News

20th CCC Convention in Berlin

• 28 June 2017

Under the title “Unique Services, how selected measures lead to great customer service”, more than 100 international guests have met in the “Tagungswerk” in Berlin to receive valuable insights

The extraordinary presenter and first speaker this year was Dr. Nils Hafner. Professor of Customer Relationship Management at the Lucerne University of Applied Sciences in Switzerland, an absolute expert for the development of profitable and long-term customer relationships. In his international lectures and publications important and meaningful achievements and further developments are offered regularly.

Nils Hafner demonstrated in his presentation what it means as a company to distinguish itself from the competitor, to be different and also better. An important element is the competence and the emotionality of the customer.

According to Professor Hafner, unique products and services need to have the right answer ready to go. Speed and consistency are indispensable today as a basic prerequisite.

Exceptionally in the lecture by Dr. Nils Hafner were his quoted studies and results on the core question of the customer, which showed a cost increase of 120% at 180 surveyed customer service centers if the current customer request could not be solved in the initial contact.

The goal is to have the right answers from the point of view of the customer, not from the point of view of the company, this attitude is clearly noticeable in long-term customer loyalty in actual “unique services”.

“Touchpoints” are now incredibly fast, the service or product has to be at the same time in the right place ready for the customers. Fast and unique delivered performances are expected for future business interactions from customers and consumers. Today’s change takes place from the customer contact channel to the agile “touchpoint”, away from the service level and toward the initial contact solution rate.

Available and very meaningful, helpful automation in the customer process does not in any case mean an entire automation; gained time and resources are then used to concentrate on the essentials and important emotional and personal conversations.

In his summary, Dr. Nils Hafner gave as an advice to the learning companies ,the recommendation to use big data as a help for anticipatory customer service.

As the second speaker, Siegfried Schallenmüller, responsible for customer experience at Dimension Data in the EMEA region, was able to bring the future generation closer to the customer service.

The main reason for this is the availability of sufficient context to make future customer experience more human and more informative. The integrated image of the customer process requires the integration of different eco-systems.

Through today’s integration of “IoT”, Internet of Things, an additional service diversity is achieved. The successful build-up of the unique customer experience initially requires concentration on the result and as a second step the structure of the service path. Today many companies are working in the opposite direction.

Cordula Winter-Schweizer, who is responsible for customer experience at the Zurich insurance company in Switzerland, showed the impressive results of her implemented extra mile for the last three years in her company.

Their new focus on customer experiences and expectations clearly demonstrated the increase in the “net promoter” value through the combination with the meaningful customer service value “customer effort”.

The period of the company change required an orientation on all involved teams and parts of the insurance, no single employee should be lost during the reorientation. Voluntary company ambassadors were in the service to support the successful customer experience team.

At the end of the Convention 2017, Olav V. Strawe, the founder of the German industry magazine TeleTalk and owner of Fortify Communications, brought a clear outlook on the upcoming customer service era. From his point of view, many employees will be supported by a wide range of different communication channels in a call center.

Excellent and unique customer service is made possible by using “small data”. Companies should consider how they can achieve more interaction with their customers. Wonderful and innovative examples are provided by large companies such as Google, Amazon, Facebook and Apple, and Microsoft as a “small data” user cannot be ignored.

Bid data provides us with important statistical results and values, while “small data” are the building blocks for customer relationships. Outstanding customer experience at Disney, the company practices the culture of the preservation of individual experiences is an excellent example.

The focus is on employees with direct customer contact, here the motivation of the individual employees is of great importance. The training for the sales-oriented interaction in the customer dialogue also supports the personal exchange.

About the CCC Convention:

The CCC Convention is an international business and customer care event and promotes the exchange of experiences among international experts.

The CCC Convention was launched in Vienna in 1998 with the goal of professionalizing and developing the image of the industry.

Today, the Convention looks far beyond industry borders every year.  Keynote speeches and lively discussions provide valuable business input on international economic trends and successful business models.