In 2023, companies leaned into technologies like generative AI to improve efficiencies and enhance the customer experience. New technology is doing much the same for the phone channel. Branded calling and phone scam protection technologies are transforming the phone call, increasing consumer trust, providing protection from fraud, and efficiently optimizing interactions with customers.
This transformation is elevating the phone call in 2024 to the preferred communication channel for businesses.
#1: Trust
Building consumer trust is vital for brands to maintain a competitive advantage. Customer trust drives loyalty, increasing sales through repeat purchasing and through recommendations of trusted brands to others. Consumer trust is also a powerful lever for enhancing a company’s reputation and brand image which can strengthen the bottom line.
Data from PwC emphasizes the impact of consumer trust, revealing that 61% of consumers have recommended a company that they trust to friends or family, 46% purchased more at companies they trust, and 28% paid a premium.
Many companies are not reaping these benefits as consumer trust has deteriorated in recent years. According to a recent Qualtrics XM Institute survey of 10,000 U.S. consumers across a variety of industries, consumer trust in the U.S. is at its lowest point since 2016.
Today, this trust challenge is exacerbated by the relentless barrage of spam and scam phone calls plaguing consumers. As bad actors work to undermine the trust brands are looking to create, branded calling technology is bringing trust back to the phone call, helping companies successfully leverage this channel to build trusted relationships with consumers.
Branded calling is a powerful tool designed to restore trust in voice calls by delivering brand information content on incoming call screens so consumers can identify who is calling and why. Content-rich and branded solutions bring transparency to the phone call which is key to building consumer trust. That transparency helps companies increase engagement, deliver superior customer experiences, and protect brand reputation.
Today, all major mobile carriers support branded communications, allowing over 350 million U.S. mobile subscribers to make informed decisions about whether to answer calls. When consumers know that the call they are receiving can be answered without the fear of being scammed or phished, trust and loyalty in the brand increases and experience is enhanced.
When companies use branded calling solutions for outbound calls, consumers do answer the phone and are ready to engage. For example, a call center experienced a 76% increase in first call conversions; a national home improvement retailer saw a 55% decrease in its decline rate and a property insurance provider saw a 68% increase in long call duration.
#2: Protection
Call spoofing and spam threats continue to evolve, harassing consumers with fraud attempts on their mobile devices. With the rise in call spoofing and spam, an overwhelming majority of consumers (90%) are afraid to answer phone calls from unknown numbers, causing them to decline these calls.
Scammers pretending to be legitimate businesses are defrauding consumers of millions of dollars each year. The FCC reports that illegal and spoofed robocalls are the top consumer complaint received by the organization.
Businesses can do more to protect customers from fraud, helping ensure they don’t fall prey to bad actors impersonating their brand. Research reveals that almost 90% of consumers surveyed expect businesses to protect them by ensuring their phone numbers are not being spoofed by scammers in an attempt to trick consumers.
Technology exists today to help brands protect the customers who trust them from phone scammers and spammers. Spoof mitigation technology works to ensure legitimate calls are delivered and illegitimate calls are blocked so that they never reach the end user’s device.
#3: Efficiency
In the digital age, consumers want faster service and value brands that efficiently respond to their inquiries. According to the 2023 Sprout Social Index, 39% of consumers expect a brand response within 1-2 hours, and 69% expect a response within 24 hours.
That’s a real problem for businesses that don’t brand their phone calls. The vast majority of consumers don’t answer calls from unknown numbers and that means they don’t get their questions answered or issues resolved quickly. This negatively impacts customer experience (CX), creating unhappy customers and unhappy customers don’t stick around for long.
These missed connections are also a major source of frustration for employees, negatively impacting employee experience (EX). The harder it is for employees to connect with customers the more frustrated they become. That frustration can spill over into interactions with customers, negatively impacting CX.
Branded calling solutions enhance CX and EX, making interactions seamless and efficient. The technology allows companies to consistently deliver excellent customer and employee experiences by reducing friction along the customer journey and facilitating direct connections and meaningful interactions between employees and customers.
Boosting business efficiency in this way builds better relationships with customers, increases customer loyalty, and improves business outcomes.
The state of the phone call today is defined by trust, protection, and efficiency thanks to branded calling technology. In 2024, the phone call is once again a primary channel for companies to meaningfully engage with consumers, delivering great experiences that ultimately lead to lasting customer relationships.
