(EDITOR’S NOTE: This blog is an adapted excerpt of our ebook, How Effective Customer Communication Can Help Brands Through Extraordinary Times.)
As the importance of fast, personal and responsive communication has grown in recent years to meet changing consumer preferences, so has the pressure on businesses to “do more with less.” Rising labor costs and new technologies have already increased expectations from boardrooms and owners, but now there is little choice as a result of the ongoing health crisis. Businesses are adapting on the fly to meet new needs today and in many cases with significantly reduced staff.
Executing a communication strategy through texting is not as simple as giving customers a mobile phone number and telling them to start texting you. But intelligent messaging platforms can make it incredibly efficient for small teams and even possible for an individual to manage proactive and personal outreach and response at scale across a business.
Reaching More People and Improving Efficiency with Text Messaging
Nonprofits are a labor of love, and wearing multiple hats is not uncommon for staff. As the team at Human-I-T sought to serve more households it became critical that they identify and solve inefficiencies along the application process for low-cost internet programs. Human-I-T deployed an intelligent messaging platform to engage in real-time text conversations and streamline a once complicated process. By improving the experience for their customers, the lean team of four is now able to connect new households much faster, without adding more staff.
By leveraging the messaging platform and using audience segmentation, automated messages and pre-configured messaging templates, the organization was able to transform inquiries and service needs that required a 45-minute phone call into 2-minute text conversations. In turn, this allowed Human-I-T to process more applications for internet access, requests for computers and devices and service more inquiries in a streamlined way.
“Before, we were able to connect 700 households to low-cost internet,” says AJ Middleton, Senior Program Manager at Human-I-T. “After adopting Zingle, we increased the households connected to 1700 in 2018, and in 2019, that number reached 2700 households.”
With a single team inbox, one or more people can monitor and manage dozens of customer conversations at once with a consolidated view of all SMS and MMS texts along with messages from web chat and social apps like Facebook Messenger. Message templates can be created ahead of time and responses automated to answer common questions without any human support, freeing up staff to spend their time on the most important issues.
Intelligent Messaging Platforms Help Optimize Workflows and Scale Communications
By integrating texting software with a business’ core systems, like management and service optimization solutions, messages can be routed to the right teams, actions triggered automatically and workflows optimized.
Intelligent messaging platforms make it easy to respond quickly, but also to proactively send personal 1:1 messages at scale. By integrating with a CRM or uploading an opt-in customer database, messages can be personalized and sent directly to different segments of your customer base, in a matter of moments. With more sophisticated platforms, relevant messages can be sent automatically to multiple contacts at once when triggered by predetermined criteria.
Managing customer communication across an entire business can be a daunting task, especially in rapidly changing times, but with the right strategy and technology it can be done by a focused team, or even a single person.
