While the business world and industries across the economy have been transformed by the digital age, some basic business principles remain the same. One core principle that businesses need to continue to follow is finding ways to provide great customer service. This is particularly true when it comes to solving issues and challenges for customers.

With the continued advancement of online and AI technology, many businesses are able to provide great service to customers while using an online digital self-service program. These are smart online programs that can be used to diagnose and solve many common challenges. If you are looking to create and implement a quality digital self-service program, there are various tips that can be followed.

When you are going to implement a digital self-service program, it is important to first evaluate the goals of the program. The most important goal of this program is to help solve a customer’s problem. These can be technical issues or answer basic questions that the customer would have. The use of AI-powered technology should be able to help answer many of these questions, which otherwise would require a long wait on hold to speak with a live agent.

There are various benefits that come with implementing a self-service program. One of the main advantages is that it can help to answer a customer’s questions efficiently. Nothing is more frustrating than having to wait on hold for 30 minutes or longer just to have a simple question answered and self-service programs will help you avoid this. This can improve the customer’s overall experience, which can lead to further sales, better online reviews, and brand loyalty. It can also help to cut costs over time as the use of these programs does not have the same overhead.

If you would like to have an online digital self-service program, it is important to create one that is efficient and effective. There are various tips you can follow to implement one of these programs successfully.

No matter how good your product or service is, there are bound to be some issues with it that lead to customer challenges and complaints. It is important that you review past pieces of information and feedback from customers to identify issues that should be fixed with the self-service portal. By focusing on these items first, and ensuring that you have a standard way to address the problem, you can serve and improve the experience of most customers.

While an advanced self-service program will use AI technology and smart services, there are often ways that you can solve customer problems even more easily. If there are easy fixes to problems, and frequent questions or complaints, having an FAQ page posted on your website will be helpful. This can be an easy resource for customers to access, which could then be used by the customers to fix their problems on their own without using AI technology.

When you start to roll this program out to customers, you will likely be very excited to start making it available. However, it is important that you know when to start offering this service to your customers. Instead of making it available on every page, you should be strategic about where links to the self-service page are located or when chatbots will appear on the page. One good option would be to have these accessible when someone is on the FAQ page or trying to find contact information. If you have these bots appear on areas of the website where customers could be browsing, it can be distracting.

While setting up a self-service page today can help you start to provide better and more efficient service, it is important to remember that this technology is still growing. Because of this, you need to be realistic about the types of issues it can help with. While you may be able to use it to fix many routine problems, more complex solutions are still going to require the support of an experienced professional. Therefore, you will want to continue to have quality support staff on hand to provide assistance when necessary.

While you will be able to handle many customer requests with the digital program, there are situations when someone will want to talk to a live agent. Because of this, you should make it easy to be transferred to a live person. One way you can easily do this is by having buttons that can be pressed to put you in line to either chat with or talk to, a live person at the other end of the call.

While a new self-service program will be an effective tool to improve your customer’s experience and help with troubleshooting, the initial attempt should not be your last. You should always look for ways to improve your self-service program by finding new problems to solve. While you will likely focus on the most common issues to address at first, there are always more challenges that can be fixed with the self-service program. Further, it is important to listen to customer feedback to identify if there are any common issues and challenges they have when using this technology.

When you are looking to implement an improved digital self-service program for your customer’s convenience, Salesforce continues to provide various solutions. They are a leader in the industry and offer many of the services you need to build an effective platform.

Looking into Salesforce for your business? CLOUDSTREET has implemented B2B digital self service portals for manufacturers in the industrial, IT services, and consumer goods sectors. CloudStreet also use it’s own cloud-based program to help customers with all of their questions and troubleshooting needs.