Call Recording Featured Article

Sometime in the last decade, we have become a nation of text messengers. While teenagers may have ushered in the trend, nearly all generations today report sending at least a few text messages. While the trend may have started for personal communications, text is now also a channel of choice for customers interacting with businesses. A recent study conducted by Harris Poll and commissioned by OneReach found that over 60 percent of customers reported they would rather text than call a business for support. There’s a good reason for this: rather than waiting on hold and making small talk with an agent, customers can get faster, more efficient responses to their questions.

From a business perspective, text is also very desirable (or should be). Agents can carry out multiple transactions at a time, and they can handle many more customer queries per hour via text than live telephone support. With a great messaging solution, contact centers can save a considerable amount of time and money, according to a recent article by OneReach CEO Rich Weborg.

“In our experience, texting has been shown to reduce call volume by 40 percent and decrease phone costs from $6 to $20 per call to $2 to $5 per interaction per text chat,” he wrote. “By offering the option to pivot to text messaging within your call center’s IVR, your company can deflect calls to a less costly channel, reduce wait times and improve self-service options. In fact, over 40 percent of customers would prefer to text with an agent than wait on hold.”

While telephone calls are unpredictable – long-winded talkers or people with difficult to understand foreign accents can make calls run on -- text messaging is easier to manage and script, which makes it an ideal option for any company looking to get better control of its workforce optimization. Interactions (News - Alert) are more predictable, and they can even be guided by scripts without making the responses seem robotic (unlike in telephone calls). This cuts down on typing time, and ensures better compliance with the brand identity, according to Weborg.

“Canned responses are answered recorded ahead of time that can help agents respond more quickly and make sure that answers provide the appropriate information,” wrote Weborg. “Canned responses can also be used to help train agents on how they should answer. Your contact center can also use artificial intelligence to auto select an appropriate response based on a customer query.”

This assumption, of course, is based on a company having an SMS or text channel that is formal, integrated into the rest of the contact center’s channels and fully supported by the organization. Expecting agents to do text messaging ad-hoc with a hastily built informal system is simply asking for trouble. Contact centers should be using a text solution that can help customers escalate to other channels – particularly live voice – if they run into trouble and need more intensive help. It’s also critical to choose a solution that logs chat sessions and leaves them available for quality monitoring. Done properly, however, text messaging can greatly benefit both customers and the support organization.

“By interacting with customers and employees on a channel that’s proven to improve collaboration, reduce costs and get results, companies can ensure that they’re getting the most out of their communication technologies,” wrote Weborg.