Automating your customer services is a balancing act that requires constant vigilance to reach optimal levels of customer satisfaction. Unfortunately, companies are still using gut instinct and inaccurate information as a determinant factor in deciding what portion of their customer service strategy they’re automating. The result is inefficient service that hemorrhages overhead and customer loyalty. Contact Solutions not only provides an array of automated solutions, it also allows its customer a detailed view that can help them decide where they can be saving money with automation and how it will affect satisfaction. We had a chance to talk with Contact Solutions at this year’s Call Center Week in Las Vegas to learn more about how their process works.

“You might have the CEO of a company say something like I want 20 percent of service automated, but that figure is purely emotional, No one knows where the optimized level and the emotional benchmark not necessarily concrete. “ Paul Logan CEO of the company said.

Contact Solutions’ role in helping optimize automation is not to tell customers whether moves are good or bad, but rather to let them quantify their choices. The company has found that while service operations have historically conferred with customer for feedback on agents, they’ve neglected to do so for automated solutions, the result is a gap in the intelligence that leaves companies ill prepared to determine what focus their IVRs and Voice Rec systems really need.

The company’s director of continuous improvement, Justin Lemrow, has led development of automation enhancement. By harvesting the opinions of customers, Lemrow and his team have determined how to package the information so it can be used to drive customer service satisfaction.

“You have to be able to evaluate the tools in a kit that help your customer accomplish goals. Task and goal completion metric gives a true picture,” Lemrow said. “Again it all comes down to being able to quantify a decision. We’re not judging, we’re trying to help. “

Logan wagers that the misleading information coming to decision-makers is coming from the IT level where a basic understanding of customer service can sometimes be lacking. “A CEO might say ’times are tough we need to automate more’ that’s ok but they need to do that based on responding to a business problem with information. When they rely on IT people who have no interaction on Customer service the info is misleading. When they don’t have that information customer attrition happens and it’s a genie that can’t be put back in the bottle. Make a bad decision and we can show you why it was bad, or make a great one and find out why it was great,” he said.

Automation is a great way for companies to cut cost while continuing to offer top notch customer service. Contact Solutions provides a road map to find the sweet spot were the optimization of cost and service meet.