There are five common myths in web self-service that often lead to poor business results, negative customer experiences and eventually, customer defections. Based on over a decade of experience in implementing self-service at world-class companies, eGain has developed best practices that businesses can leverage to get past these myths and maximize the business value from self-service, while enabling memorable customer experiences.

MYTH 1: "ONE SIZE FITS ALL" ONE WEB SELF-SERVICE METHOD FITS ALL CUSTOMERS

Believe this one and you're really in trouble. The truth is users prefer multiple ways to access information through self-service. There are pros and cons to each access method, and different situations warrant different approaches.

BEST PRACTICE: A multimodal approach to self-service dramatically improves self-service adoption. This entails providing the right access method, depending on customer preferences and skill level based on demographics and psychographics, problem type, and the customer lifecycle. Some of our leading clients have used the following approach to maximize self-service effectiveness:

* COMPANY INTRODUCTION-NATURAL-LANGUAGE VIRTUAL AGENT

* INFORMATION GATHERING-NATURAL-LANGUAGE SEARCH OR BROWSE

* PRODUCT COMPARISON AND SELECTION-GUIDED HELP, DRIVEN BY A REASONING ENGINE, WITH AGENT COLLABORATION AS NECESSARY

* TRANSACTION-WEBFORMS WITH LIVE-CHAT ASSISTANCE

* PROBLEM RESOLUTION-FAQ, SEARCH, BROWSE, GUIDED HELP DRIVEN BY A REASONING ENGINE, WITH AGENT COLLABORATION AS NECESSARY

MYTH 2: SELF-SERVICE IS ALL ABOUT COST CUTTING

The most common reason for businesses to implement web self-service is cost cutting. Taken in isolation and carried to the extreme, this approach can hurt the organization's most significant asset - customer loyalty.

With the onset of ATM technology, banks cut down their retail presence and agent-assisted contact center service to the barebones, only to realize that they had no emotional capital left with customers. In the face of increasing customer churn, many of these banks are now bringing back branch and agent-assisted customer interactions to re-build customer relationships.

The truth is that lasting relationships are built through self-service and human interactions.

BEST PRACTICE: Customer service is one of the few sustainable business differentiators. We recommend that self-service complement and add value to human-assisted service offerings, while expanding interaction choices and service availability. A self-service implementation should not be focused on simply eliminating other forms of customer interactions.

MYTH 3: WEB SELF-SERVICE IS AN EXTENSION OF PHONE SELF-SERVICE

Phone self-service is often considered a synonym for IVR hell! The truth is that web self-service that creates an IVR-like experience is a recipe for failure and misses a big opportunity to maximize value for the customer and the business. Moreover, the web and the computer enable richer self-service interactions than the telephone and a keypad, resulting in a better and more effective customer experience.

BEST PRACTICE: We recommend that companies provide customers the "safety net" of contextual escalation to assisted service. This contrarian approach often increases web self-service adoption. Moreover, we advise clients to use web collaboration technologies sudi as co-browsing to guide customers through web self-service capabilities when they call. Coaching customers on self-service dramatically increases adoption.

MYTH 4: SELF-SERVICE IS A QUICK, STANDALONE FIX

Standalone self-service can create tremendous customer dissatisfaction. A self-service silo disconnected from the rest of your company's business systems and processes won't yield lasting benefits.

The truth is that your company is one entity. Any service "island" that fragments the customer experience hurts your brand.

BEST PRACTICE: We recommend implementing a customer interaction hub where your business presents one unified and informed face across self-service and agent-assisted interaction channels and processes. For instance, companies could start with self-service first and add assisted interactions that seamlessly integrate with self-service. It's also critical that these frontline systems integrate with backoffice data and content assets so that customers and businesses get a 360-degree view of what they need to see.

MYTH 5: OUR SELF-SERVICE DEPLOYMENT IS "LIVE" AND "WE'RE DONE"

The truth is a sustainable self-service implementation must include ongoing closed-loop management.

BEST PRACTICE: To ensure self-service success and leverage its full value, you should know in real-time if customers are finding the information they need, whether they are getting stuck or they are leaving your site without taking the next step. Moreover, your self-service implementation should include the technology and processes to collect customer feedback on web-site content, ease of use and your company's offerings for closed-loop management. Many eGain clients are leveraging our adaptive content management capability that automatically triggers content-related tasks, based on ongoing content performance. Moreover, they collect customer feedback both at the end of service interactions and through periodic surveys.

GET TO KNOW EGAIN

For over a decade, eGain has helped world-class companies achieve and sustain customer service excellence. eGain Service(TM), the company's top-rated multichannel customer service and knowledge management software suite, enables organizations to build customer interaction hubs to provide unified, multichannel customer service, while reducing costs. Available for on-premise or on-demand SaaS deployment, eGain Service includes integrated best-of-breed applications for self-service; contact center knowledge management; email, fax, & letter management; chat and web collaboration; alert management; call tracking and resolution; and case management-all built on a common platform for customer interaction and knowledge management.