5 Automations to Help Build a Better Customer Experience

To build a great customer experience, you need efficiency, personalization, and timely follow-ups. As someone who handles your company's client relationships, you balance renewals, follow-ups, feedback collection, and reporting while keeping a personal touch with clients. It can feel like a balancing act. With custom client portals and CRMs, you can simplify these tasks and deliver a consistent, superior experience. 

Today, we’re examining 5 Automations to Help Build a Better Customer Experience. These strategies can reshape your client interactions, easing your workload and strengthening client relationships. 

#1 Onboarding Workflows

Onboarding new clients can take up a significant portion of your time. With other responsibilities like nurturing relationships, managing renewals, and dealing with escalations, automating basic onboarding tasks is essential. Your CRM and client portal can be key in this process. By utilizing these tools, you can automate the onboarding experience and still include personal touches without a large time commitment. 

Here Are Some Automation Strategies:

• Email Sequences: This is probably the most common and straightforward automation you can set up. Use email sequences to guide new clients through the onboarding process with scheduled messages. But don’t set it and forget it. Throughout the sequence, make it easy for clients to reach out if they have questions. Include personal follow-ups from you or your team so you can check in with them directly. Remember, sequences are meant to help you automate the predictable so that you can humanize the experience. 

• Use Workflows: Too often, we rely on calendar reminders and team chats to assign follow-ups. But those can easily get lost in the abyss of our inboxes. Workflows, on the other hand, ensure tasks aren’t buried or forgotten. By building workflows into your CRM platform, you can assign tasks to internal teams, define responsibilities, and prevent things from falling through the cracks. For example, you can create a workflow that triggers a task whenever a client completes an onboarding milestone, making sure nothing is missed. 

• Automate Reminders: One of the easiest workflows to set up is for reminders. Whether it’s a meeting follow-up or a milestone review, automating reminders helps you stay connected and engaged with your clients. By scheduling follow-ups, you can ensure you’re consistently delivering a top-notch experience. 

• Self-Service Resources: Your client portal can be a powerful tool for empowering clients to help themselves. Whether it’s an FAQs section for quick answers or providing access to a personalized dashboard, giving clients the ability to find information on their own helps them feel supported and frees you up to focus on higher-value interactions. The more you can empower your clients to serve themselves, the more time you get back to continue building better relationships. 

Pro Tip: Add a personal note or video to your onboarding emails to enhance the experience. For instance, we created a short video for clients after launching their new website. The goal? To help them transition from the project phase to actually using their website and provide actionable onboarding advice so they can get the most out of their new site. 

#2 Proactive Renewal & Upsell Reminders

No matter how organized your system is, keeping track of contract renewals and upsell opportunities can feel like trying to hit a moving target. And let’s be honest, sometimes you forget to put that reminder in your calendar. That’s where your CRM comes in. By automating these processes, you can stay ahead of the curve. But here’s the trick: making those touchpoints feel personal is what really drives success. 

How to Automate Renewal & Upsell Reminders to Feel Personal:

• Set Up Contract Renewal Reminders: When a client signs their contract, set up an automated sequence in your CRM to schedule follow-ups before renewal dates. This way, you and your clients have all the information they need with plenty of time to prepare. Automating this process ensures reminders aren’t lost and keeps everything aligned to each client’s unique timeline. 

• Upsell Reminders: Checking in with clients regularly is crucial. As you have those conversations, add detailed notes into your CRM. Set automated reminders based on those notes to follow up when it’s most appropriate. Maybe a client isn’t ready for an upsell today, but by scheduling reminders, you can check back in when it aligns better with their goals. 

• Leverage Client Portals: Your client portal is a valuable tool for upselling, though many companies overlook this. While upselling shouldn’t be the primary purpose of your portal, you can use analytics and patterns from your customer portal to identify natural upsell opportunities that align with your clients’ needs. 

• Milestone-Based Workflows: Set triggers within your CRM to notify your team when clients hit certain usage or value milestones. These milestones create natural openings for upselling or discussing renewed value. 
  

Example: Recently, a CSM noticed through the customer portal that a manufacturing client’s usage metrics were consistently rising. By scheduling a follow-up to discuss scaling options, they turned a regular check-in into a significant upsell opportunity. 

