TSIA 2021 Channel Preference Study

It is no surprise that a year of “shelter in place” and a rise in virtual customer engagement has had significant impact on which channels customers use for support. In TSIA’s 2021 Channel Preference Study, the increase in adoption of digital chat channels, documented in last year’s report, accelerated even more rapidly. Especially in the US, the percent of customers who say they prefer or occasionally use SMS text chat, WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, video chat, and other digital channels, saw sharp increases.

This report highlights key year-over-year changes in the US and other geographies and suggest new channels to prioritize for introduction in 2021 and 2022. Companies that have not yet created a roadmap for introducing these more flexible and low-effort channels should investigate how these capabilities could be added to their existing technology stack before competitors announce new channel options as a way of attracting enterprise technology buyers who tend to be trending younger and have different preferences for support experiences than previous generations.