Introduction
Businesses are leveraging several methods to help customers have a smooth journey when they approach a brand. Business leaders are not only closely following their competitors to stay on top of their game but also implementing several technologies that can help consumers with their queries in less time. One of the methods that is rapidly getting popular among businesses is implementing a customer self service portal.
According to a report by Statista, 88% of customers expect organizations to have an online self help portal to quickly attend to their problems. With several omnichannel looking after challenges which customers face, businesses are rapidly improving customer satisfaction and increasing brand loyalty.
Do you want to learn more about customer self service portals and how they can transform your business? Read this blog!
What is Customer Self Service Portal?
A customer self service portal is a platform that lets your customers view any tools or services they need without directly interacting with a customer support agent. So instead of employing several employees to solve problems 24/7, these portals can deal with problems effectively without incurring extra cost. These customer self service portals help save heavy expenditure for small businesses, who are just starting out and maybe don’t have enough resources to solve customer problems.
A customer self service portal means to ease the customer experience. It facilitates simple access to all the resources available such as FAQs, knowledge base articles, product documentation etc. This digital platform enables customers to look through these documents without needing to wait for live agents. In this way customers’ queries are answered without any delay, enhancing the customer experience.
What are the Features of a Customer Self Service Portal?
A customer self service portal is not just a static FAQ page – It’s a dynamic platform with a lot of features to serve different types of customers. Here’s a closer look at what you can expect from these portals:
Account Management Tools
It allows customers to view and manage their own account information, update personal details, track a transaction or service history, without having to contact a customer support agent.
Knowledge Base
It includes detailed tutorials, how to articles, and troubleshooting guides, all in a well-organized repository of FAQ which customers can browse, find answers quickly, and solve their own problems without waiting for support from live customer service agents. If users are trying to discover what exactly a product feature does, or why a technical glitch occurred, it’s all available for them.
Task Management
Customers are provided with a portal which helps them complete a task with the help of a step-by-step procedure or a how-to guide, which otherwise they couldn’t have completed without a customer service agent.
Different Types of Customer Self Service Portals
Benefits of Using a Customer Self Service Portal for Your Business
Self service is not just good for your customers it is good for your business too. Here’s how customer self service portals help businesses:
Solves Challenges Quickly and Efficiently
By giving customers detailed answers to popular topics like order history or loyalty status, you solve challenges efficiently and automate revenue back to your business with a customer self service portal. Since customers generally prefer to solve simple problems by themselves it opens new opportunities for businesses to derive data and plan future goals and services accordingly.
Make sure to add links in your portal to your help center, customer community or service agents, so that if customers can’t solve their issue at home, they can contact you quickly. It’s also a good idea to embed a customer service chatbot to ease customers along their self service journey.
Improves Customer Experience
Customers generally prefer to solve their challenges through their private accounts, instead of using a common or public account. With the help of the data from these private accounts, you can personalize each page in your portal according to the name of the customer and their purchase history. With your customers’ activity history, you can also provide relevant offers and reward programs they qualify for.
Personalize Customer Experience
Through a customer self service portal, the most Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) and complaints can be addressed easily. The more customers use your portal, the less time they will need to spend figuring out how to solve a similar issue next time. It lets agents focus their efforts on creating personalized offers and experiences to build customer relationships.
Reduces Cost
A customer self service portal is available round the clock. It provides customers with access to information, the ability to ask questions, and to always solve problems on their own. This type of accessibility caters to today’s diverse consumers, residing in different parts of the world with different time zones. Additionally, this customer self service portal opens opportunities for the customers to connect with your brand as they see fit. This is typically useful for small businesses who may not have the resources to hire employees to solve customer challenges round the clock.
Stays Updated
With regular updates on the self service portals, customers can stay abreast with the latest developments in your brand.
Boosts Website Traffic
With a customized knowledge base integrated with a self help portal, it attracts customers to spend time on your website. This increases traffic, brand visibility and builds trust among other users.
As customer self service portals also include community forums, it provides opportunities to other writers, bloggers and users to write and publish articles that would help solve the most common challenges. This increases the probability of your business name to get ranked higher in the Search Engine Results Page (SERP).
Business leaders can also take advantage of external customer service experts who can publish a blog post or make an appearance on one of the forums. This adds value to the company’s knowledge base. It divides the responsibility of the organization to solely provide all the answers.
Enriches Social Engagements
In customer self service portals, both employees and chatbots interact with customers to address their challenges. Organizations can link their social media channels with this self help portal that will open more opportunities for the customer to interact with the brand.
These social media channels can be used effectively to address customer queries in a professional yet friendly manner that can strengthen customer relationships. It also provides opportunities for businesses to gather data from these customer interactions and utilize them while strategizing business goals or marketing campaigns.
The social media platforms can also act as news platforms that announce newly launched products, customer feedback after using any product or services and changes or new innovations which the customer may expect from the brand. This boosts the visibility and solidifies the brand voice on social media. It helps businesses attract new customers and gain a new customer base.
Why Choose Salesforce Self Service Portal?
Here are 5 key reasons to choose Salesforce Self-Service Portal:
- AI-Powered Automation: Autonomous AI addresses customer queries with relevant responses 24/7.
- Multichannel & Mobile Support: Salesforce self service portal helps customers through messaging channels like WhatsApp, Apple Messages for Business, SMS, etc.
- Personalized Self-Service: Einstein Bots do the routine tasks automatically, providing a personalized experience and provide tailored experience by guiding customers through the next steps of the process easily.
- Easy Setup and Customization: Fast, low code setup with Experience Builder to launch branded, mobile first self service portals and knowledge bases.
