The Contact Center Blog

Get the Best ROI from Your Call Center – Build a Relationship

In order to ensure that you have the largest ROI possible from your contact center, there are two main things that need to be taken into consideration.  First, ensure that the choice to outsource is not a ‘quick-fix’, but rather a long-term investment and commitment.  The cost of start-up fees, the research done on the outsourced companies, and the trust you are placing in the successful company does not fit well with anything other than a long-term commitment.  Even if your need to outsource is project-based, if you plan on going back to the outsourcer in the future you can build a relationship with the company and get more for your money.

Also, it is important to make sure that the company you outsource to is the right fit for you, your company, and your needs.  Does your culture align with theirs?  What about their approach to customer service, training, quality, values and beliefs?

Do not be afraid to ask questions, ask for references, and an official proposal.  Remember that you are interviewing this company for your business – they should have all the answers ready to give you.

 

New report shows 68% of consumers hang up if they have trouble hearing an agent

Last week I was reading my industry news emails and came across a bulletin from Contact Center World, titled "Call Center Frustrations May Cause Consumers to Shop Elsewhere".  While I automatically thought - "well, yeah!" I still clicked through to see what proof this article contained, and am happy I did.

The first line catches the readers eye - 68% of consumers hang up if they have trouble hearing an agent.  This includes a bad connection, poor voice quality, faulty speech recognition software, an agent mumbling on the phone or having an accent that is thick and difficult to understand.

The report, as pointed out in the Contact Center World article, is based on a survey of 3,925 consumers in the United States, U.K, Germany and France, and makes a good point about the investment a call center needs to make in their services.

Call centers are in business to serve people.  So it astounds me when some companies don't properly invest their time and resources in technology and people that work for them.

When you look to hire an outsourced call center, there are many things to consider to ensure proper fit.  However at the forefront of your questions should be an inquiry into the technology used, and people hired to work on your project.  Does the technology meet industry standards?  Are agents accent-neutral and easy to understand?

Customer call you for help, so don't leave them unsatisfied!  An inbound call center is your opportunity to really impress your customer base with exceptional customer service and quality - so take it!

Back to School? It’s All The Same In The Call Center Industry!

With kids hitting the classrooms yesterday to begin a new school year, the term “back to school” has been all over the internet, radio, tv and social media.

Summer is over, many have taken their vacation time and are back in the office, and it’s time to get back to the grind.

Yet, in the call center – there never was a summer break.  Sure, there are different companies whose business is based on season, but in an outsourced contact center there is never a lull.  Which is one reason why you can rest-assured that service levels remain consistent throughout the year – our agents are never out of practice, and proper Workforce Management technology ensures that optimal staffing levels are maintained at all times.

Ahh, the organization of a call center and its smooth operation.  Now if only your back-to-school routine could be this smooth.

Technology To Uninvent

A few weeks ago, MSN.ca published the satirical article 12 bits of technology we would uninvent to outline the technologies they could simply do without.

One of them was Automated Phone Systems and that couldn’t be truer! There is nothing worse than calling a company, hoping to speak to someone as quickly as possible and then having to go through the touch-tone motions of pressing numbers to finally get the answer you want. And, even then, don’t you find yourself just jabbing at the “0” to get to customer service quickly? That’s definitely something we all do.

A human voice can go a long way in making the customer experience easier and contact centers are there for that very reason. Helping a customer get their issue sorted out is their number one priority and they do it all without the help of an automated system!

The 3 Minute Rule

Sometimes the most brilliant, transformative ideas are the simplest. Take, for example, the ‘Three-Minute Rule’ that Anthony Tjan at the Harvard Business Review talks about: engage customers to find out their actions 3 minutes before and 3 minutes after they use your product or service. The three-minute rule is a great way to find out what you can do to improve your customer service, and in the contact center world, this is crucial for growth and sustainability.

