Recently, I came across an article by Peter Dooley about the various ways that marketing insights are gathered. In that piece, he makes a critical point: some of the most powerful insights on how well a brand’s customers feel about that brand are actually derived from personal observation.
That’s something we’ve been saying for years.
In his research, Dooley interviewed Joe Navarro, a highly respected former FBI agent and expert in non-verbal behavior who shared that “you can’t possibly innovate if you’re not a good observer.” While Dooley’s article focuses largely on the in-person ways that useful market insights can be derived (and references some fascinating – and almost comically simple but profound examples), his larger point applies to what happens in the contact center every single day:
Your customers are sending their most clear and obvious messages to you while they’re in your space, interacting with you.
Sure, some of them will respond to your surveys (a tool I still believe in, by the way). And of course, some of them will write reviews, passionately opinionated reviews. But what about the rest of your customers? Who’s listening to them? Who’s noticing the tone and definitely recognizing the feeling behind it?
Every single agent who is listening to your customers when they into the contact center.
Yet, more often than not, the general expectation of contact centers is that they will provide and analyze data numerical data. Any good contact center can do that. But in this day and age of highly skilled, highly trained, really talented agents who listen, care, and want to communicate about the trends they’re noticing, there is so much more you should be expecting of your contact center. I’ll go further: we live in an age when our technology can pick up on caller tone and emotion.
We hear stuff. We understand. We are your best secret weapon. If your contact center is insisting on sharing what they notice and what they recommend, maybe it’s time to talk to a contact center that will.
If you’d like to read Dooley’s article, you can check it out here. And if you’d like to know more about how Skybridge Americas can help you hear your customers and deliver the superior experience they demand, please reach out. We would love to talk with you!
