InMoment CX Trends Special Edition POST-PANDEMIC …

APAC

How APAC Organisations Can Succeed in the Future

InMoment CX Trends Special Edition

POST-PANDEMIC PLAYBOOK:

01

As the quarantine lockdown regulations ease, customer and employee expectations are evolving yet again.

COVID-19 has impacted the vast majority of businesses across Australia, New Zealand, and Southeast Asia. Whilst

the conclusions in this report help us understand our new world, there is still more work to do, making new ways of

customer listening and taking action more important than ever.

Our research produced three themes that will guide CX-minded individuals as they set out to create memorable

experiences in our brave new world:

There’s good news for organisations in these findings. Businesses are right to focus on building trust with their

customers and employees, however simply listening to feedback (without action) is not enough. Adapting your

experience program is vital for recovery and customer experience professionals in APAC are telling us exactly how

to move forward.

Accelerating Digital

Experience is Vital

Engaged Employees Are

Your Secret Weapon

Businesses That Evolve

their Experience

Programs Will Thrive

Introduction

Theme #1 Theme #2 Theme #3

02 CX Trends Special Edition

To come to the most informed conclusions,

we have included results from specific

market research and survey initiatives we

have performed on behalf of our customers.

We’ve also included survey response rate

analysis from our client programs and

conducted 30 qualitative conversations with

CX professionals in this region to understand

the business effects of COVID-19.

In May 2020, InMoment also surveyed 74 CX

and Research professionals like you across

AsiaPacific to determine the post-COVID

business impact and the way forward for

organisations. This playbook summarises

both quantitative and qualitative feedback

from across a range of industries in Australia,

New Zealand and South East Asia. Data has

been cleaned and validated.

03 CX Trends Special Edition

ABOUT THE RESEARCH

1. Accelerating Digital Experience is Vital

Since the pandemic hit, it’s unsurprising to see there has been a

move toward digital experiences.

The shift toward digital is likely due to a combination of factors;

for some APAC industries, the contact centres are receiving

a higher volume of enquiries than ever, and there is a lack of

options for consumers to visit physical locations to resolve

issues. For other organisations, offshore contact centres have

become non-operational and they’ve been trying to manage

customer enquiry volumes domestically. In the last three

months, organisations have been investing in interactive voice

response (IVR), chatbots and digital deflection methods to

answer the more simple customer queries and relieve the added

pressure to contact centres. We’ve also seen FAQ’s pushed

online and new digital communication threads describing ever-

changing COVID-19 company updates.

The Pandemic Has Digitally-Enabled Consumers

Across Generations

It’s not just millennials who are digitally self-servicing. Whether

it’s a consumer with lower digital confidence, or one that

simply preferred to handle their own business in person,

COVID-19 has pushed many customers to self-serve channels

because there may not have been another option.

04 CX Trends Special Edition

Our research shows a 50% increase in businesses servicing

customers through different channels.

Three in ten of these businesses have had to add new digital

channels to sell their products and help serve customers.

50%

0

100%

KEY TAKEAWAY

All consumers—not only millennials—are heading

to digital platforms to self-service. It’s important

that your brand offers them a seamless online

experience, captures these insights and takes

action to meet evolving consumer expectations.

05 CX Trends Special Edition

As Self-Service Ramps Up Contact Centres are Left with

BIG Challenges

It’s no secret, contact centres have been at maximum capacity.

As more customer contact shifts to digital and self-serve for

the simpler questions, contact centre agents are left dealing

with more complex consumer problems or more challenging

tasks which typically result in lower CSAT score.

“It is important to ensure that organisations have the right listening posts for these new or different moments of truth along the customer journey to understand the impact on experiences. You can fix the problems you know about, but you can’t fix the problems you don’t know about.”

It’s Time to Accelerate Digital Self-Service Roadmaps

As businesses move forward, digital channels will only become

more important. The ‘new normal’ in Asia-Pacific means more

time at home and less time in stores. Consumers are relying on

digital brand experiences more than ever, and it’s important that

your brand accelerates its digital roadmap to accommodate

these new expectations.

DAVID BLAKERS, INMOMENT’S MANAGING DIRECTOR OF APAC

06 CX Trends Special Edition

2. Engaged Employees Are Your Secret Weapon

Needless to say, one of the biggest

impacts of COVID-19 has been the way

employees do their day-to-day work.

