Call Center Scheduling Featured Article
WFM Helps Contact Centers Balance CX, Cost Control
Customer service is a balancing act.
Businesses want to deliver great customer experience. But they have limited budgets and teams of contact center agents.
The good news is that workforce management software can help contact centers strike the right balance.
“Workforce management incorporates forecasting, scheduling, and other functions into a coordinated effort to optimize your workforce resources,” says Monet Software (News - Alert). “Service and contact center efficiency is enhanced when the right numbers of agents (with the necessary skills) are taking care of your customers every hour, every day.”
WFM helps forecast contact center demand. It does that by looking at historical demand and considering factors like campaigns, day of week, holidays, and seasons that might decrease or increase traffic. It also considers such factors as abandon rates, average handle times for different kinds of calls, and volume variations in different call categories.
The resulting forecasts allow contact centers to set the most efficient and effective agent schedules. And when the right people are in place at the right time in the right number, businesses save money and customers get the attention they deserve.
When businesses save money by eliminating waste, they can use it on more value-added pursuits. That can lead to better business outcomes.
And when customers get the attention they deserve, those customers may buy more and tend to stay longer. That, of course, drives revenues. And lowering customer churn and improving customer retention also adds a lot of value. Because it’s a whole lot more cost effective to keep existing customers than to have to acquire new ones. Indeed, Forrester Research says that it costs five times more to acquire a new customer than to retain a current one.
Edited by Maurice Nagle