Demand for improved contact centre performance has never been greater. Better customer experience is a requirement that’s been at the core of customer-centric organisations for decades. More recently, the need to improve customer experience and the customer journey has been pursued with renewed intensity.
Driver for change
Consumer behaviour has radically changed. From star ratings to social media, consumers are empowered with just one click of a button. Mobile apps and communication channels have given consumers the power to demand service and make a purchase when, where and how they want it.
This means businesses need to raise the bar, escalating service levels in the hope they will outperform the competition. This side of the story isn’t about power, it’s about technology. It takes a lot to change consumer behaviour, but technology really can influence demand and the sales process.
Omnichannel communication, automated processes, machine learning, voice analytics, intelligent routing…the list goes on. The feature set of a cloud contact centre over a legacy deployment is impossible to ignore.
Foehn has identified that there’s always a specific issue that forces taking action, rather than putting up with the status quo. Individually, each of these issues sheds light on the problem with the legacy system but, as a whole, offers a broader view of a contact centre specification that organisations need today.
1. Infrastructure
A cloud contact centre saves money and delivers the most recent features. Cloud infrastructure allows scalability, configuration and implementation to be managed easily through a dedicated management portal. For busy IT managers, this counts for a lot more than financial savings.
2. Analytics
Data analytics are the lifeblood of any customer strategy. They power the customer journey, support KPIs and give valuable insight into agent performance. Latest contact centres offer dashboards, wallboards and real-time monitoring required to optimise resources.
3. Productivity
Agents waste a lot of time on enquiries outside their remit. The provision of self-service IVRs gives the caller access to answers faster and without tying up an agent. A modern contact centre allows self-service tasks to be built into the customer journey to improve the experience and reduce response time.
4. Self management
Administration of the contact centre is essential for optimal performance. Waiting for service providers can be a slow and costly threat to customer experience. A management portal with a simple, intuitive user interface can allow managers to undertake many of the simpler tasks more rapidly and at less cost.
5. Customer data
Agents need integration between the contact centre and the CRM. CRM integration provides agents with screen-pops displaying caller details and past interactions. These save time for both agent and customer.
6. Onboarding
Training and onboarding need to be swift and effective. A simple contact centre design will allow speedy adoption of the processes, workflows and features offered. Features such as call recording, live monitoring and whisper messaging will continue to provide on-the-job enhancements for continuous improvement.
7. Technical support
Legacy infrastructure demands laborious technical support. A cloud platform allows centralised management without the challenges of distributed hardware. With a well-designed, intuitive portal, in-house IT administrators can manage many of the time-consuming daily tasks.
8. Customer management
Customers value skills-based agents. But, there is always risk that smaller pools of specialist agents can incur higher overheads. The solution is to train and upskill larger pools of agents rapidly to accommodate higher volume and lower cost.
9. ID verification
Regulatory compliance means that the task of identity verification has become an important but time-consuming process for many agents. IVR automation can reduce call handling times, freeing agents for more demanding work.
10. Missed revenue
Agents focused on customer experience will sometimes miss up-sell or cross-sell opportunities. Automation of business processes and workflows will help. For example, automated skills-based routing can filter out the best opportunities and deliver immediate opportunities to support up-selling.
Understanding your contact centre concerns is an important start to building a sound business case for investment in a new system. Find out how to create a business case that qualifies what you need from your next contact centre in Foehn’s buyer’s guide.
