Omnichannel has been an industry buzzword for awhile now, and it’s mostly used to describe the various communication paths a customer can take when interacting with your brand. And while this is partially true, it often neglects the ultimate goal of creating seamless transitions across channels. Customers who start in chat and continue in voice are often left re-starting their customer journey and repeating information. Your customers are frustrated, your agents are frustrated, and NPS suffers. But achieving true omnichannel – where your customers can seamlessly transition between channels and engage with agents who are up-to-date on their client info – isn’t a future-state technology. It’s the present state of operation for OpenMethods and its clients.  

Keep reading to learn about the unique challenges of omnichannel and how OpenMethods solves them. 

Multichannel engagement & multichannel frustrations 

The pandemic changed the way your customers interact with brands, and digital and self-service channels are often the entry point for every interaction. In fact, according to a recent Get VOiP study, 51% of brands introduced digital channels to their customer service offerings in 2020. These changes have become the new norm for how and when customers choose their interactions. With many brands switching to a digital-first approach, many interactions begin in a digital channel before transitioning to a voice call. And when that transition happens, customers expect the context of their initial interaction to be passed.  

But sometimes, context is lost in translation. When your customers need to repeat information in multiple channels to multiple agents, they start to feel less like a priority and more like an inconvenience. On top of that, if your agents don’t know where the customer’s first interaction originated, they have fewer tools, resources, and context available to to them to help resolve the original issue. These problems compound until they tumble down like an avalanche of frustration. 

Your Agents feel it too

Just like your customers, your agents also feel the strain of multiple communication channels with no centralized management. Agents interact with customer with little to no previous context which makes your customers feel unheard and your agents feel unprepared. A recent Fonolo article cited one of the leading reasons for agent attrition in 2021 was inadequate technology and reduced productivity. To put it simply, when agents lack the tools they need to do their job, they end up spending more time and resources resolving issues that can be easily automated or resolved with context.

A true Omnichannel solution 

But modern problems require modern solutions. And OpenMethods is dedicated to solving the unique and complex issues contact centers are facing. 

OpenMethods Harmony creates a single pane of glass for Agents to view client communication channels. Wth Harmony, your agents have a unified desktop that provides them with call and transfer controls, . Agents don’t need to toggle between multiple applications because they have visibility and control of all interactions. Think of it like a contact center smart phone. 

OpenMethods takes the omnichannel experience a step further with PopFlow, which helps automate repeatable tasks so your agents can operate more efficiently when engaging with clients. Instead of customer data living in multiple, disconnected systems, PopFlow connects to these systems to allow for the push and pull of data cross-application. Our PopFlow Experience Designer allows you to create and publish workflows for repeatable tasks, and displays the exact information your agents need to see, when they need to see it.  

Want to learn more? 

We’d love to facilitate a deeper dive on our product offerings. Contact us today for a demo of OpenMethods Harmony or PopFlow.