We live in a world of increasing complexity: an increasing number of communication channels, an explosion of social data, the intertwining of sales, marketing, and customer service activities, and a growing amount of information and data that customer service agents need to answer customer questions. These issues complicate the challenge of being able to provide customers the service that is in line with their expectations — service that keeps customers loyal to your brand yet that can be delivered at a cost that makes sense for your business.

Being able to deliver the right customer service  involves:

No single person is responsible for a customer’s experience; it’s a complex set of relationships among employees, partners, and customers that determines the quality of all interactions. A customer-centric culture needs to be set from the top of the organization; customer-centric actions need to be pervasive in your company and infuse every customer contact and every decision. You need to communicate these values to your agents, reinforce them with the right management actions — for example, choosing the right metrics to measure your agents’ performance — and reward the agents that embody these principles.

It’s this convergence of strategy, technology, process, and people that will allow you to evolve your customer service to the next level.