Gartner Survey: 84% Of Leaders Cite Customer Data & Analytics As ‘Very Or Extremely Important’ For Achieving Goals
- Written by Kelly Lindenau
- Published in News Briefs
Gartner’s latest survey, “Top Goals and Priorities for Customer Service and Support Leaders in 2023," revealed that the two most important business goals for 2023 are improving operations and growing businesses. Specifically, 84% of customer service and service support leaders cited customer data and analytics as “very or extremely important” for achieving their organizational goals in 2023, while 80% ranked digital channel effectiveness as “very or extremely important,” along with employee performance, development and quality assurance.
“Understanding customers’ needs and expectations for their service experience is integral for improving loyalty and creating customer value, especially when organizations are up against economic headwinds,” said Jonathan Schmidt, Sr. Principal, Advisory in the Gartner Customer Service & Support practice, in a statement. “Executing on this vision requires investment in customer data and analytics, knowledge management and an enduring partnership with IT.”
Customer service and support leaders plan to devote more resources to improving, automating or eliminating inefficient processes (59%), migrating service volume to digital and self-service channels (51%) and contributing to the top-line by creating customer value (46%) in the near future.
“In tough economic times, customer service and support leaders are often encouraged by their CFOs to make do with what they have,” said Schmidt. “Given how difficult it is to hire and retain talent, it makes sense that they are tackling inefficiencies and prioritizing digital channels as a strategy for driving down costs without reducing headcount or sacrificing customer experience.”
With these survey findings in mind, Gartner experts recommend customer service and support leaders:
- Collect actionable customer data across channels through a robust VoC program that goes beyond surveys and incorporates more advanced methods such as speech, text and digital experience analytics to help guide decisions on personnel, processes and technologies;
- Build digital self-service teams to oversee the digital channel strategy, manage channels and work closely with data analysts to develop and measure success metrics; and
- Enable customer service agents with technology, such as connected desktops, to help them better guide customers through resolution.
View the full survey findings here.