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consumer trends

6 consumer trends shaping 2023: building a winning customer experience

With COVID-19 in the rearview mirror and recession lurking around the corner, 2023 is going to be the year of rediscovering business operations and emphasizing digital and human connection. Where does the post-pandemic aftermath leave us, what are the next consumer trends, and how can businesses ace the Customer Experience during the looming economic downturn?

What has 2022 taught us?

The actual shift of 2022 was the rise of customers and not businesses.

What are the 6 consumer trends shaping 2023?

Consumer trend #1: Inflation-driven buyer behavior

In 2023, CX will be the primary factor in whether customers want to do business with you or not. Inflation-driven consumers will be more resourceful and look for ways to meet their needs while trying to save money. Customers will grow less brand loyal as they shop around for the best customer experience.

In times of weakened consumer demand, focusing on your customers’ needs will differentiate you from the competition, drive brand loyalty, and give you a competitive advantage.

After all, history has taught us that long-term market share is won during market reshuffling.

A woman with a laptop in front of her, laying in a bed, with a credit card in her hand

Consumer trend #2: Desire for human connection

Focused woman using a laptop at an outdoor street café, possibly working or browsing the internet.

Consumer trend #3: Robust AI that doesn’t sound robotic

Robotic-sounding chatbots and those that cannot process simple queries have a terrible reputation. The majority of chatbots people engage with still need to be more complex, only capable of answering rudimentary queries. These first-generation, rules-based chatbots are included as top CX ‘killers.’

2023 is ushering us into a new era of smart virtual agents. Unlike their predecessors that responded according to pre-set series of rules, knowledge-based AI chatbots are powered by Natural Language Processing (NLP).

These new AI-powered conversation platforms are using cognitive algorithms and picture processing to understand human intent and analyze sentiment, disrupting the future of CX.

Consumer trend #4: Omnichannel personalization

Customers gravitate towards brands that appear to understand them and offer personalized solutions to their needs. Thanks to the rapid increase of available channels, your customers are now everywhere. But more than merely being present on all channels is required. For a truly personalized CX, all of these channels should be interconnected and share customer information between them. This allows marketers to personalize each message, product suggestion, and experience to the unique profile of each customer.

Omnichannel personalization integrates promotion, distribution, and communication channels into a single customer database. This allows for hyper-personalization of the customer journey, leading to more upsell and conversion opportunities. From targeted display adverts, personalized suggestions, and tracking browser behavior ‒ to remarketing and abandoned cart recovery across all platforms.

Managers discussing numbers in an office

In terms of improved customer support, the omnichannel strategy provides several communication channels, leading to increased customer service efficiency. The customer support representative can quickly refer to a customer’s previous purchases and interactions – reducing customer effort across interactions.

Personalized solutions and seamless communication are the top consumer trends that continue from 2022 into 2023 – and this is exactly what the omnichannel experience offers.

Consumer trend #5: CX as a shared effort across departments

The focus on the complete customer journey is the most significant CX trend sweeping across industries.

Perceiving the customer journey as more than just a sum of individual touchpoints, CX will become a shared effort across departments. From marketing and sales to product design and brick-and-mortar stores, each department must coordinate with every other department to fully understand the customer.

focus on the complete customer journey

Consumer trend #6: Active listening beyond surveys

6 simple yet powerful strategies to improve customer retention

Can you remember the last time you re-engaged with your customers and tried to win them back?

These strategies will do exactly that and more.