The gig economy flourished when the pandemic became widespread – even though people could not move around physically or dine at restaurants, ride-hailing and last-mile delivery riders kept many businesses connected with their consumers, fulfilling their needs and harnessing digital tools to bridge inadequacies in service offerings.

Mediums like video streaming replaced cinemas and terrestrial television stations as the electronic entertainment outlets of choice, online shopping overtook brick-and-mortar store browsing, and contactless payments and fulfilment became the preferred methods to pay for and to collect goods.

One of the core drivers impacting business decision-making is consumer expectations. CX Network’s Global State of Customer Experience 2021 report indicated that most customers are ready to switch brands if they are unsatisfied with a provider’s level of service. In APAC, the top customer experience (CX) trends are in digital customer experience, with nearly one in four (23%) surveyed decision-makers saying digital platforms to deliver services to customers are important to them. Less than 20% said customer loyalty and retention were the most important criteria, with lack of retention likely due to digitalisation providing users greater flexibility in choice (and value comparison).

Post-pandemic, it is not unusual to see these primarily digital channels being merged with traditional means to become the so-called ‘new normal’: hybrid working strategies, for example, are steadily eating into the workplace that used to be dominated by office space.

Despite these optimistic statements, it is still far more common in the Asia Pacific for organisations to be behind in their transformation initiatives, such as incorporating customer journey mapping or applying automation to create more human-centric customer experience (CX) digital workflows.

In a fast-developing region like APAC, many reasons are cited for this slower digital maturity. Generally, the costs to modernise and the agility to keep up with evolving processes along the digital transformation journey are often heralded as key sticking points.

Modernising services to keep pace with innovation-driven trends is something that APAC firms need to improve, with a mere 30% of IT decision makers in the region having successfully integrated a complete end-to-end user experience across multiple channels and touchpoints. While some territories like Singapore and Australia are near the top of the maturity curve, most APAC businesses consist of small-to-medium enterprises (SMEs) or family-owned outfits that are still playing catchup.

To support a portfolio of customer-facing services and after-sales activities, businesses should leverage tech such as cloud solutions to decentralise operations and allow the organisation to scale and pivot readily to new advancements. Part of the transformation roadmap should be to harness digital tools or a platform to manage existing business processes, tapping on automation to handle basic mundane tasks so that staff can focus on more productive roles as well as customer retention.

To make the most of technological investment, harnessing service management software like OTRS solution can help organisations streamline and organise both sides of the business – the customer-facing end and automate work processes throughout the company. Comprising a comprehensive, flexible suite of solutions, an OTRS can digitalise backend processes, including in departments as diverse as HR and Operations.

OTRS Asia, a subsidiary of the OTRS Group, supplies business workflow software that can document existing and new processes, reflecting the mundane but vital manual steps that usually precede automated processes. At the same time, the software can also be the gatekeeper, ensuring customer service data and processes adhere to the stringent compliance standards required by many industries including banking and finance.

Even smaller companies recognise the efficiency advantages that business process automation can bring, with McKinsey & Co finding that nearly a third (29%) of APAC businesses have fully automated at least one function. OTRS’ solution brings those efficiencies to the forefront with work management tools like multilevel approvals and resource management or documenting and task tracking – handling escalations along with saving both time and money.

Organisations also find that efficient resource management, combined with a process management engine, can improve employee satisfaction levels, as workers feel their tasks are optimised: staff can focus on their professional development and brainstorming for new ideas for the company.

OTRS solution supplies predefined process flows and over 2,500 possible software configurations that support the IT Infrastructure Library (ITIL) stack out of the box, meaning best practices can be applied, automating and speeding up process implementation and change management so that the business gets enhanced systems faster and can adapt the software to suit companies’ unique needs.

Need to pivot quickly to a new digital reality and match customer expectations for a seamless user experience? Get in touch with an OTRS Asia expert, and modernise your business processes immediately.