Reinventing The Call Center- Customer Service for the Digital World

The Opportunity Call Centers have been the human interface point for years in areas like catalog sales and order-taking, telephone solicitation, and post-sale service (complaints and returns.) With the e-commerce boom, call centers have become even more important since they play these roles in organizations that may have no other physical presence or means for human contact. These days, customer service takes many forms. Customers expect to be able to get the same answers by whatever channel is convenient for them- sending an e-mail, filling out a form on a web-site, calling on the phone, or using an online service.

The Solution

Focus on the mission- providing real, human, customer service.

The Cadillac company provides a pretty good illustration of how technology and human service are inseparable in the advertisements for the OnStar (R) system on the Cadillac Catera, when they tell their customers – automatic tellers can only count in tens and twenties. Automatic phone systems can only interpret numbers from a keypad. Sometimes you need to talk to a “real person.”

This article discusses the basic elements of Customer Service, and then a few of the options available for achieving the level of customer service your business needs and can afford.

The Elements

The elements of good customer service are not hard to determine. Just think about the last time you had a question or problem. What were you hoping for?

To get connected with a human being quickly, and this human being would be:

• Someone with good communication skills
• Someone with a complete understanding of the product or service.
• Someone who listens to your situation and needs.
• Someone intelligent and empowered enough to resolve the situation effectively.
• Someone who treats you with respect.

Quick Connections

This is largely a function of your staffing levels and technology. Besides the sheer volume of calls or information requests you are getting (or expect to get,) you also need to take some other issues into account:

• Are your customers in different time zones?
• Are they consumers that are using your product or service at some time other than business hours?
• Does the volume of calls vary seasonally, or increase at other times (quarter-end, month-end, particular weekday, or particular time of day?)
• Do you have projections about how a particular event or promotion may affect request volumes?
• Do you offer different channels for customers to contact your customer service department?

Customers these days may expect you to be available in a number of ways:

• In person (in a brick-and-mortar location)
• On the phone
• By fax
• By e-mail
• By Voice Response Unit (VRU)
• By interactive form on the Internet.

Take these factors into account when determining your staffing levels and the technology that supports customer communications.

Communication Skills

Your customer service agents may need skills that they haven’t needed in the past. Items to consider:

• Call center agents have not typically been screened for writing ability, but customer service may now require responses by e-mail. Is your staff equipped to respond professionally in writing?
• Are your reps proficient in using the equipment you’re using? This should go without saying, but bungling transfers, firing off e-mails to the wrong address, and other fumbles can impair your credibility.
• Are you expanding into different geographical/cultural markets that might require different language skills?
• Knowledge of Products and Services – Do your agents have sufficient reference material available to them to answer 90% of the questions they’re being asked? (Granted, there will always be some surprises, but you should have the basics down.)
• Is that reference material arranged in a way that they can access it quickly? (Electronically, or at the very least very clear, concise, and well-tagged printed material?)
• Do you have an orientation program that sufficiently prepares agents to respond adequately?
• Do you have ongoing training efforts to ensure agents are current on new material and fresh on old material?
• Do you have some basic proficiency required of agents before they start taking calls?

Listening Skills

• Are agents incentives based on customer satisfaction, rather than sheer volume of responses?
• Are agents actually listening to customers (or actually reading their e-mails,) rather than watching TV, listening to the radio, checking their stocks on the Internet or playing computer games?

Judgement

• Are agents able to solve most customer problems without another hand-off to a manager?
• Are they empowered to make basic decisions, such as customer refunds, returns, replacements or enhancements?
• Do they cross-sell when appropriate?
• Are they incented to match the customer up with the correct product or service for the customer’sneeds, rather than meeting quotas on a particular item the company is promoting?

Treating Customers with Respect

• Do you monitor calls?
• Are agents trained to deal with various types of challenges, such as angry customers, customers with less than excellent communication skills, etc. in a professional way?
• Is the importance of the customer emphasized in all materials and training programs?

