As the economy slows and companies are finally being
forced to do what they should have been doing all
along -- pay attention to their customers -- it seems
only appropriate to address those scenarios that have
the most potential to make customers reluctant to
contact a customer support center. This is an
oft-addressed topic in this magazine, but I know from
speaking to companies with contact centers, not to
mention from my own personal experiences as a
customer, that many companies still haven't realized
the power and potential positive impact on the bottom
line that improving customer interaction functions
represents. In short, many companies are still driving
their customers away.
Your customer has a question to pose to your
customer service department. Which of the following
scenarios are your customers likely to encounter?
IVR Headaches
Because this month's issue of this magazine is
dedicated to voice technologies, let's start with what
is quite possibly a customer's biggest headache. IVR
(interactive voice technology) is a wonderful tool
when used properly. In theory, IVRs exist to route
your call to the appropriate department in the
fastest, most convenient way...it should be a win-win
situation: the agent receives the calls he or she is
educated to answer, and the customer need not explain
a problem many times over.
In the earliest days of IVRs, however, and even
today, many people didn't understand that properly
setting up and administering an IVR is a fantastically
complicated process that requires considerable skill.
A poorly set up menu tree of options in your IVR
system can send your customers screaming for your
competition.
You may have once or twice received an e-mail
circulated from your friends and colleagues in which
the e-mail instructs you to call the toll-free number
of a financial services firm. The recorded voice
progresses through the menu choices ("Press one for
investments, press two for mortgages") until it
concludes with, "Press seven if you would like to hear
a duck quack." If you press the seven key, sure
enough, you hear a duck quack.
If only all IVR menus had a sense of humor.
However, as you probably already know, many don't.
What may seem like a logical flow to someone who knows
your company, may be hopelessly confusing to a caller
who doesn't know how your company is organized. While
you may call your human resources department "employee
relations," an unwitting caller may not understand
this and will quickly zero out to an operator, still
searching for the human resources department. If most
of your callers zero out of your IVR, you are not only
spending more money than necessary (on live human
contact), you're frustrating potential customers to
the point where they may give up.
Many of the editors at TMC have shared the opinion
that now and again, they will encounter an IVR menu
tree that confuses and frustrates them, and requires
them to finally give up. Here we are...professional
telecommunications technology editors, and even we
encounter systems that confound us. If you're
confusing the professionals, what are you doing to
your everyday callers?
Many companies have begun to figure out how
important it is for them to implement good IVR systems
to better encourage self-service. Self-service, we
know, is much cheaper than human interaction, and
studies indicate that many customers actually prefer
it.
Many more companies are opting for speech
recognition technologies to replace or enhance the
standard touch-tone IVR menu. Advanced speech
technologies are growing fast and expanding to fit
customers' needs.
Although our TMC offices are in Connecticut, we are
just a few miles from the New York State border, where
it is now illegal to use a handheld cellular phone
while driving. It can be expected that many more
states will follow New York's example. Have you ever
tried to interact with a touch-tone IVR while driving?
Most companies that use customer account numbers for
some bizarre reason insist that the numbers be
excruciatingly long (for example, does the electric
company really have tens of billions of customers, and
if not, why do they require us to use 11-digit account
numbers?)
Speech technologies, in their simplest form,
recognize simple commands of the human voice ("Press
or say 'one'"). If you have decided to implement
speech recognition into your IVR system, this
simplistic form of the technology may be all your
contact center requires.
Advanced speech technologies include natural
language processing, which recognizes pertinent
information from callers who speak in normal phrases.
("I would like to buy a roundtrip ticket to fly from
Cleveland to Miami on October 27th, please.") These
more advanced technologies are being used by airlines
and financial firms, most notably, to accommodate the
heavy load of customer requests they receive on a
daily basis.
In any case, I know the next few years will bring
about enormous growth in the area of advanced speech
technologies, and I, for one, look forward to it,
particularly if it can reduce the anxiety involved in
making a simple inquiry to my utility companies.
The Self-Service Trap
Have you ever been desperate to talk to a
knowledgeable human being when you had a query? It
would be hard to find anyone who hasn't. Self-service
is a wonderful concept but, sometimes, it can't answer
your question. Nor can a chatterbot, a list of FAQs, a
customer chat group or a user's manual.
Many companies assume their self-service options
are so perfect, no one will ever need to speak to a
human. This assumption is almost as nave as
theorizing that the world is flat. No matter how
clever a company thinks it is, it can never anticipate
all potential customer needs. It must consider that
customers are humans, and humans get confused,
misunderstand, fail to read directions and are
sometimes just too lazy to seek the answers
themselves. Imperfect as they are, they are still
customers, and you can't afford to lose them to a
competitor because you couldn't answer their
questions.
But not only is it important for an agent to be
available, it's important that the agent who picks up
the query is informed, helpful and can get the
question answered. In other words, avoid the following
scenario.
The Robot Agent
Have you ever made a call to a contact center, only to
have your call picked up by one of these agents? This
is the agent who reads from a cue card, and if your
question deviates from what he or she has been trained
to deal with, you begin receiving irrelevant answers
that don't address your question. Not only can this
agent not answer your question, he or she has no idea
who can. You even begin to suspect that the agent does
not even know what the company he or she represents
sells. Even worse, the agent becomes rude when you
become exasperated at the lack of progress on your
query.
Many companies have still not recognized the
importance of thorough agent training via both
classroom and simulation, as well as some of today's
Web-delivered training modeling software, which allows
the agent to progress at his or her own pace during
slow periods in the contact center.
Chances are good that you have spoken to both bad
agents and good agents. If you have, you'll know that
it is the agent's skill, attitude and demeanor that
can lead you to hang up angrily or conclude your
customer service experience with a warm, fuzzy
feeling. A bad agent is a liability to your company...a
good agent is the most valuable asset your call
contact can possess.
May I Have Your Account Number?
We've all been here before, many times. This is the
contact center that has many databases of your
information. Unfortunately, none of these databases
communicate with each other, and if you have multiple
accounts or have bought different products from the
company, you exist as nine different people according
to the company. Billing? You'll have to be transferred
to accounts payable. Did you receive my payment? Oh,
sorry...that's accounts receivable. Where is my
shipment? I'm sorry, that department is at lunch right
now, and they're the only ones who can answer your
question.
This type of contact center usually asks you to
enter or repeat your account number a half-dozen
times, and then finishes up by disconnecting you after
you've worked your way almost to the end of their
circuitous procedures. For this reason, database and
knowledge management technologies are hot properties
right now. What many companies that store their data
in separate silos still don't understand, is that an
integrated database structure will benefit the company
as much as the customer. While the wise contact
centers have begun leaning toward the "one and done"
philosophy of solving the customer's queries on the
first call, the clueless contact centers that require
six different agents to take care of a routine call is
spending many more times the resources on each
customer, essentially becoming a giant,
customer-churning call center.
Let Reason Prevail
This magazine has often told you that if you're not
devoting all the attention possible to improving your
contact center's CRM, your business is in trouble.
Even more important, the current economic downturn
means that there are more players scrambling for a
decreasing pool of customers. More than ever,
customers are able to pick and choose among products
and services from a variety of companies. This means
that your customer service must be absolutely stellar...no
excuses.
Practical wisdom is what is required to come out on
top of the service heap in a flattening economy, and
practical wisdom is what this magazine aims to supply
you with. Good luck in making your call center one you
would want to contact.
Sincerely,
Rich Tehrani
Group Publisher
Group Editor-in-Chief
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