Amdocs released the findings of a study that identifies social media as an emerging channel for consumers seeking customer-care assistance. The research highlights an opportunity for service providers to improve customer experience and reduce call centre costs. By linking customers' social media identities to their profiles stored in the customer relationship management (CRM) system, and using big data analytics techniques to identify important social media shouts, service providers can pre-empt calls or even better resolve the issue before the call reaches the call centre. However, the study also found that 52 per cent of consumers expect a response within 30 minutes of their social media contact, but only 24 per cent of service providers say they respond within that timeframe. Furthermore, 93 per cent of service providers state that they cannot identify customers from their social media profiles, and 64 per cent of service providers do not store social media interactions in their CRM database. Release
