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The Covid crisis, new challenges for customer relations

A study published by the research company INIT in collaboration with the Association for the Management of Customer Complaints and the blog Sens du client, reviews the major trends in customer relations.

This study, carried out during the Covid crisis, highlighted a few lessons. Among them are:

  • Supporting and strengthening proximity with customers (34%). After the crisis, companies have become aware of the urgent need to strengthen ties with customers.
  • Rethinking the customer journey (32%). Customer relationship professionals understand that the experience still needs to simplify and evolve to produce immediate benefits for their customers.
  • The digitalization of relationships (32%). The development of hybrid solutions that promote stronger and richer remote relationships.
customer relationship

Customer relations: the Ellisphere case

The human being at the center of the processes

During the crisis, we had to be reassuring, show solidarity, and above all answer all the questions that our customers had. First of all, we had to communicate on the continuity of our services during the crisis.

In order to make telecommuting a success, "collaborative" tools were also deployed. The major challenge we had to face for " customer relationship management " was to work on the implementation of intuitive tools that would guarantee, above all, excellent customer care.

 

An adaptation in several stages

The adaptation to the crisis took place in several stages. The first was a time of urgency in this reorganization exercise, followed by a time of "indulgence" for employees and customers, who were asked to work differently and to be a little more patient than usual. They showed great understanding.

"Listening to its customers, but also to its employees has never been more important than in this period of crisis related to the Covid-19 pandemic."

- Laurence Bourdin, Customer Success Manager at Ellisphere

Laurence Bourdin

In addition, during the crisis, we (Customer Service Department) produced analyses of client portfolios incorporating the Business Resilience Indices created by Ellisphere in order to take into account the impacts of the crisis on certain sectors of the economy.

We also provided the so-called Covid score matrices. These allow our clients to compare the economic and financial situation of their business partners before and after the crisis.

Finally, the crisis has led to a sharp increase in requests to our client support services (+20% between 2020 and 2019 and +25% between 2021 and 2020). Our clients were more interested in additional in-depth analysis of their business relationships, in the context of direct human contact. They needed to be reassured by Ellisphere's experts in their decision-making with regard to customers and suppliers.

In fact, our various customer satisfaction indicators broke records during this period!

  • Customer satisfaction rate of 4.8/5
  • CES at 1.1
  • NPS at 69...

Undeniably, customer service is at the heart of external communication with business partners; empathy and expertise are more than ever the drivers of a good customer relationship.