Technological Progress and Customer Relationships

Technological Progress and Customer Relationships

Today, technology has effectively become most people’s sixth sense. We cannot go without technology—or technological products—for even a moment, not even for an hour. Technology guides our professional lives, helps us enjoy our leisure time, and keeps us up to date with current events. It plays a vital role in nearly every aspect of our lives. Over the next five to ten years, the scale and speed of digital development will grow by leaps and bounds. Today, the average household has three internet-connected devices. By 2020, that number will increase to at least ten. Beyond phones, more products such as cars, coffee makers, shoes, and refrigerators will be closely connected to the internet.

The rapid growth of digitization will affect the relationship between users and companies. Customer relationships will be intertwined with digitalization from beginning to end. The distinction between online and offline will soon disappear. Users now live in a world of self-service and automation. Intelligent data processing and proactive customer service have already become mainstream. In this period of rapid digital growth, gaining an advantage in customer relationships has become extremely difficult. Companies that were born on the internet are already leading this competition and continue to strengthen that advantage. Meanwhile, companies that grew out of the age of analog computing have been left behind. Unless they can quickly make up for their weaknesses, their future will become increasingly uncertain.

In the near future, customer relationships will become a commodity. Companies that fail to make a successful transition to digitalization will find it difficult to survive. However, even successfully going digital will not be enough to win customers’ favor. Digital transformation also brings transformation in the way businesses operate. Over the next five years, what role will people play in customer relationships? Will self-service, automation, and robots dominate the customer relationships of the future? There are still things that humans can do that machines cannot do—at least for now. For example, people can bring emotion into customer relationships. This means that if humans continue to play this role, it will be extremely important to place proper and direct focus on emotion. Computers do not have creativity, empathy, or passion—but we humans do.