The marketplace is going digital. From being a “nice-to-have” to graduating to a “solid addition”, online avenues have now become mainstream. This is especially true in the Asia Pacific where, as per Statista, approximately 2.15 billion people used e-commerce in 2020, and by 2025, this number is estimated to increase to 3.13 billion people. In Singapore alone, on just one single app Shopee, during the very recent 9.9 sale people purchased 45 million items within the first 99 minutes!
Customers rule this digital marketplace. A McKinsey report says “Technology has handed customers unprecedented power to dictate the rules in purchasing goods and services.” This means that winning over the modern customer takes experiences that are unforgettable, convenient, and digital.
In fact, some of the world’s most popular brands, including Byju’s, PhonePe, 7eleven, Zalora, and Booktopia credit their success to the digital reinvention of CX. Recently, CX leaders from these brands came together at RE:SOLVE by Freshworks– one of Asia’s biggest summits on digital-first CX to reveal how they drive customer loyalty and business growth with technology solutions like AI and more.
Freshworks, the company behind this summit, is a leading provider of modern SaaS solutions that empower businesses to delight customers.
Bringing world leaders together to create a learning opportunity on digital-first CX
RE:SOLVE by Freshworks offered an unmissable opportunity for CX leaders, founders, marketers and innovators to learn the art of delighting the modern customer with digital CX from some of the most popular and successful brands in the world. get in-depth insights directly from leading brands into unlocking business growth by leveraging the power of CX. The summit brought together leaders from different industries, including e-Commerce, edtech, retail, ride-hailing, food delivery and more to help both digital disruptors and novices learn the art of delighting the modern customer with digital CX by getting inspiration from some of the most popular and successful brands in the world.
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Participating brands spanned a wide range of industries including e-commerce, edtech, retail, ride-hailing, food delivery and more. They included 7-Eleven- an international convenience store chain, online fashion platform Zalora, the world’s most valuable edtech company Byju’s, PhonePe- Asia’s fastest-growing fintech firm, Australia’s leading online bookstore Booktopia and Africa’s leading entertainment company Multichoice.
As the go-to event for everything digital-first CX, RE:SOLVE also featured curated masterclasses to help attendees get started with actionable takeaways on building a bot decision tree, calculating the ROI of customer service and getting started with WhatsApp business API.
Key takeaways and lessons shared during RE:SOLVE 2021
Today, customers expect real-time responses to their enquiries. A recent survey of 2,760 professionals across nine markets in APAC, including China, Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Taiwan, South Korea, Thailand, Vietnam and the Philippines revealed that social media platforms are emerging as the preferred channel for customer support, as consumers perceive them to be faster and more convenient.
At RESOLVE, Balaji Muthukrishnan, Sr Manager Partnerships at Freshworks reinforced that messaging is crucial for better customer engagement and retention.
He shared that proprietary research showed that customers expect instant services and immediate replies. Research also found that around 77 per cent of customers keep their notifications on for messaging apps with 90 per cent of texts being read within 3 seconds of receipt.
“In fact, speed is one of the key metrics based on which customers make purchasing decisions. They not only expect complete but quick responses- as early as within 8 seconds,” he added.
During a fireside chat on the topic of “Modern CX for the modern shopper” Mustehsan Siddiqui- Manager of Digital Operations CX at Landmark Group emphasised the importance of customer-centricity. Landmark has a solid presence across a diverse market, including the Gulf countries as well as the APAC region, and they have managed to set a benchmark for consistent customer-centric CX across all markets.
“We ensure that we are engaging our customers not only with sales and services but also serving them based on changing behaviour and trends. We keep customers at the centre of everything and take feedback very seriously,” said Mustehsan. Landmark has an O2O2O model- online to offline to online and hence, it becomes key to maintain consistent experiences. “Omnichannel used to be a buzzword, but today it is a mandate all over the world. The pandemic has elevated customer expectations,” he added. Today, every customer is a VIP and brands need to leverage digitalization to treat them that way.
It takes only one bad experience to lose around 68 per cent of customers- expectations are high not only for purchases but for resolving issues as well, Mustehsan explained.
Reducing purchase friction and increasing conversion rates
Purchase friction or simply ‘friction’ is a term used to describe anything inhibiting a seamless sales and purchase lifecycle in the business world. According to a 2019 study, ‘friction’ could be costing APAC businesses $325 billion per year. So, this is arguably one of the biggest challenges faced by small and big companies in the region. Mili Semlani and Anand Venkatraman (VP and GM) from Freshworks explored this further with Zalora’s Kanan Rajaratnam.
Kanan shared that amidst the pandemic a lot of new customers have embarked on the journey of online shopping. One of the key expectations from this new set of customers is a seamless and smooth experience.
“Merchants around the world have big shoes to fill. At Zalora, we believe that communication is key. With every second or minute of delay in responding to a customer, businesses are losing trust,” said Kanan. “We monitor every single customer interaction and look at every raised ticket very minutely. We flag delays, analyse why they happened and make sure the gaps are eliminated,” he added.
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Freshworks works with a wide range of eCommerce players from all over the world. Anand from Freshworks added that these days people are constantly online on multiple channels and that the journey to purchase isn’t predictable.
“They are interacting with brands 24X7 and expect the brands to be available all the time. Around 61 per cent of our customers start from one channel and end up making the purchase at another channel,” he said. Another important thing Anand added is that today customers expect brands to recognise them across channels- they expect personalization to an extent that they don’t want to repeat information on all channels.
An Accenture study revealed that more than nine of 10 consumers say they are more likely to shop with brands that provide offers and recommendations that are personally relevant to them. This is seconded by Freshworks findings too. “48 per cent of our customers have left brands where they felt personalization was lacking,” Anand said.
In another fireside chat during RE:SOLVE, Mohnish Jaiswal, VP of Operations at Byju’s spoke on re-inventing CX from sales to support and elaborated on how Byju’s support ensures user retention and engagement at all levels. He said no business can work in silos within a digital ecosystem. “All user touchpoints need to have an exceptionally seamless experience- from sales to supply chains and operations to student or customer support. Collaboration is key for friction-free seamless CX.” He added that given the current climate where teams are split across remote and in-office, fostering a more collaborative ecosystem that is not location-dependent but digital-first has become an inevitable need.
Inspiring emerging innovators and entrepreneurs
In addition to game-changing chats with CX leaders, RESOLVE also aimed to deliver holistic inspiration, in the form of keynote sessions with cricket icon Adam Gilchrist and technologist-activist Shiza Shahid.
Speaking with Freshworks Co-Founder and CEO Girish Mathrubootham, Adam Gilchrist said, “Winning is the byproduct of the desire to learn, evolve and disrupt. Just knowing that you really have the hunger and the winning mentality is important.”
Technologist-activist Shiza Shahid said empathising with customers is important. “Ownership and connection on both sides are crucial. If one of our customer’s orders is delayed, I see my customer representatives caring deeply about the issue. They want to drive across the state and deliver the product. And, this is what separates us. When it stops being about the numbers and becomes more about being empathetic- that’s when it really starts to matter.”
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Overall, it can be said that offering seamless digital CX will be key not only for surviving the new normal where online is mainstream but will also help businesses become future-proof. Mapping customer journeys, riding the mobile-first wave, creating seamless messaging bots and understanding the importance of customer-centric business models will be some of the most vital trends for businesses in APAC.
You can watch RE:SOLVE on-demand here and to find out more about Freshworks, visit https://www.freshworks.com.
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This article is produced by the e27 team, sponsored by Freshworks
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