When someone posted a complaint on a popular cycling forum about his Road ID tag – a Velcro bracelet that contains necessary identification information in case of a cycling accident – something “remarkable” happened, according to the tag-making company’s CEO, Edward Wimmer, speaking to Inc. Magazine.

Contributors to the forum began to defend the company, praising its customer service practices and showing intense brand loyalty. According to Wimmer’s interview with Inc., he believes much of this stems from their insistence in not using an interactive voice response (IVR) system for customer calls. This coincides with a recent Interactions Corporation survey, which found that 83 percent of consumers will avoid companies that use these IVR systems, faulting bad customer relations experiences.

“It’s not a contact center problem,” explained Interactions Corporation CEO MIke Iacobucci. “It’s a customer experience problem. Customer touchpoints go from the most basic to the most intensive, from Google searches to live calls. If each customer interaction is not consistently satisfying then each negative customer experience will translate into a decline of brand affinity.”

In addition to the 83 percent of consumers who will ditch a brand using IVR software, another 70 percent say that they will also use social media to share their bad experiences with customers, generating negative buzz for the business.

For these intensive customer touchpoint calls, it may help companies to invest in custom database software that can be used to power a customer relationship management system (CRM). The use of CRMs can help businesses enhance their customer touchpoints and provide better feedback and assistance by keeping track of critical client details.

In addition, by providing a CRM software for customer service representatives to use while speaking with clients, businesses can create a pleasant experience and help build the type of brand loyalty that Edward Wimmer and Road ID were able to experience.