Anticipating Customers’ Needs

Your technology, reference materials, and skills required of agents, should constantly be evaluated and modified based on new information. Stay current on and be open to react quickly based on:

• What your customers like or dislike about their customer service experiences
• Statistical trends in numbers and types of calls
• What your competitors are doing
• What other customer service departments (outside of your industry) are doing
• What new technology becomes available.

You will probably want reports on statistics on the numbers and types of consumer interactions, but you can’t burden your customer service agents with also being the census bureau. Use technology to make this as unobtrusive as possible to the agents and to the customer. Never take the same information more than once.

Determine Your Approach- Do It Yourself or Outsource

After reading the preceding material, you may decide that there is so much involved with customer service that you’d rather not handle it yourself. You can devote your time, people, and facilities much more effectively to your actual product or service, and outsource this function.

Even so, the information here is important to be aware of in selecting a firm that will represent your company effectively and be worth what you pay them.

The Options

Years ago, the only way to supply reliable customer service was to have a department devoted to that, or to have much of your employees’ time devoted to customer service, putting product and service design and production tasks second.

I remember working in a florist shop when I was in college. A poster on the wall in the back room listed the priorities:

1. Serve Customers
2. Serve Customers
3. Serve Customers
4. Make arrangements to fill existing orders
5. Make arrangements to fill display case
6. Water plants and clean showroom

There were times (Especially around Mother’s Day and Valentines Day) when we had to scramble and bring in extra people to fill existing orders, the display case got pretty bare, and the showroom was an absolute wreck; but my manager had the priorities straight and the shop was the most successful in the city.

Fortunately, there are alternatives these days so that the rest of your business doesn’t have to suffer to meet customer service needs.

Virtual Assistants

Virtual Assistants, or VAs, are an ideal solution for microbusinesses. VAs are generally freelance administrative assistants who work out of their homes, generally for a number of businesses. VAs can take customer calls, answer e-mails, check on your web site, and even perform some sales duties.

They all have their own specialties.

Two cautions-

The first involves tax and labor regulations. Ensure that the tax situation is covered for your area. In some cases, a VA may be hired as an “independent contractor” rather than being put on payroll, which saves a great deal of paperwork; but there may be specifics such as where the person works and whether they work exclusively for you or have other clients. Consult your tax advisor.

The second caution is that since this is a part-time arrangement, people tend to be a bit casual about the paperwork, specifications and requirements. Since you may become quite dependent on your VA very quickly, and they may be your single point of customer service, documentation may be even MORE important than when contracting with a firm. Be sure the expectations of this person are well-documented, understood and agreed to by both parties, and have a back-up plan in case your VA lands a more lucrative client or goes on vacation.

Outsourcing

This is often a very cost-effective, and efficient alternative to having your own customer service department. Customer Service firms specialize in their hiring and training processes, and can afford expensive communications equipment.

See our article on Cross-Company Teamwork for specifics on how to make an outsourcing relationship more successful.

Internal Customer Service Department

When you must have control over the customer service process, be able to react quickly to changes, and collect information from customers immediately, this is your most direct option.

• You will need to invest in equipment appropriate to support the communication channels you use (telephone routing systems, e-mail, Internet, etc.)
• You will have to devote the time to recruiting and hiring for a traditionally high-turnover market
• You will need to develop training and reference materials.
• You will have to provide appropriate motivation and incentives.
• You will have to provide physical facilities that inspire a good attitude (when the call center is in a dark warehouse, callers can usually tell the difference!)

Accommodate the demographic groups that are typically available for customer service work, such as students and senior citizens. Our Generation X article has some useful suggestions for recruiting and motivating young people

Conclusion

Happy, loyal customers are your best salespeople, and repeat buyers are much less expensive to find and sell than new prospects. Customer service is probably the most challenging aspect of doing business in the present market.  Fortunately, if you develop a good system for this, it is also the most difficult for your competitors to steal or copy.