Organizations in the past were often able to dictate the methods that customers could use to communicate with them. Today, customers have greater control over these communications, requiring businesses of all sizes and industries to adapt to their customers’ preferences. New technologies like business document software play a key role in meeting these expectations. Customer Communications Management (CCM) aids organizations in improving their relationships with customers by optimizing document management, from the generation of documents to their distribution to the customer.
Overview
CCM and document management are closely linked concepts, with similar evolution and processes. Customer Communications Management is a set of practices that allows organizations to manage their communications with customers across a range of channels, including printed documents, email, text messages and web pages. It involves delivering these communications and segmenting them according to context and customer profile, with the objective of acquiring new customers and retaining current ones.
A document management system (DMS) receives, tracks, manages and stores documents. It typically maintains multiple versions of each document, including a record of the users who created and modified each version. The purpose of a DMS is to optimize document management, which reduces costs.
DMSs have evolved greatly over the last two decades due to the increasing use of digital documentation. They now manage the entire document process and can handle documents generated by many different methods. This document software is often part of an enterprise’s content management system (CMS) and related to similar concepts such as digital asset management, document imaging, records management systems and workflow management systems.
The Need for Customer Communication
Today’s customers expect organizations to be available at all times. This expectation is no longer restricted to millennials, but all ages and demographics. Most customer communication is now digital through channels such as mobile devices, social media and the Web, requiring relevant and timely responses. Businesses must also deliver self-service to customers, which often requires them to reengineer traditional business processes, so they will function in a modern digital environment. For example, customers browsing a website with a smartphone should receive the same customer experience as they would from a desktop computer. Achieving this goal requires the website to automatically size the display for the user’s device.
Customer Communications Management document software solutions allows organizations to create and deliver personalized communications to any output device throughout the customer’s lifecycle. This capability benefits many processes, including lead generation, purchase transactions, customer service inquiries and bill notifications. CCM is therefore becoming a common approach for streamlining and integrating customer communications through the corresponding document software solutions.
Integrating Document Management with Customer Communications Management
An organization should ensure that the customer communications platform implementation includes document management. This document software solution should provide the following benefits:
- Personalized communications
- Improved customer communication
- Regulatory compliance
Personalized Customer Communications
Customers feel unappreciated when they receive a communication that ignores previous correspondence. It also damages customer relations when a business does not know anything about a customer such as the products they’ve purchased and how long they’ve been a customer.
Generating more personalized communication requires document management software to integrate with smart process applications (SPAs), which provides a controlled environment for managing customer personalization. This capability is particularly important for negotiated documents related to case and contract management. The document software in a customer communications platform should allow business applications to access data that contains personal information about document recipient.
The document software solution should also allow users to edit composed documents in their preferred word processor to further personalize the message. They can provide additional data at this stage that is unavailable from other sources. Templates can help users select text blocks from a library, thus reducing the time needed to generate documents. Users should also be able to change text manually when needed to refer to previous communications or the customer’s personal situation.
Improved Customer Communication
Organizations often have disjointed communications that do not allow them to engage their customers in a meaningful way. A Customer Communications Management solution should improve this situation by allowing them to speak to their customers as individuals and provide them with a consistent experience across all communication channels.
For example, integrating CCM into business processes makes customer communications more reliable. This integration should include standards business applications such as Microsoft Dynamics, Office 365, SAP and SharePoint in addition to customized applications. The documents that reach customers should have the same brand image, content, and tone, regardless of the medium. Integrated document management software solutions help accomplish this goal by providing templates for documents in printed and electronic formats, including emails, faxes, letters and PDF files.
Regulatory Compliance
Government regulations and industry standards are generally tightening, making it increasingly important to remain fully compliant. A Customer Communications Management solution should help your organization manage its document generation in a way that minimizes the risk of violating these requirements.
Document software solution features that strengthen your control over document compliance include the use of communication profiles from organization stakeholders to drive documents rules. A CCM solution should also allow you to authorize specific users to edit parts of a document. This capability helps facilitate the generation of critical documents that meet regulatory compliance requirements by ensuring that staff members only handle the elements of a document for which they are qualified.
Summary
A Customer Communications Management solution should integrate document management technology with tools that manage customer requirements, which can change quickly based on personal desire and evolving trends. Furthermore, CCM platforms should include applications that intuitively develop customized documents for customers. This combination of capabilities allows organizations to create and distribute their communications more effectively across a wide range of communication channels. Integrating CCM with document management software also helps users send consistent messages to their employees and business partners.
J.C. Olivares
Business Development Mgr. at DocPath Corp.