The document discusses the importance of customer experience and social customer service for companies, highlighting that many recognize it as a competitive differentiator. Despite this recognition, only a few companies excel in delivering outstanding customer experiences across various channels, including social media. Furthermore, it emphasizes the necessity of aligning customer service and experience strategies, as well as the business benefits and risks associated with adopting social technologies for customer service.

3. Companies
view customer
experience as
one of their top
priorities
Use customer
experiences as
a competitive
differentiator
Source: The State Of Customer Experience, Management, 2013

4. Companies are focusing on online, cross channel,
mobile and social customer experiences

5. © 2012 Forrester Research, Inc. Reproduction Prohibited
Few companies deliver an outstanding customer
experience
Source: January 15, 2013, “The State Of Customer Experience, 2013” Forrester report

6. Good customer experiences are good for business

7. Customer service managers agree that customer
experience is important

8. © 2012 Forrester Research, Inc. Reproduction Prohibited
And many companies have good alignment between
their customer service and customer experience
strategy
8
What is the relationship between your customer service strategy, and your customer experience
strategy?
Customer service
and customer
experience
strategic goals
are well aligned.
Our customer
service strategy is
a cornerston
84%
We are in the
process of
aligning our
customer service
strategy to our
customer
experience
strategy.
14%
We don't have a
customer
experience
strategy.
2%
Source: A commissioned study conducted by Forrester Consulting on behalf of Lithium, March, 2013
Base: 50 US Enterprise customer experience or customer service managers

9. © 2012 Forrester Research, Inc. Reproduction Prohibited
Forrester-Lithium study background
9
In March 2013, Forrester Consulting completed a commissioned
survey on behalf of Lithium to explore the rise in demand for
social customer service, the maturity of these communication
channels and realized benefits for responding to changing
customer needs around social channels.
We surveyed 50 US managers of customer experience or
customer service at enterprises that offered social customer
service.

10. Customers want support when they want
it, where they want it, and how they want
it. Otherwise it will be hard to keep them.

11. Consumers want quick answers to questions or will
abandon

12. Realize that communication channel usage has changed
in the last three years

13. © 2012 Forrester Research, Inc. Reproduction Prohibited
Companies believe it is important provide customer
service over a range of channels
Source: A commissioned study conducted by Forrester Consulting on behalf of Lithium, March, 2013
How important is it to your company to provide customer service via the following communication channels?
28%
30%
42%
38%
38%
30%
32%
26%
22%
60%
56%
30%
26%
24%
22%
10%
8%
8%
Phone
Web self-service
Email
Online customer community
Online FAQs
Public social networks
IVR (automated voice response on phone)
Chat
SMS
4 Most important 5
Base: 50 US Enterprise customer experience or customer service managers

14. But, realize that not all channels have similar
satisfaction ratings

15. © 2012 Forrester Research, Inc. Reproduction Prohibited
Our study also shows that maturity is still lacking in
nascent customer service channels, such as social
15
How mature do you believe your operational processes are to support customers across the following channels?
12%
32%
32%
42%
22%
32%
40%
24%
22%
82%
50%
44%
20%
30%
18%
4%
18%
8%
Phone
Email
Web self-service
Online FAQs
IVR (automated voice response on phone)
Online customer community
Chat
Public social networks
SMS
Rank 4 Most mature 5
Source: A commissioned study conducted by Forrester Consulting on behalf of Lithium, March, 2013
Base: 50 US Enterprise customer experience or customer service managers

16. On a scale of 1 (Poor) to 5 (Excellent), how proficient do you feel your organization is currently
when it comes to providing the following customer service capabilities?
16%
22%
26%
28%
34%
4%
8%
12%
12%
10%
6%
8%
8%
8%
16%
Empowering our social customer service agents with customer
and product information that they need to answer customer
questions
Successfully nurturing and growing our online community
forum
Allowing our customers to start a conversation on our forum,
and escalate to a customer service agent if it is unresolved
Allowing our customers to receive the same level of service
from our social channels compared to what is offered on the
digital channels (email, chat)
Allowing customer service agents to handle social inquiries via
Personal Social Media Networks and Microblogs
Rank 3 Rank 2 Poor - 1
There is room for improvement in delivering
customer service via social channels
Source: A commissioned study conducted by Forrester Consulting on behalf of Lithium, March, 2013
Base: 50 US Enterprise customer experience or customer service managers

17. © 2012 Forrester Research, Inc. Reproduction Prohibited
What can you do to make your social customer service
better?
Service Manager
Customers
“I know how I want to deliver good
social customer but I don’t know
where to start.”

18. Start by understanding who your customers are and how
they want to interact with you
Source: Understand Communication Channel Needs To Craft Your Customer Service Strategy, March 2013

19. Understand the journey that customers expect to
have with your company

20. Empower your agents with the right information to
make social interactions successful
20


21. 6%
16%
28%
49%
Does not apply - our contact center only has one
mode of communication (e.g., voice)
Most or all of our agents are specialists and support
only a single channel
All of our agents support multiple channels (e.g.,
voice, chat, email)
Most of our agents support multiple channels, but
some are specialists (e.g., social media)
In general, what is your contact center's approach to having agents
serve customers through multiple channels?
Base: 272 North American Enterprise Network and
Telecommunications decision makers
Source: Forrester Forrsights Networks and Telecommunications Survey, Q1 2013
And dedicate agents to the social channels

22. © 2012 Forrester Research, Inc. Reproduction Prohibited
Investing social customer service is good for
business
22
What business benefit are you achieving by offering social customer service to your
customers? (Rank the top 3)
4%
6%
4%
4%
8%
8%
16%
26%
24%
6%
4%
2%
8%
4%
10%
10%
6%
10%
10%
14%
16%
4%
2%
6%
4%
4%
12%
16%
14%
8%
14%
16%
Boost SEO
Increased average order size
Increased share of wallet per customers
Increase awareness through word-of-mouth marketing
Increase number of cross-sells and upsells to current customers
Reduce customer churn
Bring new customer ideas to market
Increased rate of new customer acquisition
Improve agent efficiency
Reduce support costs/incoming support calls
Improve customer loyalty
Increase customer satisfaction as measured by NPS or CSAT
Top benefit 2nd benefit 3rd benefit
Source: A commissioned study conducted by Forrester Consulting on behalf of Lithium, March, 2013
Base: 50 US Enterprise customer experience or customer service managers

23. What are the perceived risks of not adopting social technologies in your
customer service organization?
26%
40%
46%
48%
56%
56%
Internal operational inefficiencies
Customer defection
Inconsistent customer service delivery
Poor overall experience
Competitive disadvantage (e.g. lose market
share, lose ground to competitors)
Fear of being left behind from a technology
perspective
And not investing in social technologies carries risks
to your company
Source: A commissioned study conducted by Forrester Consulting on behalf of Lithium, March, 2013
Base: 50 US Enterprise customer experience or customer service managers

24. Thank you
Kate Leggett
kleggett@forrester.com

31. Matching

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39. Globe receives an average of
34,000 tweets a month with a
feedback turn-around time
target of 5 minutes, which
promises to soon be the
fastest turn-around time in
the world. This volume and
reply speed requirement is
delivered with the support of
a world class tool Lithium
Social Web.
“
“

41. “ “