application called Zang Spaces.
Posted March 11, 2016
For years, Apple has made an effort to avoid establishing a major presence on social media, but on Thursday, the company broke its social silence by launching a Twitter customer support account. The launch comes on the heels of Twitter's rollout of additional customer service tools, as both Apple and Twitter acknowledge the social channel's central role in modern customer service.
Posted March 04, 2016
From silly GIFs to sophisticated branded content, video has been exploding online but hasn't really entered the enterprise feedback management space. With its video feedback solution, InMoment is turning video into a key Voice of the Customer (VoC) channel and enabling companies to use customers' video testimonies to gain insight into the customer experience.
Posted February 26, 2016
Twitter's stock is hurting, and CEO Jack Dorsey has been making an effort to set the social network back on course with new features, including a suite of customer service tools that play to one of Twitter's greatest strengths. Earlier this week, Twitter updated its Direct Message capability with deep links, which enable users to send private messages to businesses quicker and more effectively.
Posted February 19, 2016
Pegasystems continues to expand its Pega 7 platform with the launch of Pega Field Service CRM, an app for field service agents; it provides on-the-go CRM functionality to professionals who deliver service on site and unifies customer service across the customer journey, from initial call to service delivery.
Posted February 12, 2016
For the second quarter in a row, L.L. Bean reigns supreme on Stella Service's benchmark report of retailers' customer service performance. Stella Service evaluated retailers by looking at a number of service areas, including the speed with which customer service issues are handled, the efficiency of returns and exchanges, and the amount of missed opportunities for customer engagement. Most notable were L.L. Bean's prompt responses to both phone and email requests, according to the report.
Posted February 05, 2016
Earlier this week, former Amazon employee Eric Springer shared his recent experience with Amazon customer service, revealing that the e-commerce giant unknowingly gave away his identity to hackers on three occasions. Springer was alerted to the situation after receiving an email confirming a recent interaction with customer service via Web chat that he did not actually have.
Posted January 29, 2016
With messaging apps such as Facebook Messenger and WeChat staking a claim to how consumers communicate on mobile devices, brands are working to get in on the action. Mobile support is becoming a must-have for customer service, but in-app support and service via the mobile Web just aren't cutting it. Joshua March, CEO at Conversocial, sat down with Smart Customer Service to discuss the evolution of social support and how Sprint is tackling the growing demands of the space.
Posted January 22, 2016
Customer experience management solution provider InMoment has teamed up with predictive analytics vendor RapidMiner to deliver a more sophisticated Voice of the Customer solution that not only provides insight on what customers are doing at different phases of the customer journey, but also why they're taking certain actions.
Posted January 15, 2016
Customers who received replies from airlines through Twitter were not only happier with their experiences but also were more willing to pay more for their next tickets and to recommend that airline to others, according to research from Twitter and Applied Marketing Science.
Posted December 18, 2015
Pages has long been a powerful resource for marketers maintaining a Facebook brand presence, but the social network is launching new capabilities to enhance the platform's customer service features. With better engagement tracking and an emphasis on faster response times, Facebook is enabling brands to deliver an improved social customer service experience in real time.
Posted December 11, 2015
Thanks to social media, customer reviews, and other tools that give consumers the power to shape brand dialogues, companies have had to improve how they deliver service. Increasingly, expectations for customer service are extending beyond traditional call center and support experiences to include in-store support, delivery, and product consultation. According to a recent report from Constellation Research, five trends are shifting power to retail consumers. These trends have key implications for brands.
Posted December 04, 2015
Social customer service provider Sentiment is teaming up with systems integration company IP Integration to help inject social solutions into existing contact centers. As contact center providers rush to offer social tools, Sentiment and IP Integration are working to ensure that social solutions are no longer considered an afterthought.
