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By Channing Rollo, E-Business Analyst, and Harvey Garrett, Director of Solution Planning at ClientLogic
In the conclusion of this two part series, the authors continue to discuss how to maximize the lifetime value of customer relationships without breaking the bank. Here are the final eight steps:
With the plethora of new methods and technologies for contact management, there is simply no excuse for providing poor service or going broke ensuring a good customer experience. Delivering a positive, memorable customer experience is possible without breaking the bank.
9. Computer-Telephony Integration (CTI)
CTI has the ability to electronically identify, prioritize, and customize service for incoming calls. CTI is designed to give customer service representatives instant access to all available customer data based on the incoming caller-ID. CTI functionality essentially detects the caller’s phone number, queries the customer database and “pops” the appropriate customer record and information to the agent’s computer screen.
It works especially well with marketing campaigns, in which the agent can immediately access customer information that already exists in a prospect database. CTI can also be used to effectively utilize each call opportunity if an agent can instantly see previous purchases, personal preferences and account information, he/she can immediately begin to cross-sell and up-sell the caller.
Advanced CTI provides even more value. Calls can be routed and prioritized according to the customer’s history. For example, CTI services can move high-value customers to the front of the queue while diverting lower-value customers to service options like IVR. CTI’s recognition capacity enables CSRs to provide customized, informed service and problem handling, based on comprehensive case records.
By automatically handling callers according to their value, CTI is a powerful tool for call center financial success. A recent report by the Pelorus Group asserts, “[CTI] is fundamental in advancing CRM from a cost center to a profit center . . . [as it] integrates the various customer ‘touch points’ with telephony.”
10. Leveraging a Knowledgebase (KB)
Knowledge bases have a long history of facilitating speedy information search and transfer. Originally created for sharing knowledge within a business or group,
KBs—searchable, dynamic electronic data reservoirs—allow individuals to access
knowledge gathered from a plethora of sources and historical records.
The service industry has traditionally leveraged them for technical support to empower agents with thousands of solutions to every possible PC error, and the innumerable software/hardware interactions involved. I
Instead of each agent needing to be a PC wizard with perfect solution comprehension, an agent can be “merely” PC-proficient and learn from others by utilizing a KB of all the problems and resolutions previously determined by other agents and experts (and adding to or modifying the KB where appropriate).
Recently, KBs have taken on a new life in the direct-to-consumer world, which demands increasingly detailed direct-to-consumer contact. KBs are now being leveraged to answer and address all types of customer concerns, from “What colors does this hat come in?” and “Will this toaster fit under my kitchen cabinet?” to “What is the average shipping time for this couch?” and “What is your return policy?” By storing all types of product, fulfillment, and solution information, KBs can significantly reduce training and contact handle time.
Knowledge bases enable and optimize many of the solutions detailed in this article, including knowledge extraction from KB for chat/e-mail efficiency, auto-suggest
and auto-response e-mail, web self-help, etc. Optimally, an organization creates and implements a single, organization-wide KB that is leveraged across all types of customer interactions (chat, e-mail, phone and self-service), creating a positive, consistent experience across all touch points.
11. Knowledge Extraction from KB
For swift handling of e-mail and chat contacts, the first step is developing a comprehensive knowledge base from which agents can quickly extract solutions. The vast majority of customer questions address the very same issues (thus the same text can be used again and again) or require just a small piece of custom information (thus most of
the note can be preformatted).
The knowledge base for extraction service should be integrated with the agent desktop so the agent does not have to switch between applications in order to access solutions. The KB should also be able to store, search, and retrieve unstructured data, such as client manuals, .pdf documents, and spreadsheets. An optimal knowledge base not only stores but also tracks which solutions are being used most often. Understanding which questions arise most frequently helps improve customer service, FAQ accuracy, products, documentation, and KB upgrades.
12. Auto-Suggest E-Mail
Auto-suggest e-mail is similar to auto-response e-mail, but with reduced risk to
the customer relationship. Instead of a KB program processing and responding directly
to customer inquiries, auto-suggest e-mail service provides the human agent with a
suggested response (auto-cut from the KB) but gives the agent the option to modify or
reword the response. Thus each time a chat window or e-mail inquiry arrives at an
agent desktop, it is coupled with suggested responses and solutions, as determined by
KB files. This is the most efficient method of handling customer e-mail inquiries quickly
without sacrificing quality, as the element of human personalization and judgment
remains intact. Auto-suggest e-mail ensures that a customer never receives a computer-generated answer that is inappropriate or irrelevant to their inquiry.
13. Web Remote Diagnostics Solutions
Help desks of PC and software OEMs are currently overwhelmed by the deluge of
customer tech support need, and the situation is worsening. As PC usage grows,
swift, quality customer service gets increasingly difficult to provide. Other factors are
escalating the problem -- as software expands in size and complexity, PCs are increasingly vulnerable to incompatibility issues and breakdowns.
As we go forward, PCs will hold larger and more diverse pieces of software, continuing a boom in configuration and software conflict problems. To forestall significant PC downtime and irate customers, OEMs are eagerly seeking a technological solution to this growing problem. Although PCs are maddeningly prone to breakdowns, most problems are remarkably simple.
More often than not, only a software configuration or system setting needs repair, nothing more. Fixing such takes mere minutes, but figuring out what’s wrong, however, can take hours.” And that’s where eSupport comes in—a swift and effective way of diagnosing and fixing PC problems, remotely. The future of this solution is bright, as eSupport will eventually involve nearly any electronic product operating with a microchip or software,
including phones, handhelds and other Net-connected gadgets.
