It’s no secret that employee experience (EX) drives the customer experience (CX). According to Harvard Business Review (HBR), excellent employee experience drives revenue growth, something essential for any organization. While many departments will claim credit for this success, customer-facing employees play the most vital role and whether a customer views your organization favorably. A single interaction with an employee can make or break the success of a customer interaction. Even knowing this, employees’ role in creating a great customer experience or driving revenue is often overlooked.

In this article, we’ll discuss the importance of the employee experience and customer experience, how they influence each other, and how upgrading your commercial phone system can be the solution to improving both. 

How Important Is Employee Experience (EX) for Your Business?

Simply put, the employee experience is among the most critical aspects of running a successful business. A poor EX can translate to a poor customer experience, and the results can be disastrous if your customers leave your organization for a competitor. One of the most common complaints among employees that stands in their way of a positive experience is not having what they need to conduct their job. 

For example, software required to do their job effortlessly might be outdated, which causes communication challenges between colleagues. This can prevent them from serving the customers the way they should. Employee experience is an imperative piece of the puzzle in delivering the highest customer experience. It’s also important to note it goes beyond training. You can hire and train top-tier talent, but they need modern business software like CRM and tools they use to communicate with customers to help them achieve favorable solutions. 

Employee experience has a profound effect on other aspects of the workplace as well. Employees who report positive experiences at work that provide the right tools to do their job are more likely to stay at that organization – this is in stark contrast to those who report negative experiences because their company didn’t provide the right tools.

Individuals with positive experiences are also more likely to promote your business as a great place to work by leaving positive reviews on job search websites, which attracts more highly qualified job candidates. Employee experience also affects how engaged a worker is – higher engagement levels lead to better company culture, resulting in increased productivity and a positive impact on revenue and profits. 

Why Employee Experience Matters for the Customer Experience

Every business in existence strives to have happy employees. However, providing a positive employee experience extends well beyond making someone happy – it’s about enabling them to be engaged and productive employees to better serve your customers. Engaged employees deliver the highest quality CX, which helps improve how consumers view your brand. It helps generate referrals through word of mouth and will improve revenue. Below, we’ll explain why employee experience matters and how it translates to a great customer experience.

• It Attracts and Retains Top-Tier Talent who Provide the Best CX: Highly skilled employees want to work in a business that embraces and supports them. Providing the necessary tools to make their job easier plays a significant role in keeping them aboard. Hiring the best talent ensures they’ll deliver exceptional CX. 
• It Helps Employees Feel Supported: A positive employee experience empowers your team to try hard, leading to better results. If the workplace shows them the support they need, especially if you provide them with modern business tools, they’ll feel confident in their work and provide a better CX.
• It Improves Engagement: Employees that come to work with a positive attitude each day and have pride in what they do are attentive, engaged, and ready to represent the company well to show the organization’s best side. This resonates well with customers. 
• It Inspires Creative Solutions for Customer Issues: Empowering your workers allows them to find innovative means of managing customer challenges. Your customers will take note when their needs are met – they remember these positive interactions when making their next purchase decision, making them more likely to continue their business relationship with you. 
• It Elevates the Company Image: When your employees feel good about their position, and your organization supports them with the right tools, they talk about it. This type of word-of-mouth advertising is powerful. When customers hear what your happy, dedicated, and engaged staff has to say about your organization, they’ll be more likely to do business with you.

A positive employee experience influences the customer experience. Not only will it attract and retain the best talent around, but your employees will feel supported, engaged, and inspired to deliver an exceptional customer experience, improving revenue and your business as a whole.

How Important Is Customer Experience (CX) for Your Business?

Simply put, great customer experience means business success. Period. Customer experience is the heart of the relationship between a business and its customers. The primary objective of any business is to be profitable, and providing an exceptional customer experience drives revenue. This isn’t possible if your employees are uninspired, using outdated technology, or have low morale. Happy CX reps are the key, and good EX is the key to building strong customer relationships. When your organization assists customers in meeting their goals, customers will also want to tell their friends, business associates, family, and others about how you accommodated them, which can mean new customers, additional business, and more sales. It also results in repeat business and customer retention. 

A good customer experience indicates that your customer’s needs were met. If your organization fails to deliver on what your customers need, you run the risk of losing them to a competitor. A Forbes Customer Amazement Study found that a staggering 96 percent of customers will leave a brand after one bad customer experience, demonstrating the significance of having a competent and motivated team of employees to manage your customers, and what it means to provide them with the right tools to do so. Part of this toolset is the solution they use to communicate with customers, which can include phone, text, chat and email. 

