Customer feedback management company, InMoment is offering free 30-minute consultations to customer experience (CX) professionals to help them navigate through these unprecedented times.

InMoment head of customer success, John Harb told Retailbiz the consultation is an opportunity to explore the needs of any business and propose meaningful solutions, which may include a mix of both technology and expert service solutions.

“We also readily share best practices for businesses in any industry that will help them move up the experience improvement maturity curve, which in turn leads to greater attainment of economic outcomes for their program,” he said.

With deep industry expertise, Harb has observed a number of key CX trends as a result of COVID-19.

Firstly, we are seeing many brands changing survey invitations and driver questions to be more sensitive and communicate empathy in the current climate, with customers providing deeper and more substantive insights in surveys than ever before.

“Secondly, with so many calls coming into contact centres, many CX leaders initially turned off case management programs and in some cases turned off the CX program all together – we are now seeing businesses turn these back on as it’s more important to collect, analyse and act on customer feedback than ever before.

“Thirdly, some brands are re-evaluating employee KPIs, benchmarks and targets. Our experts are advising businesses acknowledge to employees that the goalposts have changed, KPI the employees on what they can control and re-calibrate goals as achievable benchmarks.

“Lastly, brands are worried about overloading employees with too many pulse surveys – they want to make sure employees do not feel like the business is trying to find problems that aren’t there. A way to combat this is to just focus on one or two questions and spread the survey across different business units.”

Harb also provided some quick tips on how brands can optimise their CX program during times of crisis.

Firstly, it is important to empathise with employees and listen to their fears, concerns and ideas, while supporting them with the right tools and resources so they continue to feel connected.

Secondly, employers should continue ‘business as usual’ practices to create a sense of  consistency, especially to maintain an optimal CX. They need to monitor their business; look for things that have changed and if they are permanent or temporary and assess the importance of key drivers.

Finally, employers should share results of EX pulse surveys and ideate as a company to create action  plans owned by the individual to see them through into recovery.