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Android instant apps are all the buzz in the tech industry news, lately. The promise is very appealing. Who actually enjoys being forced to visit the Play Store and install an app before getting to the content they are after? Android users will soon have instant access to the entirety of mobile application content, without the annoying blockades and buzzkill of having to download the full application. Or at least that’s what they’ve been promised.
It would be naive to think Apple isn’t working on a similar capability. Similar to Android users, the App Store and “get” button often stand in-between the content or destination we are after. However, the capability of removing the “download button” in the user’s experience isn’t a new and unique idea. This is a benefit of Uniphore’s Visual IVR and we have been successfully delivering upon this benefit for years, regardless of the operating system and channel. Organizations that have implemented Visual IVR, already offer their customers a way to digitally interact with their content, without requiring the customer to download their mobile app.
According to a study conducted by SAP1, nearly 80 percent of mobile apps are abandoned after their first use. The real problem isn’t that consumers are unwilling to download apps, though this is certainly a contributor to a slowed app adoption rate2, consumers seem to be reluctant to use apps, to begin with. There are a number of theories as to why this is the case, some of which are discussed earlier in this blog. However, the real problem organizations face is that customers just aren’t using your mobile app period.
The problem Uniphore battles on a daily basis is high call volume into the customer service contact center. Our customers (organizations that provide customer service) are inundated with their customers calling their contact center, in massive quantities, looking for assistance or information. The majority of the time, the very thing the customer is calling about could have been self-serviced through the organizations’ mobile app or other online digital resources. Most of their customers are just reluctant to use these resources.
Uniphore Visual IVR removes the obstacles standing between your consumers and your digital content by pivoting those callers to a mobile digital session specifically designed to deliver the content they are looking for. This pivot to digital is accomplished without requiring the customer to download the organization’s mobile app or anything for that matter. However, the main benefit of Uniphore Visual IVR is its unique ability to increase your customer’s adoption AND use of your existing digital resources by introducing, seamlessly, and contextually, those resources to the customer at the time at which those resources are needed. We lower your inbound call volume which decreases your cost to serve by being the “Vendor Agnostic, Instant App Equivalent” for your customers.
Of course, we will closely follow Android’s Instant App capability as it matures, and we’re eager to see what Apple delivers on this front. Having experience as the “Instant App Equivalent for Customer Service” for over 4 years now, we are always on the lookout for new technologies to assist in delivering an even better customer experience.
[About the author]
Dylon Mills is the Director of Marketing Content Strategy & Development at Uniphore. As such, Dylon’s main responsibilities are to strategize, create, and deliver content for Uniphore’s product portfolio that aligns with the global Go-To-Market strategy, corporate positioning, and marketing campaigns. Dylon’s prior work experience includes Product Management at one of the top Fortune 500 Technology companies, Symantec Corporation. Outside of work, Dylon enjoys problem-solving and any project that includes building/tinkering with tools. Dylon holds a BS Consumer Economics from the University of Georgia.
1 – http://www.cio.com/article/2453985/mobile-apps/how-cios-can-boost-mobile-app-adoption.html 2 – http://www.gartner.com/newsroom/id/3018618