Call Center Management Featured Article
Should You Advise Your Customers of the "Best Time to Call"?
When it comes to providing the best possible customer support, not all times of day are equal. Depending on your business, there will be times of day, days of week and times of the month when enormous call volume prevents you from offering a great customer experience. It doesn’t matter how well trained your agents are, how terrific your contact center software, or how skilled the manager is: long hold times and rushed agents will diminish the quality of the experience.
Customers are more demanding today in general. Many people want to be served quickly and accurately no matter when they choose to call. But not all customers are like this: they would actually prefer to put their interactions off until a time when they’re more likely to get great service. Experiments in evening out driver visits to departments of motor vehicles (DMV) around the country have worked well: by publishing their peak hours and days of the week, and noting the “quieter” times, many DMVs have been able to spread volume out more evenly and reduce long lines. Perhaps it’s time for contact centers to follow the example, according to a recent blog post by Monet Software (News - Alert) CEO Chuck Ciarlo.
“Should you share [information about low-volume calling times] with callers that ask? Or offer a few recommendations on the company website or Facebook (News - Alert) page? Why not? By doing so you're not only lightening the workload at peak calling time, you're also improving the likelihood that every call receives the personal attention and positive experience it deserves,” wrote Ciarlo.
There are a number of ways to make information about your low-volume contact center periods. You can put the information on your Web site, or you can include it in the IVR greeting that customers are met with. Publish it on your social media pages, and ensure that it’s in the auto-text that greets customers before they initiate a chat session. You can even pop it to customers who attempt to get service via your mobile app.
It’s also a good idea to use automated messages to help customers understand what they will need to have a successful call or contact outcome, according to Ciarlo.
“Let them know what information you'll likely need for them, so they won't have to start searching for it after the call is initiated,” he wrote.
While it may not seem like it – particularly with your more aggressive and demanding customers – most people are looking for a way to avoid annoyance and conflict when they seek customer care, and will be happy to avoid an aggravating experience, according to Ciarlo.
“Yes, the public is more demanding now,” he wrote. “They want what they want when they want it. But not everyone is like that, and most will appreciate any help that you are willing to provide.”
Your agents, too, will appreciate your efforts to reduce peaks and troughs and make their days more predictable and less alternately stressful/boring.
Edited by Alicia Young