Posted November 20, 2015
With Black Friday and Cyber Monday right around the corner, companies expect more transactions to occur through mobile devices. Last year, mobile commerce accounted for 22.56 percent of online sales in November and December, and 27.91 percent of Black Friday sales, according to the 2014 IBM Experience One U.S. Retail Online Holiday Shopping Recap Report. This year, the number will likely surpass 30 percent, and as mobile secures its position as a key channel for online retail, retailers should consider stepping up their mobile customer support.
Posted November 13, 2015
To the surprise of many, the company that all-but demolished the brick-and-mortar book business debuted its first brick-and-mortar book store earlier this week. With the opening of Amazon Books in Seattle, the e-commerce behemoth is redefining the in-store experience, and it's all about personalized service. On the surface, the store is a condensed, limited version of the online business; digging deeper into its shelves, however, reveals a much more nuanced business model.
Posted November 06, 2015
At its G-Force summit in Miami this week, Genesys debuted AppFoundry, an app marketplace where developers can design, innovate, and collaborate on customer service solutions. With wide-reaching integrations for on-premise and software-as-a-service solutions spanning from CRM and database applications to sales and e-commerce tools, the marketplace promises to extend Genesys's offerings while maintaining the vendor's commitment to the customer service space.
Posted October 30, 2015
Metrics are the lifeblood of every contact center's performance, yet many of them aren't measuring the right performance indicators, the ICMI determined in a recent study. The findings, announced at the ICMI Contact Center Conference earlier this week, revealed that as contact centers evolve to be increasingly multichannel hubs, companies are struggling to maintain consistency across channels and customer touch points.
Posted October 23, 2015
The company is expanding its technology into the B2B space.
Posted October 15, 2015
The brand now offers workshops and presentations on customer service for non-competing companies.
Posted October 09, 2015
Author Marsha Collier hosts discussions about the latest trends in customer support and experience.
Posted October 02, 2015
A Q&A with Aircall founder Olivier Pailhes, whose solution enables the mobile customer service agent.
Posted September 25, 2015
Apps that provide support are becoming essential across industries.
Posted September 18, 2015
New capabilities include resolution management, geotagging for Instagram support, and CROWDS communities.
Posted September 11, 2015
A personality match promises a better customer service experience.
Posted September 04, 2015
Global hotel chains are experimenting with customer support via text messaging
Posted August 28, 2015
Company debuts customer support videos for its Beats by Dre products.
Posted August 21, 2015
The Seattle Seahawks cornerback answers customer service calls on Nike's Gear Up Day.
Posted July 31, 2015
What brands can learn from United's social customer service hits and misses.
Posted July 24, 2015
The new app promises to boost efficiency for customer service reps.
Posted July 17, 2015
In two decades, Amazon has entirely transformed consumer expectations.
Posted July 10, 2015
Separate but specialized support teams are replacing traditional outsourcing.
Posted July 02, 2015
In a crowded market, the vendor attempts to differentiate itself with speed and solid caller ID functionality.
Posted June 26, 2015
The social network expands Messenger's customer service features with a time-saving tool.
Posted June 05, 2015
Latest Temkin Group Customer Service report reveals a service decline in 13 industries
Posted May 29, 2015
The company is continuing on its growth trajectory.
Posted May 22, 2015
Though interactions will now be more quick and seamless, there are some caveats.
Posted May 15, 2015
There were a few surprises on Forrester's 2015 CX Index.
Posted May 08, 2015
In the second wave of major updates this year, Microsoft furthers its integration of Parature products.
Posted May 01, 2015
Do happier employees really equal happier customers?
Posted April 24, 2015
The company's mobile app is turning heads in the fast-food industry.
Posted April 17, 2015
Contact centers aren't prepared to handle growing cross-channel demand.
Posted April 10, 2015
The new general manager of IBM Commerce, Deepak Advani, shares his vision for an experience-centric strategy in an interview with Smart Customer Service.
Posted March 06, 2015
The company is overhauling its CX strategy with the help of its employees.
Posted February 27, 2015
The deal expands Verint's cross-selling opportunities within the customer service market.
Posted January 06, 2014