So this is the third part of the five part series on technology trends that I am seeing in the customer service marketplace for 2013. Again, for those that have not read my posts before, the information and data for these types of posts are coming straight from research that I do with leaders of customer service that I am blessed to interact with on a daily basis. I am fortunate to hear many things and so what I try to do is to aggregate it all and semi-intelligently post what I am hearing for others to comment on.
So, part three is really all about Mobile. Day after day we are bombarded in just about every possible medium, about how mobile devices, mobile software and everything mobile is the way of the world. You can read articles on trade sites, expert analysts are talking about it daily and even the newpapers like USA Today are writing weekly about the explosion of Mobile and what it means for our society at large. As always, the place where most companies are attacking the mobile experience is in the sales and marketing channel, as it is here they are trying to drive differentiation and ease of use for their mobile customers. Much has been made of how consumers are using mobile devices to shop at all times of the day, even during their physical shopping experience in a store. Over and over again we hear of consumers that are "showrooming" in stores by looking at a product in a physical store and then pulling open a comparison shopping site on their mobile device and finding the best price online. Again, focused almost exclusively on the acquisition of customers and sale of products or services.
As is always the case though, no one is thinking about how this trend is going to impact the service environment. No one is thinking about the potential unintended consequences of conditioning consumers to use their mobile devices to interact. These consequences are pretty simple: When you push people to interact with you to shop or purchase in the mobile channel, they are eventually and quickly going to come to you in that same channel to get their questions or issues resolved. But, most companies are not even thinking about this, let alone planning for it in the coming year or 18 months. Almost everyone I have talked to, that is a leader in the service space, has told me that mobile service is a second or third priority for them if it even makes the list. The reason for this seems to be two fold, politics and money. Imagine that.....
In terms of technology and where things are going, I think there are a number of niche players right now that are trying to define the way forward for mobile customer service. Some are using the idea of voice to make a call to a call center from a mobile device much easier, smoother and more intelligent. Others are looking at using smart mobile devices to use the tap interface to create what are termed "visual IVR's". And still others are using the screen real estate issues on a mobile device to push the concept of Virtual Assistants onto mobile devices or into mobile apps. I think all of these concepts have merit and have a place in the process of providing a high quality service experience for consumers.
The companies that are likely going to define this space over the next few years will be both the small niche companies and also some of the bigger companies that can either buy their way in or use their marketing muscle to help define the path. The smaller companies that I would keep an eye on are companies like Fonolo, Jacada, MyCyberTwin and NextIT. The bigger companies are the classic names in the space, Nice, Verint, Nuance, Genesys, Avaya and Interactive Intelligence. But I would also keep one eye on the larger technology and CRM companies. With the replacement of older CRM systems picking up pace, mobile CRM/Service, Knowledge and the like will be likely a priority investment area for SFDC, Oracle, SAP and others.
As always, I would suggest that before anyone invests in this area, that service leadership defines the optimal customer experience that aligns with optimal processes so that customers actually feel supported effectively long term.