#3 Automated Feedback Collection

When it comes to gathering feedback, many of us get stuck thinking surveys are the only option. But there are countless ways to collect valuable insights from your clients. Their feedback is essential for continually improving the customer experience, but manually managing this process is overwhelming. Here are some ways to use automation to collect feedback without sacrificing the personal touch. 

How to Automate Feedback Collection:

• Survey Workflows: Yes, we still need surveys to gather feedback. But are there ways you can automate survey requests after key interactions, like completed projects or support tickets? Most teams miss these opportunities because they rely on manual collection. Setting up workflows in your CRM or customer portal can ensure those opportunities aren’t overlooked. 

• Integrated Feedback Forms: Provide accessible feedback forms within your customer portal for a seamless experience. Whether it’s a dedicated support section or a chat feature, allowing clients to provide feedback in real-time helps you understand how to improve your tools and processes. 

• Automated Analysis: Use your CRM to analyze survey results and generate satisfaction reports. This saves you time and provides a clear view of what’s working and what needs improvement. 

• Personalized Follow-Ups: Follow up personally with respondents, especially if feedback is negative or highly positive. Automation can flag those responses so you or your team can respond quickly and create a more positive experience. 

Pro Tip: Surveys and feedback are meant to be active listening tools that show your customers you care about their experience. So don’t just gather feedback. Act on it. Incorporate their insights into your business and growth strategies to keep delivering top-notch customer experiences. 

#4 Managing Support & Issue Resolution

We’ve all been there, a support ticket that starts as a minor issue quickly escalates because it went unresolved. Few things are more frustrating than watching a small problem turn into a big one. And when it does, it’s not just your client who feels the frustration. You do, too. 

But you’re human. Things slip through the cracks. Ensuring that nothing is missed requires constant vigilance and coordination unless you have the right automation in place. 

How to Automate Support & Issue Resolution:

• Automated Ticketing Systems: If you have a client portal, providing your customers with an easy way to submit support tickets is essential. But the real value comes from what happens next. When tickets funnel through your CRM and are automatically assigned to the right teams based on priority or category, it ensures that the right person can resolve the issue the first time. 

• Follow-Up Workflows: Setting automated reminders to check in with clients after an issue is resolved adds a personal touch. It shows you care about their experience and ensures they’re satisfied with the outcome. Happy customers are loyal customers. 

• Escalation Triggers: Sometimes, issues go unresolved. Create workflows that escalate lingering problems to higher management after a set period. This ensures nothing is forgotten and provides a safety net for your customer experience. 

#5 Consistent Touchpoints

“When was the last time I touched base with them?” “I haven’t checked in with them in months.” Sound familiar? 

Keeping in regular contact with clients can be challenging, especially when managing multiple accounts. Inconsistent communication can leave clients feeling disconnected or unaware of the value you provide. Regular, personalized communication is key to building trust and reinforcing your support. 

How to Automate Consistent Touchpoints:

• Scheduled Check-Ins: Use your CRM to automatically schedule check-ins based on client activity, anniversaries, or project milestones. By setting these reminders, you ensure clients never feel neglected and always receive attention when it matters most. 

• Automated Nurturing Emails: Create email sequences that provide clients with helpful resources, tips, or updates related to their accounts or services. But don’t rely on automation alone; add personal touches like phone calls or customized messages throughout the sequence to keep the interaction feeling genuine. 

• Event-Triggered Outreach: Use client activity (or inactivity) to trigger automated reminders for you to reach out. Whether a client has gone silent or recently completed a major milestone, these triggers help you stay proactive and maintain consistent communication. 

Pro Tip: Automating the scheduling of touchpoints doesn’t mean sacrificing personalization. Keep detailed notes from your previous check-ins in your CRM so you can tailor each interaction to the client’s current needs and goals. 

Wrapping it all up:

Implementing these 5 automations can simplify your daily task lists and improve your client relationships by giving you the time to be flexible and respond where you’re needed. From personalizing onboarding to creating consistent touchpoints, automation helps you work smarter, not harder. 

Want to learn more about what makes a great client portal? Check out our blog post, How to Slay Customer Loyalty with a client portal.