Unsurprisingly, 73% of employees are

now working from home.

Across all industries, 64% of businesses

have adjusted policies and processes

to support working from home. Across

Asia-Pacific, we’ve seen a successful rapid

evolution of IT systems and processes to

allow for hundreds of internal staff mem-

bers to stay isolated in their homes whilst

continuing day-to-day business operations.

Understandably, senior leadership has

become more invested in the employee

experience as a result. Businesses are

reporting that 68% have seen increased

senior leadership communication with staff

members about their engagement and

experiences since the isolation period began.

One in two employees (51%) believe that

their organisation has supported them

more during this time. There has been a

positive reception from employees as they

recognise their respective organisations

taking steps to protect their health and

safety, encouraging flexible working

and delivering ongoing communication

around COVID-19 during this time. In most

instances, organisations are providing

teams with the tools to work remotely and

encouraging greater collaboration and

communication between colleagues.

In this remote work environment, nearly half of

employees believe that their work productivity

has increased.

Less commonly, some businesses are

showing support to their employees in

new, more empathic ways. These include

checking in regularly on how employees

73%of employees

are now working

from home

GILLIAN MACKAY, INMOMENT’S HEAD OF CONSULTING, APAC

“Most people have experienced

some degree of upheaval in their

working lives through COVID-19,

and many have been impacted

on a personal level. The organisa-

tions that have best managed the

employee experience through the

crisis have done this through ongo-

ing senior leader engagement with

employees, action taken around

new ways of working, support for

flexibility and a high degree of

empathy for employee’s work and

life challenges”

are feeling, being flexible on previous

agreed targets and objectives, additional

training and support in juggling work and

caring for and homeschooling children.

07 CX Trends Special Edition

KEY TAKEAWAY Businesses have adapted to work-from-home conditions, which has

included extra check-ins with employees regarding health, safety,

working flexibility, adjusted KPIs and the ‘new normal’. It’s crucial for

businesses to have the right listening posts in place and continue to

monitor changes to working and servicing, shifts in reasons for calling,

ability to respond on aspects including hardship, and increased self

serve on digital. When employees are engaged, your customers are

getting a better experience.

Sources & Further Reading:Better CX Begins with Employees | The Impact of Employee Engagement on Performance

2xCompanies with high employee engagement

scores have 2x the customer loyalty

than companies with average employee

engagement levels.

My functional needs are met

Customers

Employees

I come to work and to my job

I like working here my manager and my team

I had a good product/service delivery experience

I like them and will go out of my way to use them

I care about my job and want to stay here

I will recommend them to others

I love my job and want to contribute to make it a great place to work

Cust

omer

Loy

alty

Employee Engagement

DELIVER SATISFIED LOYAL ENGAGEMENT CREATES ADVOCACY

We know that there is a strong relationship between employee

engagement and customer experience outcomes. The data around

employee engagement and its impact on revenue has been growing.

The Harvard Business Review reported that 71% of businesses

surveyed ranked employee

engagement as “very important” in achieving overall organisational

success. Additionally, companies with high employee engagement

scores have twice the customer loyalty of companies with average

employee engagement levels.

08

3. Businesses That Evolve their Experience Programs Will Thrive

When the pandemic hit, we saw entire

industries adapt their business model

seemingly overnight.

Data from a study we conducted in the US

market reveals that customers are more

satisfied with pandemic responses from

restaurants and shipping industries. On the

other hand, customers are least satisfied

by COVID-19 responses from companies in

technology (online-only retailers, mobile,

and television) industries. But why?

The answer lies in the timeliness with which

businesses from these industries were able

to adjust their processes and services to deliver

for—and in some cases to—customers.

Take for example the restaurant industry.

Almost immediately following self-iso-

lation orders, businesses were partnering

CX Trends Special Edition

with third-party delivery services or even

creating their own delivery options in order

to keep meals going from their kitchens to

the dining room tables of hungry guests.

In many cases, the only differences guests

noticed in their interactions with these busi-

nesses was that they didn’t need to leave

their house in order to indulge in their

favourite foods.

