Optimizing Your Customer and Employee Experience for Digital Natives

SPEAKING TO DIGITAL NATIVES IN THEIR OWN LANGUAGE Optimizing Your CX & EX for a New Generation of Workers & Buyers

Speaking to Digital Natives in Their Own Language: An Edify eBook

WHILE MANY DECISION-MAKING ROLES in enterprises remain occupied by ‘digital immigrants,’ those born into a continually connected world, digital natives (a demographic comprising Millennials, Gen Z and Gen Alpha), are coming of age in every sense. By 2025 digital natives from the Millennial and Gen Z groups will make up 75% of the workforce, so businesses need to start preparing now in order to be ready.

Already, the eldest of the Millennial cohort are approaching their peak earning and spending years, and businesses who seek to serve them - as workers and buyers - need to raise their game in order to ensure they’re able to attract and retain this generation’s attention.

It’s not that digital natives have flawed or sub-par attention spans… they simply operate in a matrix of greater optionality.

So, they invest less time in anything that does not immediately satisfy them, whether that’s a job or a customer relationship.

Digital natives have a plethora of alternatives available to them at the tap of a screen, and they are used to doing several things at once.

If the employee or customer experience you deliver is cumbersome or time-consuming, then don’t be surprised if the entire digital native demographic switches away fast. Having a ‘job for life’ or ‘bank for life’ is just not for them; they exist in a sea of continually evolving options and possibilities and will always be willing to make a change if something more fun or something that better resonates with their point of view comes into play.

They want to live, work, shop, and hang out at a place and time of their choosing, all of which align with their personal values.

Digital natives invest less time in anything that does not immediately satisfy them, whether that’s a job or a customer relationship. They have a plethora of alternatives available to them at the tap of a screen, and they are used to doing several things at once.

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TL/DR AS AN EMPLOYER, THIS MEANS: • Respecting their mobile mindset and allowing them to WFA without disruption • Providing them with frictionless workplace experiences on a single screen • Giving them UC tools that support rich collaboration - without creating more work • Eliminating complex setup, downtime, and troubleshooting • Considering the power & flexibility of everything, from software to laptop to headset

AS A SELLER, THIS MEANS: • Providing fluid omnichannel conversations that match the ones they have socially • Removing the silos between digital and physical outlets so the CX is consistent • Designing away barriers to easy interactions • Putting the customer at the heart of a single, continuous conversation

If you’re making it difficult to reach you via the channel of their choosing, that multitasking Millennial or Gen Z has another tab open right now searching for an alternative provider who can meet their needs. They know communication CAN be easy and convenient, so if your brand puts obstacles in their way, they’ll simply change direction. Anything else is simply too much work.

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Speaking to Digital Natives in Their Own Language: An Edify eBook

EMPLOYING MILLENNIALS & GEN Z MEANS SERVING UP THE DIGITAL TOOLS THEY DEMAND As an employer, matching the communication preferences and technology expectations of digital natives must be a priority. Yello’s recruiting blog says it best, “Connecting with Gen Z means meeting them where they are.” This means respecting their mobile mindset, offering hybrid working environments, and providing access to innovative technology solutions and workplace experiences that complement this intrinsic motivation.

These generations are accustomed to smartphones & apps that ‘just work’, and they have little patience for setup, downtime, & troubleshooting - because they know it doesn’t have to be that way.

This means that every employee needs to have access to technology and devices that empower them to work from the space of their choosing. They need tools that are powered by software designed for frictionless working on a single screen. And they need to be allowed to work from anywhere – without disruption. Opt for browser-based, cloud-native applications that are machine agnostic and integrate perfectly with other necessary software within your organization.

These generations are accustomed to smartphones and apps that ‘just work’, and they have little patience for setup, downtime, and troubleshooting – because they know it doesn’t have to be that way. They need brilliant UX design that looks incredible whether on a large monitor or on their phone, with intuitive and accessible navigation and tooling. They need to know security is built-in too, wherever they connect from and get to work, so they require solid hardware as well as software.

Digital natives demand tools that extend product functionality, quality, security and their user experience. This demographic won’t settle for anything less than the highest performance standards in both their professional and personal lives. And don’t even think of requiring them to send a device to an IT specialist to upgrade software or to troubleshoot issues. Digital natives expect enhancements to be made virtually – no downtime, no IT interventions, no nothing.

