Thomas Saint Hilaire, chief experience officer Odigo, a specialist in contact center as a service (CCaS) solutions takes stock of the transformation of the customer experience in the energy sector and discusses the digital tools that support it.
What is your view of the energy sector and how is it lagging behind in terms of customer relations?
The Ukrainian crisis, environmental concerns, rising oil prices, the energy sector is going through an exceptional period that confronts it with major and unprecedented challenges. It is at the center of households' concerns, and paradoxically the market players are lagging behind in terms of customer experience. The energy market has traditionally been more about winning customers than building loyalty. The energy transition and the strong competition between the historical players and the new entrants are reshuffling the cards and questioning the customer relationship strategies today.
It is no longer a question of operating a "passive" customer relations service but rather of implementing proactive and anticipatory customer experience strategies. Our energy customers are looking to improve the quality of their customer service (limit the time it takes to answer a call, let the telephonist talk for a long time if necessary, etc.).
What levers should players in this market use to improve the customer experience?
The levers are not specific to this sector, they can be duplicated in other activities, in insurance for example. Major efforts have been made to digitalize customer relations, with an increase in the number of available channels that complement the telephone (e-mail, social networks, live chat). A new area of work is opening up with the automation of "self-care". Energy companies are striving to offer their customers access to data and processes so that they can obtain a first level of response to their questions. The challenge is to be more efficient and to enhance the role of the agents.
What tools should be used to deploy this "self-care" process?
Chat or even more the voicebot allows this kind of innovative experience. Voice remains the preferred channel for customers. Conversational paths are becoming more and more sophisticated, with high quality voice synthesis and design (choice of voice, intonations) that enrich the voice experience. Odigo offers a range of tools that promote self-care and allow agents to focus on higher value interactions.
The augmented agent is another avenue. The tools record and analyze the content of the conversation during the call and store a kind of report in the customer's file, which optimizes follow-up. As the data is processed in real time, the semantic analysis engine identifies patterns and helps the caller address the problem at hand. For example, if a customer asks to cancel his subscription, the system pushes a commercial proposal to win back his business. This type of solution works well in the energy sector.
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