Using Live Chat, we can talk to our customers while they are in the midst of product or service usage. We can find out what brought them to a particular site, or what drove them away from it. As Tjan points out,

The three-minute rule reminds us that rearranging the context of a shopping experience to better meet customer patterns can be extremely effective. Customers seek solutions, but it is likely that your offering is only part of one. The three-minute rule is a forcing mechanism to see the bigger picture and adjacent opportunities.

There are opportunities on both sides here - For the customer, a better experience and for your business, a better chance at a sale. For example, if your customer is having trouble finding something on your website and a contact center agent manages to engage them in a live chat, they should ask the customer what made it so hard for them to find that product in those minutes before help arrived. Then, the agent should find out what their next step will be with the desired response being that they will finalize the sale and checkout online. It is the hope that this attention to detail and level of customer care will make the customer realize just how worth it the business is to invest in.

So, taking a moment to chat with customers and finding out how to make their experience a more satisfactory one all-around will benefit everyone in the long run and make for a much more satisfactory experience.

A Call for Help in Haiti

In light of the earthquake this week in Haiti, the importance of aid and emergency communication lines becomes a prevalent topic of conversation.

These are not your regular 911 calls I’m referring to, but calls in response to an emergency on such a vast scale that very few people can imagine the devastation.  It is times like these when help lines, donation lines, and phone lines for inquiry become important to aid in the relief of an entire country.

Campaigns have begun on Facebook and Twitter, text message lines set up, telephone numbers posted to donate, and much more. 

From a humanitarian perspective this tragedy is extremely devastating and it’s comforting to see the support of so many people through various donations.  From a contact center perspective, I give my thanks to those who are behind the social media campaigns, answering the calls, and organizing the emails and tweets.  This is the finest example of the ability of a contact center to ramp up on queue – and proof of the capabilities of great call centers.

* To learn more on how you can donate, visit the Mashable Social Media Guide blog at http://mashable.com, which has an extensive list of options including updates from participants.

Black Friday and Cyber Monday Sales Up - Are You Supporting These Sales?

The results are in, and online sales from Black Friday and Cyber Monday are up compared to one year ago. 

According to comScore, a company that monitors online consumer behavior, Black Friday experienced an 11% increase in sales to $595 million compared to the same day in 2008.  Meanwhile, Cyber Monday rose 5% from the same day in 2008, reaching $887 million and matching December 9, 2008 for online spend, which is the heaviest in record.

These statistics speak great for a recovering economy, and definitely shed an optimistic light on the upcoming holiday season.  But, before we get ahead of ourselves we need to explore the full scenario and ask ourselves – how are these sales going to be supported into the New  Year?

See, the sale doesn’t end when the credit card is processed online.  After this is complete, retailers must shift focus to the after-sale experience in which the customer uses the product and seeks help setting it up, trouble-shooting, exchanging for an upgrade, or simply making a return.  Each of these can have a further positive or negative impact on the customer’s experience.

Many businesses today rely on repeat customer purchases, and therefore building a good rapport and reputation for beyond-the-sale service amongst customers is critical.  This is where contact center services – done in-house or outsourced – will have a huge benefit to any company.  A 24 hour help line to trouble-shoot on Boxing Day can mean the difference between a happy child, and therefore happy customer, or a disgruntled individual who will go elsewhere for a purchase in the future. 

So, while the numbers stand to be beneficial to retailers right now, will you follow-through and support these sales in 2010?

Will Internet Savvy Web 2.0'ers Lead to the Demise of the Traditional Call Center Model?

Recently, I have read that Twitter of all things is apparently the cause of significant call center layoffs. It was stated that more people than ever are taking advantage of corporate Twitter sites to ask customer service questions, which means less traditional phone call inquiries (you can read the article here ).

And what is this I am hearing about 'super users'? -people that enjoy products so much that they surf the web and online corporate communities, jumping at the chance to help their fellow users by answering customer service questions. From a recent tmcnet.com article:

Since last summer, Verizon has transferred much of the responsibility in certain divisions that require high levels of customer service to volunteers - people who have a passion for the wireless, Internet and TV technologies that Verizon peddles, and who like to feel useful. Sound strange? It is. But it's also true. They're called "super-users," and they work through online forums that are gradually developing into self-sustaining databases where customers can go to answer all their questions.

