Digital Client Management: Reinventing the Customer Relationship

In these times of accelerated technological transformation, organizations that fail to keep pace with the digital revolution pay a high price. Today, the most successful companies are those that proactively listen to their customers’ needs. This applies at every stage of the customer journey and across all interaction channels.

Statistics show that more than 70% of consumers use multiple channels when purchasing a product, and that customers using several channels spend up to three times more. In addition, companies that excel in customer experience generate significantly higher revenues and profitability.

Aware of these challenges, Proximus NXT (the Proximus Luxembourg brand) has built a multidisciplinary team of experts dedicated to providing companies with the most innovative tools to successfully transition towards Digital Client Management.

The digitalization of the customer experience creates new opportunities to acquire, develop, and retain customers. From new purchasing, conversion, and sales processes, digital technologies provide companies with innovative and powerful tools to reinvent the relationship they maintain with their customers.

“We observe that, across all industries, customer management is becoming increasingly digital,” confirms Frank Roessig, Head of Digital Trust Solutions at Proximus NXT (Proximus Luxembourg brand). “This relationship is even becoming ‘phygital’, meaning that companies must be able to create a strong connection between physical distribution channels and their digital counterparts. Indeed, seamless information sharing and the extension of services across distribution channels optimize the customer experience,” he adds.

A full-service and omnichannel experience

“Whether it is a consumer or a business customer,” continues Frank Roessig, “customers not only want to benefit from a complete online service offering, but also to access it through all available communication channels. They want to be able to use a service from their mobile device, tablet, PC, or visit a physical location whenever they feel the need. Furthermore, within this omnichannel and full-service environment, customers expect to be able to chat, exchange messages, have face-to-face meetings, or communicate via video conference. The omnichannel approach therefore relies on the combination of two components: the device itself (smartphone, tablet, computer) and the communication medium used (voice, video, text, etc.).”

The online service offering must also be as comprehensive as its physical equivalent.

“Over the past five years, the adoption rate of digital banking services has increased from 65% to 86%. Some online services are naturally more widely used than others: while 90% of banking customers use digital services to check their accounts, online investment advice reaches only 20% of them,” explains Frank Roessig.

“It is therefore important to adapt the level of digitalization according to the type of service being used. Today – and even more so following the coronavirus pandemic – customers want to be able to perform any type of transaction online, at any time. These new expectations are challenging the business models of many companies. And for this to work, trust is an essential element,” he emphasizes.

Expanding and securing new services

This is where Proximus NXT comes in. The company’s mission is to ensure that these new digital services are delivered efficiently, securely, and in compliance with regulations. Thanks to its orchestration platform, the entire customer lifecycle is managed centrally.

Until recently, online services were mainly targeted at younger generations. Here too, the health crisis changed the situation, and senior citizens discovered a growing interest in these types of services. This generational shift requires adaptations in application design and user experience.

“In the physical world,” explains the Proximus NXT expert, “it would be very difficult to design a point of sale that meets the expectations of different audiences. In the digital world, however, offering several versions of a service adapted to different audiences is not only achievable, but also significantly less expensive.”

“We are also seeing major digitalization efforts from B2B market players,” he adds. “First, because digital natives want to work the way they live; but also because many traditional services are proving inefficient. Many industries still consume huge amounts of paper, for example. Sectors as diverse as healthcare, mobility, hospitality, e-commerce, personal assistance, as well as SMEs, are still lagging behind in terms of digital transformation.”

The range of digital tools developed by Proximus NXT extends from digital onboarding – secure customer registration – to omni-device self-service solutions, including document management systems that provide end customers with direct access to their invoices, consumption data, and more.

“If the company that works with us operates in the B2B sector,” explains Frank Roessig, “the onboarding solution we provide takes the form of a corporate KYB solution. This solution is based on an automated platform that collects data about a counterparty company, whether it is a customer or supplier, including articles of association, legal information, corporate structure, ultimate beneficial owners, and more. The information required for compliance and risk analysis is centralized, making risk assessment and monitoring easier.”

In Digital Client Management, identity management is a key element. The easier access to digital services becomes, the greater the risk of cyber threats.

“Although the systems we implement can be accessed from any device, they remain highly secure,” highlights Frank Roessig. “To achieve this, we rely on various technologies: device identification through IP address recognition, multi-factor authentication, biometrics, identity document verification, and more. Some financial sector operators have also started using AI-based transactional analysis models to protect their customers. Ultimately, the widespread adoption of these practices will enable customer identities to be verified by detecting abnormal or unusual behaviors,” he predicts.

“One of the keys to the success of this type of improvement is securing customer interactions invisibly, without creating friction…”

Artificial intelligence at the heart of customer relationships

Artificial intelligence and its sub-disciplines, machine learning and deep learning, have become essential technologies for securing online transactions. AI enables organizations to effectively combat fraud, money laundering, and identity abuse.

“We are already providing transaction fraud detection solutions for major European banks,” explains Frank Roessig. “Proximus NXT (Proximus Luxembourg brand) has decided to further develop its artificial intelligence capabilities. For example, we are developing systems capable of detecting customer churn risks.”

Certain behaviors and signals allow AI systems to predict whether a customer is likely to leave their provider. By extending the analysis further, these same technologies can also identify new business opportunities directly online.

Customer requests increasingly reach companies through chat, email, postal mail, phone calls, and face-to-face interactions. Deploying intelligent systems capable of scanning and interpreting these requests before assigning them to the appropriate teams enables companies to automate handling processes. These AI systems make responses more efficient, faster, and generate significant economies of scale.

“Today, customers spend much more time on their provider’s digital platform than on the provider’s premises,” notes Frank Roessig. “Companies must therefore focus their efforts on the digital environment: observing customer activities, detecting meaningful behaviors, learning from them, and acting to provide personalized services.”

“Furthermore, the information collected in the digital space can help enrich customer management. These AI-based processes create a virtuous cycle of service improvement and customer development,” he insists. “Working with data improves services, which increases customer engagement, generating more data that further enriches the service, and so on.”

Making the promise of digital transformation a reality

“To unlock the potential of new technologies and provide companies with a comprehensive approach, we have chosen to organize dedicated workshops for them,” explains Frank Roessig. “These sessions allow us to analyze their customer journey processes, imagine how to make these experiences smoother, and identify ways to create a competitive advantage.”

These workshops involve many stakeholders, as the entire value chain of the customer organization must be represented. They include Proximus NXT experts in design thinking, digital solutions, business specialists, and technical experts responsible for assessing the required infrastructure according to the identified needs.

“We sometimes invite end customers to gather their feedback on the proposed ideas,” adds Frank Roessig. “Based on these insights, we can then scale up the solution – or part of it – according to the lessons learned.”

Whether the objective is to accelerate the digitalization of a B2B2C or B2B2B process, successful digital transformation ultimately comes from adapting solutions to end users.