In recent years, banks have removed welcome advisors from branches and security staff have started to act as welcome advisors. The reason: cost cutting. The result: customer frustration.
History is repeating itself. Back in the 80’s there was a similar trend: removing doormen from hotels and installing automated doors; only to find that doormen did so much more than opening doors. The mistake of removing doormen was so obvious that a new term was coined: “the doorman fallacy”.*
Today, as personalization is sweeping through industries, customers require banks to do more to delight them.
Welcome Advisors, as Crucial Staff Members
Welcome Advisors, also known as greeters, are frontline staff members in branch offices at banks, telecom firms, and other customer-facing businesses. They are the first point of contact who welcome and guide customers to the appropriate service areas. Their primary role is to ensure that customers have a positive and efficient experience from the moment they enter the branch. That’s why employing welcome advisors and providing them with the necessary tools, knowledge, and skills is vital in ensuring a personalized customer experience and increasing your branch performance.
Some of our customers have done the math: a welcome advisor saving only one important lead or customer from being churned and the associated costs are already covered. So, can the costs be justified and the headcounts be approved? Many banks are now running experiments and Linistry is here to support the role.
Now, let’s see how welcome advisors are critical in making the customer journey frictionless, personal and valuable:
8 ways welcome advisors can manage customer experience and improve your branch efficiency
1. Making a Pleasant First Impression
Welcome advisors are often the first point of contact for customers when they enter the branch office. A warm, friendly welcome can set a positive tone for the entire visit, making customers feel valued and comfortable.
2. Providing Professional Guidance and Flow Management
Greeters can efficiently direct customers to the appropriate service areas or representatives, reducing wait times and ensuring customers get the assistance they need quickly. They can also manage the flow of customers within the branch, ensuring that the environment remains orderly and that customers are attended to on time.
3. Providing a Personalized Customer Experience
Welcome advisors can collect relevant information about customer intent. After asking a few questions, they can provide customers with tailored information and educative content, like microsites, landing pages, or fitting services.
The welcome advisor dashboard (aka “Floor Management Dashboard”) and assisted queueing enable a highly personalized customer experience: customers can be identified by their clothing, eliminating the need to display ticket numbers or publicly announce their names.
By engaging with customers and understanding their needs, greeters can provide personalized assistance, which enhances customer satisfaction, trust, and loyalty.
4. Promoting Services
Welcome advisors can inform customers about new services, promotions, or products, potentially increasing sales and customer engagement.
5. Directing Customers to the Right Consultant
Welcome advisors can assign customers to the right consultant by understanding customer needs and knowing the consultants’ respective competencies and skills. They may even create customer excitement by offering or praising a branch employee to the customer:
“Although the wait is long, it is worth it dear customer because she is one of our best consultants and will be able to help you efficiently.”
6. Setting Customer Expectations and Reducing Churn
Welcome advisors can (re)set customer expectations and reduce walk-aways. For example, if waiting in the branch is longer than usual, the welcome advisor may explain the situation to the customer, offer alternatives (e.g., remote waiting or appointment booking), or let the customer know what channel to use next time for faster service.
7. Collecting Feedback
They can gather immediate feedback from customers about their experience, which can be used to make real-time improvements and promptly address any issues.
For example, they can:
- survey the customer service experience,
- register walk-aways and ask the reason for later analysis, or
- record comments to improve sales productivity.
8. Technology-assisted Advising
There are trials of replacing the person with technology, like an AI bot or a video call from the branch kiosk to a back-office welcome advisor. Although these solutions don’t come close to having a knowledgeable person in the branch, experimenting is worth every effort. Linistry has been developing AI assistants for the front office and in the background behind our customers’ bots. A promising new direction…
Conclusion
Welcome advisors play a crucial role in customer intimacy, education, and customer service experience. By deploying welcome advisors in your branches, you can capture your customer’s intent and provide a personalized service. By focusing on these areas, welcome advisors can significantly enhance the customer journey, manage customer experience, and contribute to your branch’s success.
Learn more about how Linistry’s technologies can support welcome advisors’ work and manage the queues at branches here.
* https://cavesocial.com/the-doorman-fallacy-rethinking-automation-in-social-media