Contact centres since inception have traded off customer satisfaction for cost, to the detriment of quality service and customer value.  Despite torrents of advice, little has changed in the last 8 years.  But the demands of customers wanting multi channel service through SMS, web, call-back, chat, self service and co-browsing, may at last be the change needed to jolt the contact centre into being the hub of the organization’s value proposition - as the name has always implied. 

Customers not only want but expect now to interact with organizations using a channel suitable to their current situation - location, time of day, urgency, degree of help needed. An organization is judged on its availability, speed of service, and issue resolution.  Contact centre managers know this, 15% of all transactions are now handled via these new channels, but generally they feel ill equipped to rise to the upcoming challenge. 

The answer is not to rush out and ask customers what channels they want to use - they often will not know.  Instead look at how your services and products are used and experiment with channels that provide solutions to problems.  Then monitor and observe the take up.