The Power of Digital Transformation for Retail and eCommerce Businesses  

Only one-third of retail and ecommerce businesses are confident about maintaining or improving profit margins, according to Deloitte’s 2023 Retail Industry Outlook.

Retail businesses are feeling the repercussions of a volatile business cycle in such a condensed time frame due to shifting customer expectations driven by the pandemic. Massive demand fluctuations during this time period forced ecommerce and retail businesses to rethink archaic systems in favor of more pliable operations. They learned that rapidly evolving consumer preferences requires more effective analytics and cloud toolsets to reduce friction and maintain customer loyalty.

This insight combined with the knowledge that the cost of acquiring a new customer can be up to seven times more than retaining old customers, lead businesses to adopt retention strategies critical to evolving for their customers.

These findings synchronize with the study conducted by Forrester Consulting on behalf of SuccessKPI, which indicated that digital optimization was challenging for businesses due to many reasons including IT and operational complexities.

One of the most critical functions for a retail and e-commerce business is the contact center, the bloodline of customer experience is shaped by every incoming interaction–minute by minute, and through multiple sources of digital communication. The source of the challenge is that these interactions happen across countless channels, and the sources of digital communication spans phone calls, SMS, emails, social media, chatbots, and more. With the ever-evolving customer experience landscape, it makes sense that. Yet only 25 percent of all survey respondents–contact center decision-makers from across North America, South America, and Europe–are content with the performance of their contact centers.

The good news is that ecommerce and retail businesses are choosing not to be stuck and taking the opportunity to innovate during these unprecedented times. More than 70 percent of respondents agree that optimizing the performance of their Contact Center as a Service (CCaaS) is critical for business success, according to the Forrester study.

Businesses can deliver a next-generation shopping experience by unifying customer insights and automating time-consuming processes with the right cloud toolset in place. Cloud toolsets enable businesses to unify customer insights, so that contact center leaders can better understand the customer journey and increase customer loyalty. Problems within the customer experience can be identified and escalated quickly, and automated responses including agent-assistedassisted scripts can be triggered before a negative interaction escalates.

A leading insight and action platform, SuccessKPI, deciphers and displays consumer insights and patterns by integrating real-time and historic contact center data with interactions from a range of channels such as text chat, email, and virtual assistants. Insights are illuminated by artificial intelligence and machine learning engines that can identify keywords in over 40 languages.

Beyond technology, contact centers are an exchange between people. The customer journey is improved by empowering agents to succeed and create joyful experiences. Cloud toolsets like SuccessKPI provide agents with a complete view of every interaction, including coaching and real guidance during live calls so that they are supported every step of the way. By automating business actions and step-by-step script guidance, agents are equipped to provide a seamless experience that reduces customer–ultimately leading to positive interactions and a joyful customer experience.