Powerful, flexible, and high build quality matters, from the laptop to the headset.

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Speaking to Digital Natives in Their Own Language: An Edify eBook

THEIR OFFICE SPACE IS ANY SPACE The digital natives on any team may have adjusted well technologically – even led the way – as we were all rushed overnight into homeworking environments during pandemic lockdowns, but they rapidly lost patience with hastily hacked-together solutions. Two years on, they see no excuse for fragmented, legacy software which was never designed for remote or hybrid working; it’s holding them back.

For too long organizations have plotted to “migrate to the cloud.” But the global pandemic sent anyone who wasn’t ready or at least extremely well-prepared spiraling. Today, cloudnative tools are the ones that ensure employees can work anywhere and seamlessly move from corporate headquarters, to their living room, to a satellite office across the country, or even on the other side of the globe. This nomadic work style is no longer something the C-suite can contemplate; it is the reality in 2022 and beyond.

In addition, while they may be forced to or choose to work remotely, even nomadically, that does not mean they want to feel distant from their work and colleagues. Cultural fit and values alignment really matter to this cohort, so it’s vital that the unified communications tools they’re given support rich collaboration and easy interaction with their teams, along with a greater sense of involvement and connection with company priorities – all without creating more work.

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The digital natives on any team may have adjusted well technologically even led the way - as we were all rushed overnight into homeworking environments.

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Speaking to Digital Natives in Their Own Language: An Edify eBook

THE NEW WAY OF WORKING NEEDS TOOLS TO MATCH Don’t expect these tech savvy employees to use the same hardware and software that your organization has been using for decades.

Digital natives want the newest, most innovative, and intuitive tools they can find. And for good reason – the old, cumbersome devices that require ongoing IT intervention are incapable of properly supporting today’s WFH/WFA employees and offer nothing more than headaches and frustrations. Your people deserve to be supported by a powerful, flexible, secure, and straightforward cloud-first OS with laptops to match. Frankly, digital natives are accustomed to this level of ultraconnected and untethered way of life at home, so how can we expect them to get by at work with anything less?

Their productivity, motivation, and satisfaction as employees hinges on the tools and equipment we arm them with. So brands wanting to appeal to digital natives must consider the entire technology suite they’ll offer and choose providers whose solutions are engineered to work perfect together, namely an operating system, CCaaS/ UCaaS, CRM, and hardware that make work reliable, secure, fast, and intuitive – whether they’re working from the coffee shop or the living room coffee table.

Their productivity, motivation, & satisfaction as employees hinges on the tools & equipment we arm them with.

Edify is Chrome Enterprise Recommended, meaning it’s built to run flawlessly on Chrome OS and can work with the rest of the Chrome Enterprise Recommended tools too. Chromebooks really are a dream come true for the workplace right now, as brands can dropship these user-friendly devices to employees across the business and have them up and running in mere minutes.

If a company chooses to implement Edify, Chrome OS, and Chromebooks simultaneously, they can be assured of several benefits: ease of use and productivity, fast deployment, the perks associated with having your entire workforce on the same technology, tip-top security, and an unbeatable price point.

This tech combination is quite attractive as a go-to option for powering remote teams and virtual contact center operations. It’s a sure way to win with your digital native employees - letting them be productive and protected wherever they’re logging in from.

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Speaking to Digital Natives in Their Own Language: An Edify eBook

CONTACT CENTERS CAN’T STAY STUCK - IT’S TIME TO TAKE A PAGE FROM DIGITAL NATIVES Legacy technology does not cut it any longer… and hasn’t for a while.

Contact center software needs to incorporate modern, innovative employee support and communications functionality, with intelligent automation. No excuses.

During the pandemic in particular, many CX professionals experienced burnout and stress from being on the receiving end of customer frustrations, while far from their usual supervisory support.

In order to create sustainable work-from-anywhere practices, it’s essential these features are the norm, not the exception, as they are integral to the employee experience. Leaders must start thinking about their people and how they work in an entirely new way.

Finding the balance between remote supervision (in order to provide support during a stressful call) and intrusively monitoring people in their own home is a challenging line to tread. Consultative transparency will always help, as will the promotion of ownership of performance improvement, via engaging and even gamified applications. Younger digital natives have a healthy awareness of their well-being needs and their employers’ responsibility for this, and they are the most likely group to rapidly move on if faced with inadequate support. But, as other management tasks are automated away, those who invest in relationship-building and providing rewarding work environments will build successful and lasting teams.