Providing an outstanding customer experience not only differentiates your brand but also helps it stay at the top of customers’ minds and elevate the perception of your organization. It’s crucial to have customers choose your business over your competition. 

Why Customer Experience Matters and How to Provide It

Providing a positive customer experience is crucial for many reasons. It will boost your business, and satisfied customers will be more inclined to do repeat business with your organization. Even more, they’ll refer your business to others through word of mouth, which is regarded as one of the most influential elements driving purchase decisions today. According to Semrush, 23 percent of people talk about their favorite products with friends and family daily, and 88 percent had the highest trust in a brand when friends or family recommended it. 

Below, we’ll outline ways to provide exceptional customer experience and why doing so matters. .

• Give Accurate Information About Products and Services: When your employees are at the top of their game and operating on modern business and communications tools, they can provide accurate, up-to-date information to the customer. This sets realistic expectations about your products and services, meaning nothing ever gets lost in translation. Your customers will appreciate always being in the loop.
• Deliver a Personalized Experience: Despite living in a seemingly anonymous culture where self-service has become the norm, customers still crave a personalized experience. According to Twilio, 62 percent of consumers will lose their loyalty if they deliver a non-personalized experience. Modern communication tools enable businesses to establish proper relationships with their customers, and fostering these relationships increases the odds these customers will become your brand advocates. 
• Respond Quickly on Various Channels: Providing the best customer experience means delivering lightning-quick responses and meeting them on the channel of their choice, whether that’s phone, text, email, or chat. It doesn’t matter where it is; no one likes to wait. We live in a fast-paced and busy world, and the response times your business delivers must be reasonable. Data from HubSpot research shows that 90 percent of customers rate an immediate response as essential when they have a question. Sixty percent defined “immediate” as ten minutes or less. This might be challenging for your team to provide with outdated communications tools. 
• Solve Problems Quickly and Completely: When a problem arises, an essential element of a positive customer experience is the need for a fast and complete resolution. A highly motivated team with the right tools can address customer problems immediately to keep them from snowballing. Providing customers with complete and accurate solutions to their issues can ensure they continue doing business with your organization. 
• Save Time for the Customer: Customers don’t want to wait when they contact your business. When employees have the information in one place, it enables them to respond quickly. Good business communication tools put that information in one place, resulting in a good EX, which can translate into a great CX. This generates positive business results, happy customers, and organizational success. 

How Do Modern Communication Tools Improve Employee Experience & Customer Experience? 

Communication tools play a vital role in improving the employee experience, which in turn results in a better customer experience. According to research from the PwC Millennials At Work Report, 78 percent of millennials stated that access to modern technology tools makes them more effective at work. Modern business communication tools play an integral role in today’s workplace and consist of advanced phone features, contact center functionality, text, chat, group messaging, video conferencing, and collaboration tools. Adopting a cloud-based UCaaS solution can substantially improve both the employee and customer experience.

If your business is operating on an outdated, antiquated commercial phone system, it’s hard to expect your employees to deliver the results you expect from them. With outdated tools, your entire workforce is bogged down trying to manage a system that’s not user-friendly and demands attention that should be focused on the customer’s needs. When your workers are  frustrated, it carries over to the customer. If responding to them takes too long, it could mean the customer chooses a competitor. 

Organizations that fail to provide modern communications tools to their employees risk demotivation, disengagement, poor productivity, and high employee turnover. An outdated phone system can contribute to a poor employee experience, which can result in your staff not being motivated to provide a stellar customer experience.

Connected employees are more productive — upgrading your business communications system to a cloud-based communications solution gives your business and your workers the following advantages:

• Flexibility: Communicate using the device of your choice
• Mobility: Work from anywhere, at any time
• Collaboration: Improve communication between teams
• Productivity: Save time with streamlined tools
• Efficiency: Consolidate your workflows

Businesses that utilize modern communications tools enable their workforce to do their jobs more effectively and efficiently, allowing them to devote more energy into providing an exceptional customer experience that your customers want. Many businesses are interested in adopting a modern business communications solutions like an upgraded phone system – they just don’t know where to start. Fortunately, we’ve written an eBook on the topic that discusses everything and more about a new business communication system. If you’re ready to learn more about how to choose a modern commercial phone system that will empower your employees to better serve your customers, download our eBook, The Complete Guide to Choosing a Business Phone System today!