Does this all mean that the end of the traditional customer service call center is near?

I don’t think so.

Don’t get me wrong, there are great self-service companies out there like Bazaarvoiceand Lithium, and they have a place in this ecosystem, but I think people are forgetting to examine the other side of the spectrum and companies like Zappos.com- the reigning King of the customer service experience.

How does one explain Zappos.com’s success in this new self-help world? For gosh sakes they don't even set limits for how long their agents can talk to callers, and I believe the longest service call they ever had was over 5 hours.....

My current thought is that there is a middle ground, and that appropriate and tempered call deflection is the key to success.

What I mean by this is:

Companies should take advantage of these new technologies, incorporating items like robust self-help sections to their websites, and they should also use communication channels like Twitter, live chat and email (which are usually more cost effective than voice support to deploy because of concurrency). But as is the case with Zappos, there is no replacement for the service that can be achieved through voice support. The experience is unparalleled, and for more complicated support issues it is the only viable channel that can be used to adequately understand and address a customers needs.

Although a lot of startups are finding the initial cost savings of self-service tools appealing, as these companies mature, if they hope to develop a long term and re-occurring customer base they are going to have to invest in multi-channel customer service which is anchored by traditional phone support. Simply put, customer’s expectations are higher than ever, and consumers expect a multitude of contact options so they can interact in the way they feel most comfortable with a company.

To conclude, I think self-service is here to stay, and I think it works amazingly well for simple customer services issues. In these challenging economic times, the technologies discussed will also help businesses to reduce their overall customer service expenditures. With that being said, call deflection can only be taken so far. For companies that care about their brand and their overall customer experience, there will always be a need and a role for the kind and caring customer service representative who is available to speak with consumers by phone.                         

-Tim Peters

Outsourcing Revisited

The economy today has an obvious impact on many companies, resulting in efforts to cut costs to help balance decreasing revenues and customer spending. Operations is one area being slashed, as jobs continue to be cut and responsibilities begin to consolidate.

In light of this, the idea of outsourcing is making its way back to the forefront. We all know the benefits of outsourcing, which is something that never went away. I just wanted to make a point that it's seems more relevant now as companies are looking for ways to cut cost but still maintain the quality and reputation they have.

All service and process related functions are ideal to be outsourced - such as call centers. If you're looking into outsourcing any area of your business for the first time, I think you'll be pleasantly surprised about what's offered, the savings you can incur, the improvements you can make, and the overall ROI you'll receive.

What's your opinion on the role outsourcing in today's economy?

Learning to Speak Contact Center-ese

While getting familiar with the contact center industry, one of the most challenging things is familiarizing yourself with all the terminology and acronyms. In hunting around I found a call center “dictionary” of sorts which you can find here. I thought it might also be useful to briefly summarize some of the key terms which you might encounter and explain how they could impact you if you were selecting an outsourcer.

Talk Time – This includes the total time spent on a call when an agent is talking to a contact. It’s the time from when the phone is answered and the agent says “hello” right to when the caller hangs up.

Wrap Time – This is the time at the conclusion of the call when the agent is still working on something to assist the contact, however the actual call itself is over. This might include data entry, etc.

HT – This is an acronym for “Handle Time”. Basically this includes the entire length of time required for dealing with one customer contact. The HT includes the talk time of the call plus the wrap time.

AHT - You might also hear AHT which stands for “Average Handle Time”. You can get this by taking the total of all the HT’s for a particular group of calls divided by the number of calls in that group to get the average.

When shopping for an outsource contact center AHT can have a strong influence on the price. Most outsourcers charge a price per agent minute or per agent hour. While a potential service provider that offers a cheaper rate per minute might seem like the obvious choice, shaving a few seconds off the AHT – for example a shorter wrap time – can result in significant savings when multiplied times your total number of calls.

When you’re shopping around, ask what techniques each center has for reducing the AHT.  If they don’t know what an AHT is, refer them to this blog (and choose a different provider).