Disconnects in the employee experience are frequently mirrored in the wider customer engagement world too.

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Speaking to Digital Natives in Their Own Language: An Edify eBook

APPEALING TO YOUR DIGITAL NATIVE CUSTOMERS Customers who are used to fluid omnichannel conversations in their social world find it incredibly frustrating when they try to communicate with a brand only to discover their social media, ecommerce, and retail outlets are completely siloed from one another. In a hybrid and interconnected world, it is vital that companies design away barriers to interaction and truly put the customer at the heart of a single, continuous conversation.

The gap continues to widen between the best and worst in customer engagement via digital channels, and switching brands is far easier than switching from one job to another. If you’re making it difficult to reach you via the channel of their choosing, that multitasking Millennial or Gen Z has another tab open right now, already looking for an alternative provider who can meet their needs. They know communication CAN be easy and convenient, because they experience that every day in other contexts - so if your brand puts obstacles in their way, they’ll simply change direction.

It is vital that companies design away barriers to interaction & truly put the customer at the heart of a single, continuous conversation.

Smart brands realize that digital natives are capable, intelligent, and engage easily with self-service tools – routing routine inquiries straight out of your queue, enabling them to resolve their issues flexibly and asynchronously, and on their device of choice. This means that contact centers need to be serving up the tools that these savvy digital natives are drawn to, and we mean bots. Intelligent ones, that is. A smart bot has the ability to simulate a conversation (or chat) with a user. And we’re not talking about robotic voices that only ask one or two questions. Today’s chatbots are intelligent, powered by machine learning, and leverage sentiment analysis; businesses can implement bots that actually review customer data in order to know which questions to ask and what prompts to deliver. Bots blend perfectly with live agents to create a better CX. Give the digital generation what they want, and they will stay loyal. This means building user-centered experiences that remain wholly embedded in your brand identity, while enabling an unprecedented sense of control and ownership, so they become loyal, satisfied, and potentially evangelistic repeat customers.

To establish brand loyalty, it’s critical to remember how vital value and purpose is to this generation of shoppers; and, therefore, successful brands and contact centers will ensure their public behavior and messaging and stances on issues that matter all consistently align.

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If you’re making it difficult to reach you via the channel of their choosing, that multitasking Millennial or Gen Z has another tab open right now, already looking for an alternative provider who can meet their needs.

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Speaking to Digital Natives in Their Own Language: An Edify eBook

THE EX-CX CONNECTION Customer-facing brands cannot afford to misunderstand the needs of digital native employees and customers any longer.

If your contact center is a great place to work – while working from anywhere – then you’re in the position to offer excellent service to everyone who buys from you. Digital natives are not just potential employees, they’re about to become ALL of your employees. They’re a massive percentage of customers, too. We’re hiring them, we’re serving them, and this means they have a lot of power. Regardless of industry, businesses need to adapt to this new tech-loving mindset. It doesn’t matter if you didn’t grow up with a phone in your palm. You need to realize that a big portion of your employees and customers have and that’s what matters now.

But the good news is, the changes that digital natives are demanding are good for everyone - even those who didn’t know what was missing. The tools and convenience digital natives demand make life a heck of a lot easier from the contact center and beyond.

Digital natives are the employees we’re hiring and the customers we’re serving today. We need to not only acknowledge this truth but go one step further and embrace it, which means making the changes needed to evolve and improve the way we serve and sell to them. And when the employee and customer experience is aligned and optimized for digital natives in a meaningful way, everybody wins.

Digital natives are the employees we’re hiring & the customers we’re serving today. We need to not only acknowledge this truth but go one step further & embrace it.

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Edify connects businesses with customers and employees with each other, making business communications as easy as personal ones. Its flagship product, Edify Huddle CX, unites contact center (CCaaS), unified communications (UCaaS), and real-time communications platform (CPaaS/API) functionality in a cloud-native solution that lets users move seamlessly among channels within one conversation, just as we do on our phones. Edify removes all the risk once associated with moving to the cloud by delivering global availability, real-time redundancy, no-waste pricing, and a 100% SLA uptime guarantee. Edify is a Google Chrome Enterprise Recommended partner for the contact center. Learn more at edify.cx.

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