Top CX Trends to Watch in 2023

Delivering a high-quality customer experience has become an essential part of business success. With customer expectations ever on the rise, companies face the daunting challenge in ensuring their customers get an outstanding experience every time. To succeed, delivering quality CX is now essential for businesses looking to stay competitive and be connected with their audience. According to Emplifi, 77% of brands believe CX is the key competitive differentiator and Forbes surveyed that 89% of companies compete primarily on the basis of customer experience. With companies facing immense pressure to deliver excellent CX, we have compiled the following list of key trends we expect to shape the CX industry in 2023, so you can stay ahead of the curve!

1. Every Experience Matters
2. Personalization as a Defining Factor

3. Consumers Expect Brands to Be Phygital

4. Transparent communication, happy customers

5. Predictive analytics for empowered company-wide decision-making

6. Enhanced accessibility with voice navigation

7. Automation and Self-Service to realize efficiencies

8. Immersive CX to become more prevalent

Every Experience Matters

As we enter 2023, it's no secret that customer service will be driven by meaningful experiences that customers remember. However, this means that every encounter with your brand should create an impression and build a connection that lasts far beyond the initial moment of contact. With the power of social media, every experience customers have with a business can make or break its reputation. Businesses need to ensure that their interactions with consumers are positive and meaningful in order to create loyal relationships.

With consumer spending projected to dwindle in 2023 due to inflation and a possible recession, providing support through empathy-driven experiences is now more important than ever. With customers feeling the weight of inflation and recession-induced hardships, non-essential spending will undoubtedly shrink making every customer experience all the more vital.

Personalization as a Defining Factor

Consumers expect more than ever when it comes to a quality customer experience — and personalized content is the key. Accenture Interactive's Pulse Check report revealed that 91% of customers are far more likely to engage with brands who recognize them, recall past transactions and suggest relevant offerings tailored just for them - making this an essential element in building loyalty.

How can you provide a more personalized customer experience? Learn your customers names (and use them). Collect and utilize your customer data to provide personalized recommendations or browsing options. Using customer data to easily trouble shoot purchased items or readily have solutions based on purchasing behavior can make your cx even more efficient. Read the hubspot guide to personalization here. 

A personalized customer service experience is fast becoming a deciding factor for customers when choosing which companies to give their loyalty. By using data insights and implementation of strategies tailored towards individual preferences, brands are able to create an immersive journey that truly resonates with its users.

Consumers Expect Brands to Be Phygital

With the traditional divide between online and in-person experiences blurring, it has become essential to create hybrid customer engagements that seamlessly merge physical and digital elements. Leveraging these phygital technologies can offer new opportunities for engaging customers in an immersive way.

What does Phygital mean? Forbes calls Phygital the perfect blend of physical and digital experiences for customers. Take QR codes as an example. They're designed to help provide a smoother, more connected journey - one that bridges traditional customer touchpoints with today’s latest technologies. Customers are quickly becoming accustomed to interacting with brands digitally and expect their experience to remain consistent as they move between channels. With this combination, brands can create truly unique interactions with their customers which will allow them to stay competitive in today's market.

Transparent Communication = Happy Customers

Offering complete customer insight into product and brand pricing, products, and processes will help strengthen the bonds of trust between a business and its customers. By being transparent in every aspect of their digital experience, companies can make an impressionable impact on potential buyers while expressing confidence in what they sell.

Every company, no matter the size or industry, makes mistakes from time to time. Regardless of how aligned your teams are, there will always be some road bumps in the customer journey, and that’s where transparent and honest agents come in. Make sure your contact center is informed about potential mistakes and how best to remedy the situation. Honesty builds trust and loyalty which is important in any long-term relationship.

At VIPdesk we know the power of transparency. We conducted a Customer Delight Study and asked respondents how likely they were to pay more for a product or service after having a positive customer experience. The study compared different types of delighters and ranked which delighters respondents would pay more for. Coming in at #1 was Transparency and honesty with 41% of respondents willing to spend more with a company after having a transparent interaction. Read our full Delight guide below!

Predictive analytics for empowered company-wide decision-making

Utilizing predictive analytics can give businesses a leg up in the competitive world of marketing. By delving into historical data, it is possible to forecast what actions consumers may take. With this forecasting power, businesses are able to make more effective decisions about which strategies will draw in their customers and lead to greater success for their campaigns.

Businesses are leveraging predictive analytics now more than ever to deliver tailor-made customer experiences and optimize their relationships with customers. By using data strategically, companies can target the right people and anticipate customer needs before they know them and identify potential risks. Predictive analytics can provide a roadmap for what comes next in consumers lives, enabling you to anticipate key milestones - giving businesses an opportunity to meet those upcoming demands with well-timed solutions.

Enhanced accessibility with voice navigation

As technology progresses and speech recognition becomes more refined, brands can now explore a world of potential with voice. Natural language processing is opening doors and enabling new approaches that give companies the chance to engage more audiences in innovative ways. Voice control is quickly becoming a revolution in convenience, enabling shoppers to go from inquiry to purchase with just the sound of their voice. The ideal situation would be for users to have effortless access and navigation via an online storefront – giving them more time back for what matters most.

Today's consumers have already adopted voice-activated technology to conveniently purchase items, reorder supplies and check their order status. Consumers will soon be able to explore new possibilities with personalized recommendations tailored just for them as well as smart appliances that communicate via voice; even advertisements could become engaging conversations.

Automation and Self-Service to realize efficiencies

Your customers are your number one priority, and research from Forrester shows that almost all consumers prefer to find the answers to their questions by themselves rather than contact an organization. Self-Service Automation can conveniently handle simple transactions in place of calling a contact center.

Brands are increasingly leveraging self-service solutions to help customers troubleshoot their own issues and make interactions easier. Not only can this approach cut operational costs, it gives businesses the opportunity to divert attention away from simple inquiries so they can focus on more complex customer issues. From messaging apps and conversational chatbots, there are a number of ways brands have made getting assistance quicker than ever before—allowing them greater efficiency while allowing companies to focus on the interactions that matter.

Immersive CX to become more prevalent

Customers today desire a more personal, interactive shopping experience that incorporates the best of both physical and digital elements. Companies can get ahead in this ever evolving realm of customer service by providing customers with immersive self-help options tailored to their individual needs. The possibilities are endless. A virtual store front where customers can shop for products, view specs, ask questions and purchase. Virtual self-help where how to videos and product demonstrations are available in real time. How do we know that CX is going virtual? It is already being utilized by some of today's top brands like Nike, Disney, and even sports stadiums. 

How are companies and industries using virtually immersive cx today? Car dealerships and the automotive industry are using virtual reality to show customers 360 car views and interiors so that they don't have to leave their couch to find their perfect vehicle. The retail clothing company is allowing consumers to try on their clothes virtually and even order all at the same time. Travel companies are using virtual experiences to transport potential guests to locations and test out amenities. Not only are these experiences convenient and immersive, but they offer even more personalization than any online or physical store. Imagine going into a virtual store with customer service avatars ready to answer your questions, trouble shoot items, and help pick and purchase products. These immersive experiences are expected to be more prevalent and more accessible as we progress through 2023 and beyond.

Stay ahead of the game. Today's consumers are discerning and demand more from brands than ever. To meet their expectations, it is essential for companies to create a streamlined customer journey that offers quick service, seamless transitions between physical and digital platforms, personalized care tailored to individual needs, as well as an omnichannel experience without any disruptions in continuity across channels. Efficient and automated service will remain key as personalization and immersive experiences become even more crucial to success!