WHAT’S BUZZING
Customer experience maturity correlates to revenue growth: Zendesk
Mid-sized and enterprise companies in Asia Pacific (APAC) that have continued to invest in their customer experience (CX) over the past year are 4.7 times more likely to have grown their customer base in the past six months. They are also 10 times more likely to have increased per-custom- er-spend over the same period.
These findings are from The 2021 State of CX Maturity Report by Zendesk and Enterprise Strategy Group (ESG). To understand the characteristics and benefits of CX leadership, ESG built a CX maturity scale to identify common patterns and behaviours that separate high-maturity CX organisations — what ESG calls “Champions” — from less mature ones.
According to the study, APAC Champions are 2.8 times more likely than their peers to have accelerated major CX projects in the past year, and 7.4 times more likely to be using service data extensively.
APAC Champions are also pivoting to a more conversational experience, with 73% predicting that customers will prefer chat and social channels in future.
As a result of their efforts, APAC Champions said they are 6 and 9.4 times more likely to deliver excellent customer visibility and cross-channel visibility, respectively, to their customer service agents.
The report also reveals that making the right CX investment can help improve business resilience. APAC Champions are 10.3 times more likely to have maximised their resiliency during the pandemic. They are also better positioned to adapt and thrive in the face of change, taking roughly half the time their peers take to grow their team by 50%, on-board new hires and add a new service channel.
Only 40% of Singapore companies have a climate action plan
Most companies in Singapore have a long road ahead to achieving their sustainability goals, according to Schneider Electric’s Building a Greener Singapore report.
While many Singapore business leaders believe their company’s sustainability performance may be a barrier or opportunity to future growth and success, only 40% have an action plan to address climate risk.
Moreover, only 28% of the respondents said sustainability is central to their business strategy. More than half also do not have key sustainability resources, systems, and processes in place internally.
However, a positive momentum is seen around energy transition and resource and technology use to further sustainability ambitions. Recent global disruptions have motivated many to invest further in digitisation (60%), energy efficiency (57%) and purchasing renewable generation (53%).
See: On the road to becoming digital native enterprises
The top three projects and technologies being employed to achieve energy goals in organisations are energy and resource efficiency measures (43%), carbon offsets (40%) and renewable electricity certificates (34%).
According to Schneider Electric, Singapore companies can enhance their sustainability preparedness by making sustainability central to the organisation and having the right resources, processes, systems, and technologies. They should also have a clear climate action plan and targets, raise understanding and knowledge of the sustainability landscape, and tap on government grants and programmes to further utilise new technologies to operate more sustainably.
IN PICTURE
Photo: Ngee Ann Polytechnic
You may soon see smart robots roaming about SingHealth Polyclinics to help disinfect the premises. Called HIRO (Healthcare Assistive Robot for Frontline Infection Control), the robots will use UV-C light to eliminate more than 99.9% of bacteria and viruses from high-touch and hard-to-reach places.
Additionally, HIRO can detect people who do not wear masks or follow safe distancing rules and record their temperature. They can also show patients and visitors the way to different service points in the polyclinic.
All these automated functions will help the polyclinics save manpower while managing their facilities more efficiently to enhance safety. HIRO is jointly developed by Ngee Ann Polytechnic’s School of Engineering, School of Health Sciences, School of Life Sciences & Chemical Technology and SingHealth Polyclinics.
DIGITAL LIFE
With sustainability becoming a business priority, here are some ways Google Cloud is helping organisations make their IT operations greener.
Carbon Footprint is a tool that reports on the carbon emissions associated with every organisation’s Google Cloud Platform usage. Businesses can use it to measure, track, and report on the progress against their climate goals.
Unattended Project Recommender uses machine learning to identify and flag projects that are likely abandoned so that organisations can choose to easily delete them. This helps reduce carbon emissions, save money and mitigate security risks.
Google Earth Engine — together with BigQuery, Cloud AI, and Google Maps Platform — enables organisations to track, monitor, and predict changes in the Earth’s surface due to extreme weather events or human-caused activities. Consequently, firms can save on operational costs and better mitigate and manage risks — ultimately boosting their resiliency to climate change threats.
Main photo: Unsplash
