Exploring customer training ROI
A recent customer service and customer experience (CX) survey found that over 80% of customers prefer a personalized customer experience. And in the age of artificial intelligence (AI), even consumers who are not talking to humans expect a personal touch to the interaction of any brand.
In addition to the Upskills Support Team, it offers better customer experience, learning and development (L&D), and revenue leaders prioritize customer education, filling the gap between customer expectations and customer service reality. A recent Forrester study shows that training customers will deliver concrete business outcomes. [1].
However, the demand for strengthening customer training is not one-sided. Customers also want seamless, supportive customer training to avoid submitting countless support tickets and meet where they are. According to the Technology and Services Industry Association (TSIA), more than two-thirds of trained customers reported a higher adoption rate, and 92% of trained customers also renew their subscription compared to just 80% without training.
Create a business case for customer training
If you’ve reached this article so far, you may think that these customer training statistics speak for yourself. The return on investment (ROI) for customer training is obvious, right?
However, as L&D leaders know, it is difficult to get buy-in for new initiatives, potentially profitable initiatives. Here’s the discussion to bring in a table when discussing the business impact of customer training:
Customer training promotes retention
According to Harvard Business Review, attracting new customers is 5-25 times more expensive than retaining existing customers [2]. Additionally, customer acquisition costs are expected to rise in 2025 as digital advertising spending increases and competition intensifies. This creates churn as a major concern for business leaders. Modern customers are increasingly using AI chatbots and agents. This means that we are now expecting immediate resolution and personalized support from our products. Customers want to make their newly purchased product or service ready to use. Investing in customer training can help you increase your clients’ success with their products and spend time becoming the enthusiasm of power users that all sales and CX leaders dream of…
Customer training improves support outcomes
There are no perfect customers. The truth is that some customers are not using the product or service as intended. You may overlook the instructions or try “hacks” or shortcuts that will negatively affect the effectiveness of the product you purchased. Customers fill in the blanks when faced with a lack of product support, documentation or training. This often leads to an increase in customer support tickets, and spends valuable time that can be spent more efficiently on CX teams. With sales twice the average for non-CX jobs, customer support agents with complex and time-consuming support tickets are naturally burning out [3]. It gives training and resources access to the moment your customers need. Mobile-friendly, AI-powered learning solutions can reduce the amount of support tickets that can improve morale and retention within your CX team.
Customer training helps businesses manage their reputation
Thinkjar founder Esteban Kolsky explains that only one in 26 people who are unhappy with 26 people will express their complaints directly to the company. [4]. However, 13% express their dissatisfaction with others, both in person and online. Such public slander can have a negative impact on the brand’s reputation and potential revenue. By not providing comprehensive or accessible customer training resources, you can leave your customers to your device. Today, it means turning to third party resources for answers that may misrepresent your product. This not only leads to customers receiving inaccurate information, but ultimately reduces the trust that your team works hard to build with them.
Conclusion
By providing customers with the resources they need, your organization can make it more effective to use your products and services. So, what is the ROI for customer training? Strategic investment in customer education does not only reduce churn. It is to promote better relationships that build long-term trust with the brand’s most important ambassador: the client.
References:
[1] New research reveals the real impact of customer education programs
[2] The value of maintaining the right customers
[3] What happens when you focus on employees and customers?
[4] Faced with rising customer expectations, providing great service
