How Self-Serve Portals Improve a Utility's Customer Engagement
In the past, customers interacted with your utility when they needed something to pay a bill, report an outage or change a service. Now, mobile and digital solutions, like a self-serve portal, are coming into play as utilities move from a demand to a managed-services approach to customer engagement. Customers want to interact with their utility account in real-time when and where convenient for them, making a self-service portal essential to your utility’s customer engagement.
3 Benefits to Improving a Utility’s Customer Engagement
And how a self-serve portal can help.
Reduces call volume and office foot traffic
Increases e-billing adoption
Improves cash flow
Reduces Call Volume and Office Foot-Traffic
In the past, if a customer wanted to reach out to your utility, they had four options: phone, direct mail, email, or an office visit. Customers used direct mail and email when they didn’t need your immediate attention. But when they did, they called or walked into your office. Emergencies don’t always happen during office hours, and frustrated customers don’t want to wait. But, with these forms of communication, you need customer support staff during and after office hours. Even with extra staff, you still have wait times and frustrated customers waiting in a queue.
With a self-serve portal solution like SilverBlaze, customers now have a fifth option to engage with your staff. SilverBlaze provides dynamic two-way communication between your utility and community, helping customers take charge of their accounts. Instead of waiting for office hours, now your customers can serve themselves. They can pay bills, see account history, initiate move-ins and move-outs, and learn more about their usage. With customizations, the portal dashboard gives your customers what they need when needed, and notifications keep them up to date. With SilverBlaze, your customers are first in line every time they interact with your utility, increasing their engagement and satisfaction.
When your customers use SilverBlaze on the go, it’s convenient for them, but it also helps increase your staff’s efficiency. With fewer calls coming in and fewer customers walking into your office, your team has more time to work on other high-priority tasks to serve your community. Each customer who uses a self-serve portal engages with your utility in a way that has a lower cost per interaction than phone calls or foot traffic. Because a self-serve portal is a dedicated team member working 24 hours a day assisting multiple customers at a time, you’ll increase customer satisfaction. What’s more, you’ll be able to increase customer engagement without adding more staff members or increasing the strain on your current staff.
Increases e-billing adoption
It’s not surprising that the utility industry lags in e-billing adoption. Early on, e-billing lacked the ease of use that would have increased adoption, and many of your customers did not want to take the chance that their water or lights would be turned off because a payment didn’t go through electronically.
But, when utility offices closed during the pandemic, it became more important than ever for your customers to opt into paying their bills digitally. With the pandemic leapfrogging the adoption of online purchases, your customers are now primed to use a self-serve portal to pay their bills and are more likely to demand one.
With a self-serve portal in place, customers have an easy, convenient way to perform seamless billing transactions that require minimal effort on your team’s part. After receiving a portal notification that a bill is due, your customers can simply pay that bill in a few easy steps.
Once customers pay their bills through SilverBlaze, they will be more likely to spend time using the self-serve portal. As they become more comfortable with the portal, they can review account information, learn more about usage patterns, and interact with your utility, increasing their engagement. The more engaged they are in their accounts, the more they will understand their consumption and pay bills on time.
Improves cash flow
When customers use a payment portal to pay their utility bills, many utility providers see a shift from a large portion of late payments to more on-time payments. Because customers can interact with your utility at a time that is convenient for them, they are more likely to pay their bills on time. And with a self-serve portal in place, your utility can send notifications to customers, keeping them aware of when a bill is due. What’s more, your customers can opt for the notification method that is most convenient for them, keeping them satisfied with how they engage with your utility.
Because self-serve portals provide an easy and convenient way to help customers remember to pay their bills, you’ll see a reduction in 30- and 90-day payment delays, improving your cash flow. With fewer customers paying late, your staff will have to spend less time trying to collect payments. And with a smaller cash flow gap, you’ll have the money you need for payroll, daily operating expenses, and equipment repairs.
When you create the right message for the right customer in the right format, you’ll have a tailored and personalized customer engagement solution that streamlines operations, increases efficiency and improves your cash flow.
Ready to see how SilverBlaze can improve your utility’s customer engagement? Schedule your demo today.