We all love our customers, but we don’t always look forward to tracking them down to complete onboarding tasks. Luckily, the method and channel for customer interactions expands seemingly daily. So much so that we’ve found ourselves in an era of digital onboarding.
We see tech companies already relying on digital onboarding, but there is always room for optimization. The most exciting opportunities lie with companies that have relied on ‘traditional’ onboarding via paper forms and manual tasks, which easily result in friction and churn. In this era of digital onboarding, customers expect intuitive and seamless digital onboarding experiences - ideally completable when it works best for them.
Research shows that customers are 50% more likely to remain loyal when they’ve gone through an effective onboarding process, which creates a foundation for retention and growth. Common digital onboarding practices include a series of calls, resource sharing, training, and implementation. These tasks involve multiple stakeholders across departments. It is no surprise that the market has jumped on this opportunity and created innovative solutions for customer onboarding. Companies like Rocketlane are streamlining the more ‘traditional’ onboarding processes via automated project management and form completion and intake. For the tech companies already familiar with digital onboarding processes, organizations such as GuideCX are changing the game. Tools like this allow CX professionals to digitally engage customers at the critical points, reduce time to first value, improve on-time delivery, and improve retention. The goal of these solutions are to provide CX teams with the necessary tools and insights, within an automated framework, to serve customers expertly and efficiently.
Customer onboarding software has made huge improvements in teams’ ability to effectively onboard customers, but they often still rely on engagement from the customer. Streamlining internal processes to guide customer interactions is invaluable, but the customer still has to do their part. The onboarding window is critical, but discrete, and requires as much time and attention to the customer as possible. This is when customers are the most engaged, so how can you take advantage of that?
Let’s go back to those common digital onboarding practices. Calls are the bread and butter of digital onboarding, especially via video conferencing tools. Think of your kickoff calls, implementation meetings, etc. If you’re a CX professional, you’ve definitely hosted a kickoff call where you’re talking to a screen full of black squares and profile pictures. Even the most old school customers are now starting to get on board with video.
Face-to-face interactions are already being used to establish trust and the personal connection needed during the critical onboarding phase. It also helps CX professionals to further build rapport, develop a personalized experience, and expand their customer base despite geography. It’s clear that customers appreciate this as well. The market has seen that 97% of the time, new customers prefer to be welcomed and educated by video.
Digital customer onboarding might be your only option - make it an opportunity.
Video is becoming an integral part of customer onboarding, and there are some key things to keep in mind to get the most out of it. CX individuals are known for their interpersonal skills and ability to extract value from their customers. Through conversation, we can achieve an improved understanding and retention of information, leading to an overall stronger customer relationship. Like we mentioned before, the onboarding time frame is highly critical and often very limited. Scheduling is a hassle, and can be a massive drain on that limited time. Not only this, but scheduled calls are often led and initiated by the seller based on what they need from the buyer. Are your CX spidey senses detecting another optimization opportunity?
1:1 video is a natural complement to existing digital onboarding software. The insights and automation provided by these tools allows for a more effective use of a company’s most valuable resource - its people. The value of 1:1 video interactions is clear, but is not sustainable at scale. Optimization tools allow CX teams to offer the video interaction when it’s most valuable. Offering instant 1:1 video can take this one step further. Instant video reduces the time gap for scheduling/in between interactions, and offers the buyer an opportunity to engage the seller during the onboarding process. Integration of onboarding software to proactively allow an instant video option to the key buyers at the critical points in their onboarding is the answer to our digital onboarding predicament.
Video is critical for digital onboarding, but it doesn’t stop there. Digital onboarding means ongoing digital customer engagement, and the same principles apply. You’ve onboarded your customer properly, now you need to capitalize on that relationship throughout the duration of your partnership. 1:1 video is going to play an important role in continued customer engagement and support.
Curious how you can achieve the integrated, optimized experience of video interactions both scheduled AND instant. That’s where Uptok can come in. You’re using digital customer onboarding platforms to streamline your processes, now it’s time to leverage that knowledge and offer a catered video experience. Not only when you need it, but your customer needs you.
