Ready or not, 2023 is just around the corner. Planning your product roadmap today can set you up for success in the coming year. But as trends and behavior in the UC industry shift, so must planning strategies. So, what can you do now to be more effective in the new year?
Through our conversations with service providers and resellers throughout the industry, we’ve been able to gauge new trends for 2023. One thing we’ve noticed? An emphasis on becoming more efficient, streamlining processes, and increasing adoption and stickiness for current products rather than focusing on new or updated products. Below, we’re sharing our top tips and resources to set your team up to achieve these goals.
Create an Efficient, Effective Adoption Strategy
First and foremost, in order for products to be effective, users have to actually use them and feel confident doing so. Rather than tailoring adoption strategies to new products being launched, focus on tailoring them to present use cases to improve performance. Consider your current adoption strategy, and look for ways to make it more streamlined and efficient for the long term, this will help you to differentiate your products from others and reduce future churn. B-Lynk can help you create a strategy to do just this, but we also have great resources you can get started with now .
Resources to create an efficient, effective adoption strategy:
- Simplify the transition to cloud communications with effective training to improve adoption:
- Reducing churn and improving stickiness through end-user upskilling and reskilling
- Improve UC adoption with self-service solutions
Streamline Your Onboarding
Part of an effective adoption strategy is your onboarding. This is where your users first get introduced to your products and services, and first impressions matter. Does your onboarding process feel clunky and disjointed? Are your users running into the same problems again and again? There’s likely room for improvement through tactics like improved “getting started” content or a smoother transition from initial onboarding to continued training for new users.
Resources to streamline and improve your onboarding experience:
- 5 critical elements of a sound onboarding strategy to always include
- Transitioning from onboarding to training
Customize Content for Users
While a solid onboarding strategy is a step in the right direction, a “one size fits all” approach to onboarding content (as well as training and support content) won’t reach every user in the same way. You’ll need different adoption strategies for different kinds of users because administrators and employees (and everything in between) all utilize the same products and features in different ways.
Ask yourself, “How can we better assist our customers with adoption content that is specific to their role?” Let your answer be your guide. Just be careful – the real challenge here is that you can’t assume how things are being adopted or utilized. You’ll release products, but without a plan to gauge stickiness after the fact, you won’t truly know how users are responding.
Resources to customize your training and support content for users:
- Driving adoption with customized training sessions
Build Proactive Plans to Gauge Stickiness
After onboarding users and implementing an efficient adoption strategy, don’t drop the ball. In 2023, having proactive plans in place to gauge stickiness and reduce churn will be more important than ever. Consider including elements such as customized training sessions as well as FAQs and live chat in your post-onboarding support plan.
Virtual training sessions allow for face-to-face interaction, which gives you the opportunity to learn firsthand how your users are responding to and utilizing their UC products and features. It also allows you to answer any pressing questions or provide solutions to challenges they’re facing to ultimately improve the stickiness of your product
FAQs can also help you gain insights into stickiness by seeing what recurring issues keep arising so you can pinpoint the best ways to solve them.
Finally, including live chat in this plan can be a chance to learn what users may be struggling with on a case-by-case basis. By compiling data from live chats, you can get a better understanding of how users are utilizing your offerings.
Resources for a proactive plan to evaluate stickiness and reduce churn:
- Custom virtual training sessions by industry experts
- Live virtual training best practices
- Why video is key for end-user training
- FAQs – If you can gather them, we can answer them
- Setting up live chat support for 2023
- Live chat services from product experts
Engage and Re-engage
One final theme we’re seeing for 2023? The need to engage and re-engage users, especially for products they’re already using. If you want your products to stick, they need to be consistently engaged and empowered to utilize their full suite of features.
A few of our top ideas to improve engagement include segmented emails that provide real value, product- and user-specific campaigns, scheduled ongoing virtual sessions, soliciting regular feedback, and checking in on users through live chat.
Resources to engage and re-engage your users for 2023:
- Diversify training and support to keep different kinds of learners engaged
- 4 simple ways to keep customers engaged
Plan for Success with B-Lynk
B-Lynk can help service providers and resellers put together a plan to get started for the new year. Our UC experts can support you with a strategy for specific products or services you’re focusing on in 2023 or your full offering, and we can ensure it stays in alignment with your resources, goals, and budget. From your big-picture approach to the small details like the best cadence for follow-up, B-Lynk can help you fine-tune your strategy for success.
Ready to put these resources to work with an actionable, streamlined plan for user adoption, engagement, and stickiness for 2023? Whether you’re a new or existing customer, learn how B-Lynk can support you and your goals by reaching out to our team.