Features Research
Parks Associates: three “promising” technologies for technical support in 2017

A major business disruption stemming from the increasing connectivity of consumer electronic devices is the growing need for ongoing support among consumers, the company stated, and “the resulting business challenge is that many companies that had not previous developed capabilities in this area find themselves in a position where providing such services is inevitable.”

Even though many support and solutions providers have utilized a variety of automation technologies to improve support service delivery, consumers are still not satisfied with the efficiency of support processes or the level of effort they have to expend while receiving support services.

Parks Associates study “360 View: Supporting the Connected Consumer” indicates that only 47 per cent of consumers are satisfied with the speed at which their problems are resolved and only 37 per cent are highly satisfied with the level of effort required to get to a support agent that can solve their problems.

Self-help support options, in particular, have traditionally been demanding of consumer effort. Newer technologies such as voice control and augmented reality show potential to improve the self-help experience dramatically, Parks Associates says, and support solutions providers must embrace this opportunity.

“The ability to verbally ask and receive answers for technical problems from a virtual personal assistant device or technology will create improvements in self-help support. Instructional videos have been very helpful in improving self-help support,” the company states. “However, the use of augmented reality for self-help can move progress a step further, with the ability to demonstrate the steps for problem resolution in the actual support environment (where the support is needed). It is critical to leverage these technologies in support only when they are mature enough to be reliable. Using immature technologies for support has the potential to further aggravate consumers.”