16/02/2012

By Scott Thompson

The banking industry can use social media to help regain consumer love, but only a select few are currently succeeding in this space. That was one of the messages to come out of the first direct Future of Banking: Social Customer Service event, which took place earlier this week.

The debate brought together key figures from the financial services and social business industries to talk about the changing face of customer service in a socially-enabled world. It began with customer appetite for a social relationship with their bank- as Zopa's Giles Andrews put it 'the evidence that people want social customer service is that they use it'. Zopa's approach to answering customer queries on public channels is the more open, the better - showing the organisation has nothing to hide, as evidenced through Zopa Talk, a forum where customers support customers.

first direct's Natalie Cowan and HSBC's Lauren Anthony said that if the problem is simple enough to be solved in the open, and the customer services person has the right information to do it, then they should be empowered to solve the problem there and then on the customer's chosen channel, communicating 'adult-to-adult' to establish trust. To empower individuals across the organisation to deliver great customer service involves breaking down some of the traditional siloes in corporate structure.

Annie Shaw of CashQuestions asked if delivering customer service so quickly through social channels marginalises customers who don't use those channels - for instance, older people who don't use Twitter. JP Rangaswami, chief scientist at Salesforce, replied that learning to empower the teams inside an organisation means they can effectively service across any channel. Lauren Anthony confirmed that this is HSBC's vision - to create seamless multi-channel customer service across the organisation. No-one should be denied quality of service, and channels should be balanced according to customer needs.

Questions of customer data protection and privacy came into play, fielded by Bridget Treacy of Huntons - the panel agreed that being approached by a brand in a conversation in a public space can be quite 'creepy', but Treacy’s rule of thumb on how to approach this as a brand was 'no surprises' for the customer - they need to feel trust that their data is being protected and their privacy being upheld - they should not be surprised by their bank's actions in the social space.

JP Rangaswami’s future vision of social business is that customers will give their data as an emblem of trust in the relationship, and that enterprises must respect this, learning more about each customer's preferences, engaging them over time in dialogue which deepens the connection. His long-term vision is that eventually, truly customer-centric services will be available, where multiple providers will work together to produce a unified dashboard (for example - all investments) for the customer.

When asked the inevitable ROI (Return on Investment) question on using social media to deliver customer service, he framed his answer with 'what is the ROI of a water cooler? Or restrooms? ' - companies make these investments without working out a direct return. Often it is a small group of early adopters within an enterprise who increase productivity by using new technologies to solve problems, then that practice is rolled out across the organisation.

The final question from the audience belonged to Kirsty Weston from Emankina - "Can the banking industry use social media to help regain consumer love?" Natalie Cowan responded that first direct regularly interacts with customers who 'love' their bank. The panel agreed that it's only a few brands that garner this affection - it's a combination of trust and brand engagement. first direct empowers its customers to create and innovate through new products and services. When customers feel the bank is listening and responding to their needs, social connection can turn into love.