Customer Support Trends That Will Define Customer Support in 2022

Customer expectations are increasing every year and 2022 is not expected to be an exception. Businesses that have invested in customer support will thrive and those who have not yet done so need to start thinking about this to remain competitive. For many companies, 2021 has been a year where they have adapted to the new reality and the effects of rapidly changing consumer expectations have been felt by everyone, across industries. This is why 45.9% of companies have made improving the customer experience their top priority for 2022. 

Since so many companies are placing greater emphasis on customer support, we will provide you with the top five customer support trends for 2022 so you will be better prepared for the road ahead. 

1. Omnichannel Support Will Reign Supreme 

Customers are now demanding to contact a company when and where it is convenient for them. This does not only mean that you need to have an agent managing social media, instant chat, phones, and other channels, but they all need to be unified into a seamless experience. For example, a customer might send you a message on Facebook with a query and then call in the next day, if the problem continues. The customer will not want to repeat their prior conversations with the previous agent. This is why all of the information gathered from various communication channels needs to be collected in a single place. Usually, this will be omnichannel support software, like Freshdesk, Zendesk, and many others as well. 

At Mindy Support, we have extensive experience providing top-quality and seamless customer support across various channels. We will use the omnichannel software of your choice to record all customer interactions. 

2. Empowering Customer Support Agents 

In 2022, 67% of companies plan to compete primarily on the basis of customer experience – up from only 36% in 2010! In order to give yourself the best shot at success, you need to start empowering your customer support agents to perform at a higher level. This starts with enhanced training, better software tools, and providing constructive feedback on their performance. Another thing to consider is to give some of your more experienced and top-performing agents greater freedom to make decisions. Customers hate to wait for an agent to get approval from their manager or have their inquiry escalated to somebody else. 

Such autonomy will also benefit the agents as well. When employees and leaders feel they have a greater sense of autonomy and control over their work, they are more committed to reaching goals and demonstrating initiative.

3. The Customer Experience Will Play a Greater Role in C-Level Strategy

Customer experience is the new battlefield and companies are in it to win it. According to Deloitte, 88% of companies now prioritize customer experience in their contact centers. In addition to this, there are many other reasons why the C-suite is placing more emphasis on the customer experience. First of all, we need to understand the importance of customer retention and reducing churn. In fact, it is 6-7 times more expensive to acquire a new customer than it is to keep a current one. Also, increasing customer retention by 5% can increase profits from 25-95%. Providing a top-quality experience is key to retaining customers and allowing your company to increase revenue while lowering customer acquisition costs. 

4. Personalization Will Be a Driving Force

Personalization is a key factor in providing each customer with an experience that is tailored to their needs. Customers are expecting even more personalization because every year the volume of data about their shopping experience continues to grow and new tools emerge to store and analyze this information. Therefore, you need to make sure that you are capturing the right data and making it accessible to your agents. A lot of the top CRMs, like Salesforce, will offer all kinds of features to segment the data and tailor the information for each specific customer persona. Analyzing customer data will not only allow you to better personalize your service but also anticipate and meet customer expectations at scale.  

5. Increased Usage of Customer Support Tools to Increase Efficiency 

In the previous section we talked about how customer support tools can help you with personalization, but there is so much more you can do with the right tools. Customer service software tends to give managers a bird’s eye view of what matters. This information helps management make informed decisions when it comes to improving operations. This also allows you to uncover the best opportunities and spend less time second-guessing yourself. 

Mindy Support Give Your Business a Competitive Edge With Customer Support

If you are looking to set a new customer support team or expand the one you have in-house, consider trusting Mindy Support to handle all of the recruiting and other time-consuming processes that come with hiring an offshore team. We are one of the largest BPO providers in Eastern Europe with more than 2,000 employees in six locations all over Ukraine. Our size and location allow us to source and recruit candidates within a short time frame and we can scale your team quickly as well, without sacrificing the quality of the customer support. Contact us today to learn more about how we can help you.