Microsoft named a Leader in 2021 Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ for CRM Customer Engagement Center

The past year has presented enormous changes in both our personal and work lives. But one thing that hasn’t changed is our desire for personalized service experiences and quick resolutions when we have issues. Service, which is often the face of a brand, plays a key role in what that experience looks like. That means that organizations need to understand what customers are looking for as expectations continue to rise, and leverage technology in a way that allows them to reimagine what customer service can look like. As a champion in customer services, we’re pleased to announce for the eighth consecutive year, Microsoft was named a Leader in the June 2021 Gartner Magic Quadrant for CRM Customer Engagement Center. We believe this placement recognizes Microsoft’s continuous investment and authority across our service solution and Cloud functionality.

“Gartner defines the CRM Customer Engagement Center (or CEC) market as software applications used to provide customer service and support. This support is by engaging intelligentlyboth proactively and reactivelywith customers by answering questions, solving problems, and giving advice.

The orchestration of customer service processes through a CEC application involves both assisted and self-service experiences within the customer journey. This is typically built around case management records and processes and extends to emerging approaches such as conversation-based customer engagement.”

CEC applications are expected to harness and synthesize customer data during their interactions to improve service delivery.

Noted capabilities

Microsoft has long pioneered cutting-edge technologies that have led to the development of rich features that empower agents to collaborate and increase productivity, optimize resources, and personalize the customer experience. Microsoft has been a partner to service organizations around the worldhelping to quickly align service operations to strengthen business continuity to withstand a changing economic landscape.

Take SHI Cryogenics Group as an example. For more than 300 years, this manufacturer has pushed the boundaries of possibilities to remain at the forefront by deploying leading-edge technology. SHI Cryogenics Group wanted to apply the same level of innovation to its service and repair processes to enhance support and value for customers. To help achieve this goal, SHI Cryogenics Group turned to Microsoft Dynamics 365 Customer Service.

SHI Cryogenics has reduced product repair turnaround times from two months to two weeks and now shares real-time product data with its customers, providing them with insight into performance issues and service needs. SHI Cryogenics’ customers have more visibility into their products, experience fewer equipment failures, and get their issues resolved faster. Customers can trace any volume of work from production into the field and they’re confident that SHI Cryogenics can deliver support under any circumstance.

What’s ahead for Dynamics 365 Customer Service

We’re committed to deliver rich, innovative features that map to three distinct pillars:

• Tailor customer engagements. Deliver empathetic connected service experiences that provide a holistic view of customers’ case information to enhance first-time fix rates and support smooth service delivery every time.
• Elevate employee effectiveness. Empower employees across your service organization to solve problems faster with actionable insights, enriched data signals, and mixed reality.
• Optimize service operations. Drive proactive service with IoT, unlock new service revenue streams, and reduce downtime and service costs.

With 2021 release wave 2, we’re enhancing this leading end-to-end customer service solution. We’re transforming service operations by connecting people, places, and things. We’re committed to helping you deliver seamless customer-centric experiences by anticipating the needs and wants of every customer. We’re helping service organizations enhance agent productivity by providing the right tools at the right time, regardless of their role or location. And we’re helping to resolve issues the first time and help you identify gaps in service and opportunities for improvement through AI-driven analytics and rich insights. These efforts can drive new revenue streams that were previously overlooked. And yes, the possibilities are limitless.

The bottom line

Many service organizations consist of siloed agents answering service calls, putting customers on hold, asking the same questions repeatedly, and searching for the right answer while following an outdated script or canned response. This process is inefficient, costly, and unsatisfying to the customer.

The world of customer service is changing. Today, service organizations are evolving into profit centers, redefining business models, and creating powerful and fulfilling customer experiencesall supported by leading-edge solutions like Dynamics 365 Customer Service.

We’re excited to be positioned as a Gartner 2021 Magic Quadrant Leader for the CRM Customer Engagement Center and are committed to bringing you the best customer service application available. Depend on Dynamics 365 Customer Service to help you tailor customer engagements, elevate employee effectiveness, and optimize service operations.

Learn more

Read the Gartner 2021 Magic Quadrant Report for CRM Customer Engagement Center.

Learn more about Dynamics 365 Customer Service.

Check out Dynamics 365 Customer Service 2021 release wave 2.

GARTNER and Magic Quadrant are registered trademarks and service marks of Gartner, Inc. and/or its affiliates in the U.S. and internationally and are used herein with permission. All rights reserved. Gartner does not endorse any vendor, product or service depicted in its research publications, and does not advise technology users to select only those vendors with the highest ratings or other designation. Gartner research publications consist of the opinions of Gartner’s research organization and should not be construed as statements of fact. Gartner disclaims all warranties, expressed or implied, with respect to this research, including any warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose.

Gartner, Magic Quadrant for the CRM Customer Engagement Center, 15 June 2021, Nadine LeBlanc, Jim Davies and Varun Agarwal.

This graphic was published by Gartner, Inc. as part of a larger research document and should be evaluated in the context of the entire document. The Gartner document is available upon request from Microsoft.

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