Improve customer service in the contact center in 4 steps. The customer is the center of the universe. This premise must be the basis of all those professionals who are part of the customer service team when designing and executing any business plan with one goal: excellent customer service.
Very far away are those commercial actions that tried to sell products and services to magnify their advantages in front of potential buyers. Today, the preferences and needs of your customers are key factors.
It is about finding out these variables and adapting our products to them. Once the sale is made, it is essential to follow up afterwards. This is where the different contact center metrics for customer service come into play.
For this reason, and taking into account the need for the customer experience to be exceptional, it is essential to focus efforts on possible problems that may exist when we talk about interaction with the customer, in order to solve the problem in the best possible way. In this post, we explain how to improve customer service (and satisfaction) in four steps. Do you want to know more? Keep reading!
Customer service: costs
When we talk about customer service, goals are drawn up with the idea of consolidating a customer portfolio that is not only broad, but also loyal (which lasts over time). Any consumer needs to know that their needs will always be heard, understood and attended to. All this is integrated into good customer service.
Investment costs play a determining role in the equations for a user to decide to purchase any product or service. It is evident that a consumer will hardly choose an alternative whose approach is difficult, not very clear, laborious and even uncomfortable.
Price is important, that’s for sure. But we must not forget that good customer service by call center agents can be decisive in the sales process.
Customer service: when a “star product” is not enough
Offering the “best of the best” is not always a guarantee of success. The key is knowing how to sell it.
This statement does not mean that the quality of the products should be neglected. What must be taken into account is that in a world in which the term Globalization is no longer mere rhetoric, everything is interconnected. Or what is the same: there is no star product without quality of service. And there won’t be satisfied customers without the best quality products.
Different sales strategies also come into play here (such as upselling and cross-selling) that can help promote the product during customer relations to “persuade” them to purchase said product or service.
Customer service: feel well cared for. What is?
A person who feels well cared for is one who ends up satisfied with both the service provided and the care received through the different touch points (incoming calls, social media, email, chatbots, etc.). Even if for some reason they were just a potential consumer, they will value positively that they have been listened to carefully and that an attempt will be made to find a solution to their requirements throughout the different points of the Customer Journey.
Therefore, a well-served customer in a contact center needs:
- Know that the products or services have a fair price.
- Have support and guidance before, during and after the purchase.
- Being actively listened to by contact center agents, without an interlocutor seeming distracted or disinterested.
- Trust that the processes to solve your needs will be, at all times, agile, simple and, above all, efficient.
- Have accessible communication channels (telephone numbers for calls or text messages, email, web and mobile applications) and, of course, make omnichannel the basis on which contact center services are based. Additionally, he/she hopes to have flexible and extensive hours to be able to go personally to his supplier, online store, etc., in order to present requirements or doubts. And increasingly, as we have already mentioned on some occasion, to have self-service tools to be able to manage the purchase of products or services autonomously.
A satisfied consumer will not only take a good impression of the business, but will also share it with their friends and circles of influence. The same will happen in the opposite cases: there may customers who leave us and that, in many cases, it is necessary to recover (known as “lost customers“). Current technologies give absolute power to our users/customers to offer both positive and negative opinions. Customers who have had good shopping experiences can become, within their environment, brand ambassadors with great potential.
How to improve customer service? 4 key ideas
Returning to the initial idea that there is no business without a customer, there are four steps that will help in the processes of service and loyalty of the most precious asset that a company has: its customers.
Step 1: Evaluation and Diagnosis
From the inside out. Before embarking on any internal restructuring plan, it is essential to be aware of everything that happens internally within a company (including the level of satisfaction of the call center agents who are in charge of dealing, every day, with the situations with the customers). You can’t change what you don’t know.
If what it is about is to correct possible errors and improve, it is necessary to identify where they are and how they can be corrected.
Step 2: Design a plan
Once the diagnosis has been made, the natural consequence is to design an action plan to make all the necessary changes. It must also be defined how is going to be strengthened and optimized the aspects that have been working well.
In this roadmap, “external” customers (consumers and users, both potential and regular), are not the only ones to consider. Internal customers (employees) also need to be served. Something that we have already explained to you in the previous point.
Regarding what is mentioned above, another basic premise must be taken into account: no one can offer what it does not have. It is humanly impossible for a person to attend to another one with empathy, trust, security and kindness if they do not feel valued, rewarded and respected in their work environment. Taking care of the human factor and ensuring that call center agents are motivated within any company is essential.
In short: to have happy customers, you need happy employees. It is worth remembering a detail: both happiness and bad humor are contagious.
Step 3: Execute the plan. Meet deadlines.
Every action plan must have execution deadlines that must be met inexcusably.
The same principle should apply to promises made to external customers. After all, punctuality and speed are the most determining aspects when evaluating the quality of services.
At all times, the proposed time periods must be realistic, according to the possibilities and resources available.
Step 4: Continuous evaluation
To evaluate “in real time” the effectiveness of all the internal processes of any company or business, it is necessary to have customer service and quality control departments with sufficient capacity to analyze different metrics or KPIs that will help to have a concrete vision in certain aspects and processes that can be improved.
Those who are in direct contact with users and consumers must be able to respond quickly and assertively to all requirements. To do this, they need to know exactly the availability of products in the warehouses or the state of some processes. They must also manage all available information about each buyer.
The quality control departments must not only supervise the faithful fulfillment of all the procedures related to the correct attention of the clients. Together with those responsible for serving consumers, they have to carry out a constant evaluation of everything that happens between the company and its users.
Offer the best customer service with ICR Evolution
Provide the best customer service with ICR Evolution’s omnichannel contact center software:
- Increase First Contact Resolution
- Reduce agent burn-out
- Advise your clients in a more complete and personalized way
Do you want to know more about our software EVOLUTION? Request a demo here!