While each eSupport tool works and resolves issues differently (some only provide a portion of the service process) they generally follow the same support pattern. Self-healing technologies are the first component of the overall eSupport process: attempting to fix the problem internally, without user or agent intervention. The second phase is remote diagnostics solutions: when the computer is unable to serve itself with local and remote KB assistance, the issue and full PC diagnostics data is uploaded to a live tech agent for in-depth work.
Given the information provided by the computer’s diagnostics engine, the tech agent can spend his/her time resolving, rather than diagnosing, the problem. Clearly, a full eSupport self-healing and diagnostics process provides multiple opportunities for resolution prior to reaching an agent, thus drastically reducing the number of rudimentary calls that hit the help desk.
Even when a problem does reach a live agent, remote diagnostics ensures
that the service rep is well-equipped with all the relevant information gathered in
previous steps -- PC diagnostics data, prior attempts at resolution, and suggestions.
Says Robert Igou of Dataquest, “[Agents are] getting that direct information from
the software and the hardware, which is a whole lot better than an end-user telling
them, ‘It gave me a blue screen.’”
Being connected, tech agents can then remotely perform complex PC repair, examine application, hardware and virus issues; and automatically “push” new fixes or upgrades to the end-user’s PC. The key benefit to the customer is that a comprehensive, eSupport software acts as an internal tech agent by keeping a watchful eye and routinely assisting live-agent repair of system configuration, settings, upgrades, drivers, etc. The end result is a smoother-running PC and a much-delighted customer.
14. Complete View of the Customer
To service customers effectively, businesses must have a comprehensive understanding of each and every customer and their individual history. A customer relationship is
actually the sum of tens or hundreds of individual experiences, or “touches.” With
access to a full case history, agents can tailor service to the customer’s unique
circumstances and preferences, in context of the overall relationship.
Features like open-incident history and integrated case management that show all previous contacts from all mediums (phone, e-mail, Web) empower companies to serve customers without wasting time re-learning about their background situation.
For example, an integrated database that tracks all customer touch points means that customers will never again have to go through the ten minute explanation, “My order hasn’t arrived so I sent an e-mail asking for my order status. Your agent responded and said it should arrive today, but it didn’t. So I called your service line and they said they’d call the warehouse and try to find out what day it was sent. But I haven’t heard from them so I’m calling back . . .”
With an accurate, company-wide customer database, the agent already has all of this information at his/her fingertips, including marketing, order fulfillment, and customer service history. The result: service and resolution (rather than a long explanation of the problem and background) can begin immediately.
An often-overlooked method of reducing costs is the use of less-expensive labor or
messaging. These options are obviously not plug-and-play technologies but are worthy
of consideration in cost-saving strategies:
15. Labor efficiencies
Off-shift agents -- Leverage existing agent seats for non-real time contact responses,
such as e-mail.
Off-shore labor -- Governments through-out the world are cutting taxes, ending
telecom and utility regulations and liberalizing labor laws in effort to attract global
businesses. This presents a new opportunity to companies with call center needs, which
can now look to countries like India and the Philippines for labor cost reduction.
Many countries are eager for these jobs, having unemployment rates well into the 15-20
percent range and a surplus of highly educated and skilled individuals, often with
fluency in multiple languages. For example, a fertile ground for contact centers exists in
India, where the government is proactively wooing international customer service centers by subsidizing voice training for citizens to lose their Indian accent.
The price reduction by utilizing offshore labor can be significant—in some areas, labor costs can be reduced by one-third to one-half for e-mail and chat services.
Call Blending -- Mentioned previously as a CTI opportunity, call blending enables
agents to handle both inbound and out-bound calls, as well as chat and e-mail
depending on contact volume ratios (i.e., a predominance of e-mail one day, versus
phones ringing off the hook the next).
While some technology problems persist due to the nature of traditionally proprietary phone switch technology, leveraging phone agents to answer chat sessions or off-line e-mail is becoming increasingly feasible, even if done manually by transfer-ring a few agents off the phones when queues are low.
A word of caution: not all agents are interchangeable across service offerings—chat and e-mail service requires a significantly different skill set (reading comprehension, writing, spelling and grammar) than phone service (pleasant voice, listening comprehension, grammar). Blending without skill set consideration will
degrade the customer experience.
16. Contact Efficiencies
Managing multiple chat sessions at one time—Chat’s multi-session capability allows an individual service representative to handle multiple customers simultaneously (2-4, on average, although the handle rate varies depending on the type of service. Tech support usually requires undivided agent attention, while several simple order queries can be handled simultaneously.)
Mass e-mail response -- Sometimes mass e-mail is an effective means of addressing
customer concerns. For instance, when an online vendor’s site server went down for
several days, its customer relations manager sent a mass e-mail to all customers that
had complained, addressing their questions and offering a gift certificate as consolation.
In Closing
Strategies closely matched to an understanding of why and how customers make contact with a vendor are destined for success. And as we move forward with technology, the opportunities for convenient, intuitive, on-demand service will only expand, and the customers will love it!
This article was contributed by Channing Rollo, eBusiness Analyst, and Harvey Garrett, Director of Solution Planning at ClientLogic. ClientLogic is an international provider of
integrated customer management solutions, including marketing, customer-contact and fulfillment services. Operating in 53 locations in 11 countries, ClientLogic offers its 250+ industry-leading clients a broad range of cost-efficient services designed to maximize the customer experience. For more information, please visit www.clientlogic.com or contact Channing Rollo at channrol@clientlogic.com.
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