In line with this, a global InMoment study

highlighted that online retailers were rat-

ed the lowest for their COVID-19 response

and effort. Various inefficiencies that in-

volved a slowness to adjust pace and

safety measures in fulfillment centers led

to low stock, overwhelmed customer ser-

vice centers, and ultimately, negative ex-

periences and comments

09 CX Trends Special Edition

Keeping customers happy is a key priority for organisations

across Asia-Pacific. And the best way to do this is to adapt and

evolve your experience programs. As expectations are at a crit-

ical point of transformation, it’s never been more important to

keep a pulse on the valuable feedback of your loyal customers

and employees.

In APAC, half of our CX Leaders believe an experience program

is more important than ever. These businesses recognise that

re-focus and adaptation is necessary for the program to capture

new touch points across the customer journey.

Organisations Have Adapted by Leveraging Empathy

When businesses communicate with their customers—especially

in the midst of a crisis—empathy should be at the front of the

message. A short formula for success would be, “we understand

what you are going through and therefore, here are the actions

we are taking to help you.

Many of our clients have adapted their survey invitation

wording to be more empathetic. A great example of this is

ahm Health Insurance:

“In APAC, it’s clear that senior leaders are keeping

the customer experience top of mind. In fact, 58%

of organisations said that senior leaderships have

communicated more with customers since the

pandemic hit.”

CUSTOMER STORIES:ADAPTING FOR SUCCESS

ahm Health Insurance

ahm has tweaked their survey invites for sensitivity. “Together

we’re living through some uniquely challenging times and

the wellbeing of our members and people is our number

one priority. At ahm we ask for feedback to understand the

concerns of our members and get better.” —example from

an COVID-adapted ahm survey invitation

Organisations Have Adapted by Adding COVID-19 Text

Analytics Categories

Just over a quarter of organisations have added a text analyt-

ics category for COVID-19. This has enabled businesses to delve

further into COVID-specific customer experiences and use these

insights to inform strategic business decisions moving forward.

HELENE JAMES, INMOMENT’S SENIOR CX CONSULTANT

10 CX Trends Special Edition

CUSTOMER STORIES: ADAPTING FOR SUCCESS

The NRMA, an Australian member organisation, is using

information sources across the entire business to moni-

tor and make decisions, one of these is the Coronavirus text

analytics category. The VoC team is updating senior man-

agement twice a week, calling out references to COVID-19

within VoC trackers including critical areas of the business

like roadside assistance and Thrifty car rentals. The team

has also built a specific “Coronavirus” dashboard to moni-

tor comments as they come through. Overall, the tool acts

as a cross-check function for business decisions to ensure

that opportunities to serve the customer better during

this challenging time are not missed.

Organisations Have Adapted by Accommodating Hardship

Whilst hardship isn’t a new concept for APAC businesses, the

onset of COVID-19 has meant organisations have had to adapt to

additionally cater for this segment. Half of businesses surveyed

are providing flexible payment options for their customers and

there have been rapid changes to policies to support this. Some

organisations have made decisions to defer payments and avoid

billing customers all together during this time. As a result, these

businesses have commented on strengthened relationships with

their customers. For other businesses, financial support and relaxed

payment options cannot be made, which can create a drop in CX

and negative media sentiment. Many organisations have seen an

increase in calls regarding hardship and this creates an additional or

expanded moment of truth that shouldn’t be ignored.

Customer and employee experiences have evolved across all industries, and

closely monitoring both of these will be critical for businesses post-covid. As

CX resources become increasingly stretched, automating a closed-loop feed-

back program will help organisations protect loyal customers from churning.

KEY TAKEAWAY

Organisations Have Adapted by Automating

Customer Communications

As contact centres become overwhelmed with queries, APAC

businesses have adapted by auto-generating personalised

emails. These emails range from acknowledging their valuable

feedback, referencing related FAQs, and pointing consumers in

the right direction.

Organisations Have Adapted by Ramping up

Closed-Loop Feedback

In short, “closed-loop feedback” is when a business responds to

customer feedback. Nearly one in four organisations have shifted

their focus to service recovery and have commenced closing

the loop (CLF) with customers within their customer experience

program, when they weren’t before. There is a growing focus

among senior stakeholders in relation to customers who need

additional support at this time and this has also led to a refresh

of the CLF process.

CUSTOMER STORIES: ADAPTING FOR SUCCESS

In particular, we’ve noticed an Australian superannuation com-

pany adapting its processes for success. As physical locations

shut down in the midst of the pandemic, this super company

redeployed frontline staff roles who have experience success-

fully resolving customer queries, from physical locations to

closed loop feedback service recovery via phone.

