It seems like once a week I come across an article about how mobile devices will revolutionize customer care. To some degree, the articles all share a theme: “Make your life simpler with anytime anywhere access to… your bank, insurance provider, even a doctor.
These articles are chock-full of facts and figures. They tell us consumers prefer to access customer care via mobile devices. And they report that companies are in their infancy when it comes to implementing improvements to meet this demand.
(And can you believe it? I’m almost finished with the introduction and I haven’t dropped the most bodacious customer-care buzzword of all: omnichannel!)
So much has been written about omnichannel that I don’t think I can add much more. Other than: As a consumer, I want it! I want the consistent customer care experience that omnichannel promises as I move from one channel to another.
But if I’m being honest, what I really want is a complete end-to-end experience on whatever channel I happen to be on.
My options are limited if I’m logged into my banking app on my iPad and I need live help. I could use my phone and call into a queue, or request a call back, or maybe even start a chat session. But how is this making my life simpler? I still have to re-authenticate myself, maybe go through an IVR process, explain what I’m looking for… You get the picture.
I’m not one to create new buzzwords, but if I could sum up exactly what I want, it’s an uberchannel experience. I want a “one-button to touch” experience. I want to easily escalate to a live expert and have my credentials and contextual information move with me. I want to engage in a co-browsing session from whatever app or site I’m already using.
Obviously I’m leading you down a specific path for a reason. Today, Cisco is bringing to market a new product: Remote Expert Mobile is a software platform that lets you integrate real-time communications with voice and video. With it, you can integrate collaboration features directly into customer-facing apps and websites. The software package contains everything you need to get started and integrate with your Cisco Unified Communications Manager and Cisco Unified Contact Center platforms.
Other features and benefits of Remote Expert Mobile include:
- Software development kits (SDKs) for iOS and Android and JavaScript for all the top web-browser platforms
- A media broker provides a secure gateway and executes video transcoding if needed
- An application server provides all the collaboration features such as co-browse, file share, annotation, and others
- An Expert Assist Gadget to simplify integration into Cisco Finesse Agent desktop
Now, with Remote Expert Mobile, you can offer real-time communication natively from customer-facing mobile and web apps. Developers can create one-touch experiences, facilitate opt-in communications, and pass customer context to agents. For example, user credentials travel with agent requests using standard SIP user-to-user information (UUI).
I doubt uberchannel will become the next industry buzzword. But I do believe real-time collaboration capabilities will become basic functions of customer-care apps and web channels. And consumers will come to expect these functions from the companies they do business with.
Get more information on Remote Expert Mobile and the supporting SDKs.
Congratulations to Cisco on this product launch. The market is ready for mobile customer care solutions like this that offer video chat, co-browse and sharing technology within apps to make the service experience more personal and convenient. I love that the experience is more unified for the business expert, too, who can keep using his/her Cisco video device, Finesse agent desktop, etc. in support of these new channels.
With one-touch contextual calling solutions like this, I wonder how long before the ‘800’ number becomes obsolete for most customers?
Ron
This really makes sense to be able to get a hold of a customer service rep or a expert on any device anywhere with REM. Companies really want a easy to use solution that can customized to fit the need for the use case and device with the SDK’s. The world is going this direction and I like the name Uberchannel ?