4 ways content can make or break a customer’s experience

Today, corporations must compete with customer experience. And most corporations about 66%I think they deliver. However, many customers feel different. Recent research has shown that 54% of buyers they imagine that corporations treat customer experience as an afterthought.

Moreover, McKinsey research indicates that as many as 70% of digital transformations that sometimes aim to modernize CX end in failure. Why the disconnect?

One vital factor is focusing too much on technology and too little on content when modernizing or improving customer support. Content, including text, images, audio, video, documents and more, is the essence of customer experience across touchpoints corresponding to web sites, email, social media, mobile apps, SMS, IVR, chatbots and call centers. Many more customers will interact with your organization’s content than with its employees – and they do so much more often.

So how can you pay more attention to content as your organization tries to compete in CX? Start by looking for opportunities in onboarding, feature rollout, order status, and self-service.

1. Content in onboarding

Acquiring a latest customer is a helpful thing and often costs greater than winning a contract from an existing customer. However, most corporations squander this chance by taking a poor onboarding or customer welcome approach. Common problems include:

• Lack of introductory and welcome content, which can result in lack of customer attention and engagement.
• The message and tone of communication is disconnected from the tone and guarantees made in the sales process, which can cause confusion or disappointment.
• The content is extensive product documentation relatively than a useful guide, which can cause confusion and frustration.

Good examples are world-class SaaS services like Mailchimp and AirBnB, which use a friendly tone and clear messaging in content corresponding to orientation tours, setup wizards, reminders, best practice guides, and success suggestions. Retailers and e-commerce corporations like Target, Crate & Barrel and Pretty Alright Goods offer helpful content ranging from special discounts to suggestions.

2. Content accepting features or products

If you run a business that sells products, you almost certainly want customers to make use of your products and check out more of their features. The more customers successfully use them, the more likely they are to proceed using them. Content can go a great distance in helping customers use your products appropriately or even must update them. Common problems include:

• Lack of content to assist customers.
• An overly promotional or pushy tone encouraging you to try a latest feature or update.
• Generic relatively than personalized suggestions and suggestions.
• Personalized suggestions that are not actually relevant, corresponding to suggesting you purchase more fridges after a customer has already bought one.
• Focusing on the product (e.g. this is how this feature works) relatively than on customer success (e.g. this is how this feature can be leveraged to get more value from the product).
• Poorly written and designed guides and documentation, especially for more technical products.
• Inaccurately translated and localized guides and documentation for customers around the world.

3. Content in communicating order status

If your corporation involves receiving and fulfilling orders, communicating the status of those orders is at the heart of your CX. Do this well at all touchpoints and your customers will trust you, even if something unexpected happens. Get it improper and customers will turn into unsure and more prone to ask for clarification or cancel the contract.

Many problems can arise when communicating about orders. Here are some examples:

• Not communicating about order status at all or communicating too little.
• Using an inappropriate tone, corresponding to cold or impersonal, when communicating a delay.
• It disconnects what an email, text message or chatbot says and what a website or mobile app says.
• Communicating a change or problem in a vague or misleading way.
• Over-communicating about order status, resulting in the customer being bombarded with emails and text messages.
• Messages that link to poorly written and designed content, corresponding to returns policies, shipping explanations, and often asked questions.

4. Content in the self-service approach

Most customers today are open to using self-service, and many even prefer it. You can help customers use content themselves corresponding to notifications, alerts, instructions, button labels, error messages, confirmation messages, context-sensitive help, and guides. Problems include

• Lack of content informing customers about self-service options.
• Poorly written instructions, form labels, and context-sensitive help.
• Puzzling error messages that do not explain what the customer must correct.
• No explanation of how self-service advantages the customer.
• Poorly written guides for complex self-service tasks.
• Lack of flow between self-service tasks and supporting content.
• Chatbots and co-pilots provide assistance that is inaccurate, discouraging, or minimally helpful.

Integrate content into your customer support or digital transformation vision to achieve a content advantage in customer support. Create a content center of excellence to attach departments that communicate with customers and ensure consistent content management.

Invest in modern content roles like content designers to create customer-centric experiences. Finally, consider working with content strategy experts to speed up your progress and achieve significant results.