We all recognise that when it comes to historical moments

that matter, it’s not the specific dates that are the most im-

portant. It is what we learn from them and how we move for-

ward that helps us to do better and be better as a society that

truly makes a difference.

Out of all researchers and professionals surveyed, almost half

of these CX leaders are planning to or currently implement-

ing changes to their customer experience programs to better

meet post-COVID-19 expectations.

11 CX Trends Special Edition

Looking to the Future

• 360 degree program review. Our CX leaders are reviewing

fundamental program designs to include new channels and

monitoring new moments that matter across the customer

journey.

• More eyes on CX results. As stakeholders across the

organisation are increasing and renewing their focus

on the customer experience, our data shows that ex-

perience program results are becoming more visible

through new and existing channels

• Regular customer check-ins. CX teams are reaching out

more frequently to consumers to check in. These feedback

programs include questions about what is important to the

customer, options for receiving ongoing communications

and enquiries to how they feel organisations are delivering

to safety measures.

CX

CXCX

CX

CX

CX LEADERS

• Big focus on closing the loop. Across the board, we are seeing

businesses build and improve their closed loop feedback pro-

cesses to recover and protect as many customers as possible.

• Surveys are getting shorter. Our CX leaders are maintain-

ing solid response rates by ensuring surveys are short,

relevant and engaging.

• Less talk, more action. CX professionals know that their valuable

customers need to see businesses taking action. Our data shows

businesses diving into unstructured feedback from text analytics

engines sharing these valuable insights across the business.

• Formalising an employee program. It’s no longer optional

to have an official employee experience program in place

to listen to feedback from the most important asset of any

organisation—your people.

HERE’S WHAT FUTURE-PROOFING YOUR EXPERIENCE PROGRAM LOOKS LIKE IN ASIA-PACIFIC:

Summary

12 CX Trends Special Edition

COVID-19 has brought the importance of agile customer and

employee experience programs to the forefront of APAC’s biggest

organisations. The pandemic illustrated the importance of crisis and

change management, planning for contingency as well as CX and

employee engagement, and how these aspects should be incorpo-

rated into business-as-usual processes.

Overall, our research has shown that those businesses who keep a

close eye on what’s happening from a customer’s perspective are

those that have and will continue to thrive. It’s time for experience

programs to adapt and evolve as businesses move forward and

both customer employee needs and expectations change. As cor-

porate priorities shift, it is more important than ever that customer

and employee experience programs are aligned to these priorities.

Channels to customers are changing, reasons for contacting the call

centre are changing, more customers are experiencing hardship,

companies who have experienced closure or similar and might be

ready or able to re-engage soon. It’s important to keep a close eye

on what is happening from the customer’s perspective at these

times and to be in a position to respond.

Many companies have rapidly adopted agile approaches to cus-

tomer responses and are proud of their ability to think and deliver

different solutions. Looking forward, there is opportunity for or-

ganisations to learn from the progress made and to set themselves

up for post-pandemic innovation across customer experiences and

employee solutions.

CX (CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE)

• Now Is the Time to Assess & Reinvent Your

CX Program

• Five Ways to Adapt Your CX Program Amidst COVID-19

• 4 Keys to Successful Customer Communication in the

Coronavirus Era

• How Your Experience Programs Can Step Up in a

Time of Crisis

MX (MARKET EXPERIENCE)

• Why Market Research is Vital to Your CX Program in

Times of Crisis (and Beyond!)

EX (EMPLOYEE EXPERIENCE)

• Revealing the Power of Experience Programs in Times

of Crisis

• Tips to Help Your Employees Stay Healthy While

Working from Home

HERE IS A COLLECTION OF ALL OF OUR

COVID-19 RESOURCES TO HELP YOU

THRIVE POST-PANDEMIC:

[email protected] | Follow us:

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and employees at every moment in their journey. Our clients gain the wisdom of our experts—who

bring deep domain knowledge in experience design and delivery—coupled with our award-winning

Experience Intelligence (XI)™ platform that continually analyses and evaluates enterprise experience

data and customer feedback. Recognised as a leader and innovator in our sector, we collaborate

with the world’s leading brands to attract, engage and retain their customers. We are fiercely proud

that our clients continually tell us they love the experience of working with our company, as we

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