Utilizing Technology to Supercharge Customer Engagement

Tech-Enhanced Engagement: A Guide for Modern Marketers

Harness the latest technologies to revolutionize your customer engagement efforts in the digital age

Amrith G.

SVP, Marketing & Customer Analytics | Oct 12, 2023

Welcome to the digital frontier, where technology meets customer engagement to forge a path towards unprecedented success in today’s competitive market. In this era defined by ever-evolving consumer expectations and rapidly advancing tech solutions, the science of engaging your audience has taken center stage.

In our landscape of limitless potential, a plethora of cutting-edge innovations await, poised to transform and elevate your customer engagement strategies. So, fasten your seatbelts as we embark on an exhilarating journey to uncover 8 transformative tech solutions that will propel your engagement efforts to unveil a future of business excellence.

1. Adopt an Omnichannel Approach to Offer Seamless Customer Experiences

Now more than ever, convenience has become a paramount desire among customers, with a staggering 82% emphasizing its extreme importance. To address this fundamental need, businesses must craft a seamless shopping experience that enables customers to effortlessly continue their journey across various platforms, be it on mobile devices or desktop computers. This omnichannel approach not only caters to consumer preferences but also alleviates frustration typically associated with disjointed events.

By meticulously ensuring a unified and user-friendly experience across multiple touchpoints, firms can not only meet but also exceed customer expectations. This then ignites the motivation needed to supercharge customer engagement.

2. Utilize Artificial Intelligence to Boost Answer Times

Leveraging artificial intelligence (AI), particularly through the use of chatbots, can be a game-changer in boosting customer engagement.

Chatbots serve as the first line of customer service, by efficiently addressing frequently asked questions (FAQs) with relatively high speed and accuracy. What makes them especially powerful is their round-the-clock availability. Customers can connect with brands at any time that suits their needs, eliminating the discontent of having to wait for business hours to resolve their issues.

This accessibility not only enhances engagement but also showcases a commitment to deliver high quality customer experiences, ultimately strengthening brand loyalty.

With this said, however, it’s still essential to strike a balance by maintaining a human presence. While chatbots excel at tackling commonly asked questions, for more complex ones, human intervention remains imperative.

As such, companies must ensure that human respondent(s) are ready to help when the need arises, hence ensuring a seamless and comprehensive support experience

3. Personalize Offerings to Capture Attention

In this digital era, a myriad of innovative technologies empower businesses to tailor their communications and offerings to the unique preferences of each customer segment. By harnessing these tools, companies can ensure that their messages better resonate with individual consumers, effectively cutting through the noise of generic marketing.

Personalization communicates that a brand genuinely understands its customers, fostering a sense of connection and relevance that will, in turn, bolster engagement.

4. Harness Geolocation Technology to Encourage In-Store Check-Ins

While online seems to reign supreme, businesses must recognize that the world of offline brick-and-mortar stores remains far from obsolete. In fact, in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic, 94% of customers expressed their renewed interest in heading back to physical stores.

This resurgence underscores the pivotal role that offline establishments continue to play in businesses’ engagement strategies. To seize this opportunity to foster more profound consumer relationships, firms should turn to geolocation technology.

Geolocation offers a precise means of targeting customers based on their proximity to a store, enabling the delivery of personalized offers in real-time. Here, brands not only heighten the appeal of their in-store experience but also instill a sense of urgency and exclusivity that online platforms can’t replicate. This approach draws customers through the store doors, allowing for the cultivation of a deeper sense of community.

By facilitating increased interactions between brands and its customers, geolocation not only amplifies engagement but also solidifies the brand’s presence at the forefront of its consumers’ minds.

5. Incorporate Remote Verification Tools to Help Customers Save Time

As mentioned above, consumers want convenience. In industries like banking, whereby customers often endure long wait times and in-person visits for service, the integration of remote onboarding tools, such as biometric sensors and/or facial recognition, emerges as transformative solutions.

By eliminating the need for physical presence, these cutting-edge tools not only streamlines processes but also significantly saves customers valuable time. They not only boost engagement but also demonstrate a commitment to adapt to the ever-evolving needs of the modern consumer, fostering stronger loyalty and trust.

6. Implement Augmented and/or Virtual Reality for Deeper Immersion

Drawing inspiration from industries such as retail, real estate, and education, businesses can harness the potential of augmented reality (AR) and/or virtual reality (VR) to create more captivating and immersive experiences for their audiences.

VR creates a simulated 3-dimensional environment where scenes and objects appear to be real, allowing audiences to freely explore and interact. A compelling example of this comes from McDonald’s, which used this tool to pique the interests of its younger audiences. They ingeniously transformed their Happy Meal box into a VR viewer, named “Happy Goggles” that allows users to get access to a fun yet educational game called Slope Stars.

By embracing VR to introduce an exclusive and novel experience, McDonald’s not only enhanced customer zengagement but also solidified its brand’s appeal.

AR is the seamless integration of digital information with user environments in real time. Remarkably, only 1% of retailers have tapped into this vast potential, despite 61% of consumers expressing a preference for brands offering AR experiences. Here, IKEA’s “IKEA Place App” stands out as a prime example. When customers use the app, it automatically scales products to fit specific room dimensions with 98% accuracy. By enabling customers to visualize products in their actual living spaces prior to making a purchase, IKEA elevated consumer motivation to interact with the brand and its app, ultimately bolstering customer satisfaction and engagement.

In both cases, these technologies immerse customers in interactive and personalized environments, granting them unprecedented opportunities to explore a brand’s offerings. By forging deeper connections and delivering more memorable experiences, AR and VR technologies are fast becoming indispensable tools for forward-thinking businesses looking to thrive in the digital age.

7. Gamify to Pique Customer Interest

Put simply, gamification infuses non-game environments with game-like mechanics to create a more fun and enjoyable customer experience.

By seamlessly integrating elements such as leaderboards, challenges, and rewards into their communications platforms, businesses can tap into users’ inherent competitive natures, motivating them to interact more actively and consistently with the brand.

This not only fosters a strong sense of achievement but also a vibrant sense of community as consumers engage in friendly competition. Ultimately, gamified experiences not only captivate customer interests but also heighten their motivation to continuously engage with the brand.

Examples of gamified experiences include “shake-the-tree,” “spin-the-wheel,” and daily quizzes.

8. Regularly Leverage Analytics Tools to Better Inform Future Decisions

Analytics tools provide invaluable insights that businesses discern which strategies worked and which didn’t. From there, it’s a dynamic process of adaptation, further optimizing what thrived and adjusting what fell short.

For example, social listening tools help companies gain a deeper understanding of customer sentiment. By actively monitoring what customers are saying about the brand on social media, businesses can better understand consumer opinions and concerns in real-time. This empowers companies to respond promptly to address issues and build on positive feedback.

In essence, regularly leveraging analytics tools ensures that businesses remain agile and responsive. With this approach, firms can confidently make better-informed decisions that align with customer preferences, hence boosting engagement.

Conclusion

In this rapidly evolving digital world, leveraging technology to boost customer engagement is no longer merely a strategy, it’s a lifeline. The utilization of new technologies has transitioned from a luxury to a necessity, as it empowers firms to craft tailored, more memorable experiences that deeply resonate with their customers to foster ongoing active engagement.

Ready to boost your customer engagement? Discover how Perx can supercharge your strategies with its powerful personalization, gamification, and analytics tools. Don’t miss out on the opportunity to enhance your customer relationships – book a demo today to start capturing attention, encouraging interaction, and anticipating needs.