How to align the workforce strategy to match changing consumer behaviors

The pandemic has shifted consumer consumption and spending behaviors from bricks & mortar to rapid online shopping. According to the latest EY Future Consumer Index, 39% of global consumers will shop more online for things they used to buy in stores. These consumers are also expecting a hyper-personalized experience in an automated fashion.  For retailers whose margins were traditionally justified by in-store, personal customer experience - these are challenging times.  It’s time to reshape the workforce strategy to meet the rapid shifts in customer behavior for sustainable growth. 

Key initiatives to support this transition:

1.     Invest to agile business models and build workforce capability

2.     Greater understanding of employee and customers relationship

3.     Create new digital experiences across a seamless omnichannel

With the rapid transition to e-commerce, business leaders need to create an agile work environment that supports virtual sales and service to evolving customer behaviors. They need to move away from a fixed role to an agile multi-purpose role. There will be hybrid workforce models to support omnichannel delivery, address online chat queries and have face to face customer agents be able to multi-task and combine e-commerce, home delivery, click and connect, blogging products with the instore experience – to deliver greater customer value.

Invest to agile business models and build workforce capability

Leaders needs to re-think how they can equip their workforce to build the foundations for a lasting relationship with their consumers. This requires a rapid investment into building workforce capability on new ways of working. They should have a culture that allows the right skills to continuously innovate around the customer experience.

Organizations will need to fill the critical skills gap by upskilling and reskilling their employees. They need to reimagine reward programs to incentivize and drive the right behaviors.

Greater understanding of employee and customers relationship

When COVID hit and consumers went online, many were met with clunky chat bots – an interaction that usually turned the sales journey into a price war. In this environment, brand loyalty and margins quickly became the biggest casualties.

Organizations need to adapt chat bots with a human interface to better connect with customers.

In this case, the sales experience can be a human and machine augmentation whereby: 

• An AI overlay to match consumers with customer service agents who understand their behaviors and preferences
• When instore staff aren’t busy with customers, they can log online and call consumers to have a proper conversation about their needs
• The sales agent is equipped with the customer data (preferences and behaviors) at their fingertips

There is a greater chance of customers paying premium prices for high ticket items that require deeper consultation. Greater personalized service generates better customer satisfaction and stronger customer loyalty

In fact, how can every customer service organization do a better job of supporting and advising consumers in those moments when they just need to ‘talk to a human’?

Create new digital experiences across a seamless omnichannel

For many retailers, the better their in-store experience the bigger the contrast when customers tried to buy online. Successful bricks and mortar retailers have a finely-honed employee mix instore specifically recruiting to match their customer demographics. In these stores, customers are used to sales agents who they can relate to and trust to give them the right advice.

On the digital platform, the same discipline should still apply via customer segmentation, listening to specific personas and developing tailored personalized tactics to drive engagement and lead generation. Customer journeys need to be mapped and constantly tweaked to build brand loyalty.

"It’s time to challenge the norm of customer service"

Are we looking at the evolution of the customer service agent? Someone who is local to their customers, sells both instore and online and manages the sale from enquiry to after care? Someone who’s empowered to add stronger customer value based on their individual preferences?

Creating new digital experiences requires a disciplined approach to customer engagement. Hybrid workforce models need to be equipped with the right capabilities to better connect with customers. Through the power of human and AI augmentation, organizations and their brands can harness technology to better serve customers and drive long-term value.