Customer retention has become the major goal of businesses because retaining existing customers is 5x times cheaper than converting a lead to onboard a new customer (Source). Increasing the customer retention rate can result in a steady revenue stream, better brand building, increased chances of referral business, and several other advantages for a business, which makes it necessary to put efforts into retaining clients. The major driving factor that can help call centers retain clients is delivering a delightful customer experience. The best call center software has a special role to play in helping businesses deliver exceptional customer service to deliver excellent customer experience.
Here is a constructive guide shared by one of the leaders in the call center software industry that has offered on-premises and cloud-based call center software solutions to several call centers.
Streamlining Customer Support with Top-notch Call Center Software Solutions
1) Understand Excellence in Customer Service
It is necessary to understand what excellent customer service can mean because everyone would have their definition. A majority of call centers are focused on technicalities and that’s why they keep an eye on KPIs reflected in their call center software. However, excellent customer service is the one that delights customers. When more than 80% of customers are happy with your services, then you are exceeding expectations and delivering excellent support.
2) Identify the Major Goals of the Call Center Solution
The first step to delivering excellent customer service is to define your expectations as a customer and once you define that, the next step is to identify tangible goals and objectives. This will help in building the right team, culture, and technology to deliver customer service that is nothing less than the best. Knowing your goals can also help in finding the best call center software for your business. Your goals must have the following aspects to become more tangible:
- Major KPIs related to customer experience
- Service level agreement for uptime of the software
- Productivity mapping
- Pain points of customers
The last point can help in defining the rest of the goals. If you are unsure of how to define customer pain points, then we have a really helpful article that shares effective ways to identify customer pain points.
3) Focus on Building the Right Team
Finding the right and skilled agents and managers is as important as finding the right call center solution provider. The first step is to define clear roles for both managers and agents. Even if it is quite obvious that call center managers manage teams and agents deliver customer care services. Using a call center solution, many call centers struggle because they delegate calling jobs to managers. It is necessary to build a hierarchy of team members, so managers would be bothered at the end when a customer cannot be handled by agents or team leaders. Based on the roles, you will be able to define key responsibility areas and hire the most skilled team.
It is necessary to clearly define roles, expectations, and KPIs to be measured for the performance and productivity of the team. It is also necessary to convey these expectations to your customer care team, so they can focus on those goals and expectations rather than focusing on mere KPIs and static values.
The managers need to train agents, so agents don’t keep customers on hold for too long due to lack of knowledge. Agents must possess complete knowledge of the software, other tools, and the product or service for which they manage customer service-related calls. Moreover, demand-based agent training should be provided to agents to make sure they receive all sorts of support to work efficiently and delight clients.
4) Invest in Technology
Without the best technology tools in place, the skilled team is restricted. You must use the best solutions, including, but not limited to the cloud-based call center software. Your software must have the required features like the right call routing strategies, auto-dialers, callback scheduling mechanism, dynamic call script display, etc. Some software also supports features of an IP PBX solution to provide a more consolidated platform for internal collaboration to deliver excellent customer service.
Integration of CRM with the contact center software is also very helpful. It provides more reliable data during the live call to agents, so agents can deliver personalized customer service. Personalization indicates how much you value your clients. You can also integrate other tools in your infrastructure to empower your agents to work more efficiently and productively without any roadblocks in delivering exceptional customer service.
5) Define Standards and Protocols for Customer Care
Clear, crisp, and easy-to-comprehend standards and protocols are vital building blocks for the right customer care center. This includes documented protocols for each member’s roles, responsibilities, and other rules in the customer care center. Define agent workflows and best practices for utilizing the call center infrastructure, including the call center solution.
6) Encourage Positive Work Culture
Happy agents will result in happy customers because your agents are going to be the face of the company. Happy managers lead to motivated agents as they are responsible for relieving agent stress even on tough days. Focus on encouraging teamwork, open-minded discussions, positive responses, and other morale-boosting aspects for your customer care team. Reward, award, and acknowledge team members for achieving productivity criteria and working hard.
7) Keep Transforming for the Betterment
consumer service is an ever-changing job since consumer wants and expectations change all the time. Call centers must alter their people and tools in response to changing client behavior and technological improvements. In addition to upgrading the best contact center software as soon as possible. You should also work on improving KPIs, agent productivity criteria, and other aspects. You can solicit input from clients and agents in order to establish their expectations and put them into action. They can also request that your managers evaluate the performance of your agents and provide them with feedback on how to improve their performance. Agents can benefit from AI-powered solutions that minimize workload and stress while increasing productivity.
Over time and with technological advancements, a call center must transform and upgrade to deliver exceptional customer service.
Conclusion
Building a call center that can deliver excellent customer service is not an overnight job. It is a process that has to touch all factors involved in delivering customer services. Everyone, from agents to software, tools, managers, and customers, must be involved in defining the client-centric culture. Delivering the right and delightful customer service rewards revenue, branding, and several other advantages to call centers. Thus, it is worth an attempt and all the effort you put in.
In this journey of building the right call center to deliver excellent customer care services. Using cutting-edge technology and power-packed features, one must use the best call center software. This software must be flexible to support integrations and customizations for exceptional customer service. We are the top call center solution provider that meets the technological needs of call centers. To discuss more on how we can help you deliver exceptional customer services, contact us.