What is the secret to customer loyalty? The answer straight from ~50,000 consumers, per a massive survey conducted by Corporate Executive Board (now Gartner), was: Make it easy to get service.

In order to find the recipe for “ease,” Forrester Consulting asked 5,000 consumers (on our behalf) about their biggest hurdles to getting customer service. The answers (by far) were lack of knowledgeability among contact center agents and inconsistency of answers across touchpoints, followed by the inability of websites to deliver answers. With a common “knowledge and intelligence” theme running across the pain points, the panacea is clearly unified omnichannel knowledge management, infused with AI.

Done right, a modern knowledge management system (KMS) can transform contact centers. Here are sample metrics and real- world examples from our Global 1000 clientele.

First-Contact Resolution (FCR)

FCR is an important contact center metric that significantly reduces customer effort. While FAQs, search, and topic-tree browsing help with simple queries, more sophisticated technologies like Artificial Intelligence (AI) can help resolve issues of medium-to-high complexity at the very first contact through conversational guidance. When a premier telco client made  it mandatory for agents to use this technology to solve customer problems, FCR improved by 37% and NPS by 30 points across 10,000 agents and 600 retail  stores.

Average Handle Time (AHT)

As you know, AHT without FCR increases customer frustration even more. Happily, a modern KMS can transform both these seemingly conflicting metrics. A premier banking client reduced AHT by 67% while improving FCR by 36% by leveraging eGain AI to guide  customers to answers. In fact, advisors in its contact center used the technology to guide customers through processes such as account opening and other banking transactions while complying with industry regulations!

Annual Training Hours (ATH)

How do you reduce training needs without compromising service quality? Again, KM delivers the answer. A global banking client soared to #1 in customer service NPS and reduced training time by 50%, even as it expanded to 11 countries with mostly novice agents in its workforce! With the same technology, a telco reduced induction training time by 43% and time-to-competency by half. Note that reducing the need for training also cuts shrinkage, which is the amount of time lost due to agents’ breaks at work, sick time, training time, holidays, etc.

Call / Email / Chat deflection

One of the popular metrics for measuring digital self-service effectiveness is the number of deflections from agent-assisted channels. Using contextual self-service, with robust KM as its backbone, a media and legal services giant deflected 70% of requests for email and chat customer service.

Product returns and exchanges

No-charge product returns or exchanges has become standard policy in many branded manufacturing firms, retailers, and telecoms due to customer expectations and competitive pressures. Called No Fault Found (NFF), many of these returns and exchanges are unwarranted where the products were not defective but the contact center could not solve the customers’ problems. NFF costs organizations tens millions of dollars each year, but here’s the good news: KM and AI can address this issue head on—one of our large telco clients has reduced unwarranted handset exchanges by 38% while improving FCR by 19% and call quality by 23% in its contact center.

Dispatch avoidance rate

Depending on the industry, each truck roll or engineer callout for issue resolution can cost from a couple of hundred to a few thousand dollars. With omnichannel AI knowledge deployed in the contact center and on the website, a water utilities client saved ~$5M per year by reducing unnecessary engineer callouts, while improving FCR by 30%!

Final word

Some technologies improve customer service on the margins, some enable incremental improvement, but only a handful truly transform it. Modern knowledge management, infused with AI, clearly falls into the last category. Gain the edge today with knowledge!

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Anand Subramaniam is SVP Global Marketing for eGain Corp. eGain’s solution automates digital-first customer engagement for global brands.