Question

1. Identify at least thee ways in which service automation can improve service quality and/or customer experience.
2. Self-service online is a major development in CRM systems allowing companies to reduce costs dramatically whilst, in some cases, improving their service quality. Identify the impact of self-service online upon customer experience focusing upon potential negative impacts.
3. Social media and user-generated content generate a wealth of information about your key customers, information that is not available on your operational databases. Identify the challenges of integrating these new data into a traditional CRM system.
4. Is it absolutely essential that an organization integrates its databases to implement CRM?

Answer 1

Identify at least thee ways in which service automation can improve service quality and/or customer experience.

Customer service is essential for small or medium sized businesses. The service's quality can either improve or diminish customer loyalty to your brand and company. Despite the recession economy consumers have more options than ever before. A strong competitive advantage can be gained from the company that appears to be attentive to customer queries, concerns or other needs. That's why it's so crucial to understand how emerging technology can help you predict consumer needs, customize business processes to better satisfy customers, and eventually increase the business ' performance–the latter being able to keep down costs.

With automation help in customer service, companies will concentrate on more high-touch customer experiences, and use technologies such as machine learning and natural language processing to understand what the consumer is actually trying to do. When a customer calls a bank call center every week to check their balance or move money automatically, machine learning may figure out that what that customer really wants is a new form of account or an online profile

With that knowledge, members of the human customer service will reach out and find the right solution for the customer to help in the long term. Automation provides brands with more time and energy to offer high-quality, enduring consumer experiences, rather than wasting their time on simplistic interactions that computers can easily cater for. Automation is vital to the potential consumer experience and helps companies to concentrate on major experiences that can make all the difference in creating better interactions with the brand. Rather than sitting on hold for hours, they will easily get the answers that they need, giving the company more time to impress and delight.

Self-service online is a major development in CRM systems allowing companies to reduce costs dramatically whilst, in some cases, improving their service quality. Identify the impact of self-service online upon customer experience focusing upon potential negative impacts.

The development of technology has greatly impacted the way business firms conduct their business in the market. Now customers can order their products online without meeting with their sellers but in the end, the product reaches them. On the other hand, technology has made it able for some firms to lay off some of their employees as their functions are now done with the technology. Therefore, this paper is going to discuss self-service technologies and their negative impacts.

Self-service technologies

They are technologies that enable customers of a business firm to independently access its services without the direct involvement of the organization's employees. A good example of self-service technologies is the automated teller machine (ATM) that enables customers of banks to withdraw and deposit money without the help of the bank staff members. Some of the self-service technologies are replacing employees on their work as they are seen to be effective and take less time than compared to human labor.

Negative impacts of self-service technologies             

Reduces employment opportunities

Self-service technologies have rendered some human functions in the business to be obsolete as such functions are now being done by the machines. This has made many individuals remain unemployed hence being unable to contribute towards the growth of the economy.

Expensive to install and monitor

Self-service technologies require high capital investment to purchase and they also require people with technological experience to monitor their performance and also repair them when they experience problems. This makes small business entities not to be able to implement them.

Reduces face to face interaction with customers

Through service points, customers were able to interact with employees of the organization. Through such interactions, relationships developed among the customers and employees and this at the end made customers loyal to the firm and through the use of self-service technologies, there is limited or no interaction among customers and employees of the business firm.

Social media and user-generated content generate a wealth of information about your key customers, information that is not available on your operational databases. Identify the challenges of integrating these new data into a traditional CRM system.

On social media, the customers give information about themselves which is very important for the marketers. For example, the companies can track where their customers are going to a visit, picnic or shopping, etc. Because the customers himself or herself update on social media. So user-generated content generates us and that information which is not available on the operational database.

There are challenges which the organizations need to overcome to deploy this information to CRM systems.

CRM basically customer relationship management software which maintains the relationship of the customers with the company.

• So the companies need to have a great infrastructure and a vision as well.
• The companies need a strategy to support integration.
• Linking the traditional customer relationship management system to the modern social media initiatives are very challenging and hence need mapping and documentation.
• The fIrms have to be ready with the adoption and for this, the companies need collaboration, technology, and non-resistance from the employees to adopt the change.
• The companies have challenged to maximize the utilization of the resources
• the companies also need to educate their customers.
• The companies may need a new business model. The traditional more business model will be very difficult in adopting the same.
• Analysis of such big data and its consideration, ranking and rating are very challenging.
• Privacy and security of those data are very challenging.
• The data user-generated data are public in nature. Hence the competitors also have the same data

Is it absolutely essential that an organization integrates its databases to implement CRM?

To make the best possible use of their processes, the company would need to utilize their databases in order to identify their customers better, creating a more personalized approach for them to target their customers based on their needs. It makes the differentiation of the customers easier, as well as the fact that the company now has the ability to target most of their customers based on what they need. CRM is a holistic process which makes use of a number of changes to the structure and functions of the company to provide et customers with the required functionality.

It is therefore absolutely necessary for them to utilize their entire database in their implementation of CRM, since they can create the necessary understanding of their customers, and therefore, can attract customers, create the marketing campaigns and add value tot he process of CRM.

****Please please please LIKE THIS ANSWER, so that I can get a small benefit, Please****