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Today, the majority of the companies are hiring call centre services to outsource their customer services. With the growth of technology, the companies are on a never-ending hunt for better services from their outsourced firms. But how does a firm check whether its 3rd party call centre outsourcer is delivering? The customers are very demanding. They want a company's representative to be available 24/7 by any means of communication. Moreover, the companies expect their BPO partners to provide quality, quick and courteous service to all its customers. With the facilities of email and internet available to nearly all customers, the job of a call centre agent has become quite a challenge. It has not only made inbound calls important, but the significance of outbound call centres has also multiplied because of the prevalent fierce competition amongst the existing firms.

As the agents are the key components of a call centre, their performance is always under the radar. In order to ensure their quality and efficiency, the call centre outsourcer must provide them with necessary training in the fields of order-taking, processing, responding to enquiries and troubleshooting. A help desk solution should also be maintained to cater to customers specific needs. The quest for survival is heating up as the competition in this industry gets fiercer making the task of an inbound or outbound call centre more important than ever before. 

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There is always going to be hundreds of challenges when you are managing a busy call centre. From HR to technical capabilities such as software integrations. Where do you start? In this article we are going to cover three problems that are constantly coming up. These issues need to be addressed no matter if you are a 24/7 call centre outsourcer and are providing inbound and outbound call handling services or an in-house call centre within an SME or a global conglomerate.

Building success is not that easy; it takes time to identify the processes that works for your call centre. We all know that cultures can be different from call centre to call centre so it is important that you align you strategies with your contact centre’s core goals. Ask yourself – where do you want to be in 3 years’ time and what do you need to do to get there?

The first issue for a call centre is: High staff turnover. This issue is very important as you can appreciate the staff is your biggest asset especially in this industry. It is important to invest in your staff by incorporating a retention programme and career plan.

The second problem is: poor first call resolution. The first step to achieve customer satisfaction is successful first call resolution. Make sure you can help that customer right there & now. Be prepared by thinking outside the box and what the customer might ask you.

The third issue is technology integration: As technology is moving forward so must we. It is important to have the right tools in place in order to provide multi-channel services and support. Be careful though, as agents often find it hard to tackle different software – make sure you have a good training programme in place to improve agents’ efficiency and knowledge.

In today’s competitive environment more and more call centres need to start thinking about creating a more sales-focused culture. As the call centres are more focused on customer service it normally does not generate any profit. So how can an inbound call centre start generate money? The answer is – start up-selling! By asking the customers if they are interested in other services or products, a call centre can become a cash cow. 

To turn agents from a customer service mind-set to a more sales-focused role will require a lot of training and product knowledge investments and support, as well as strong commitment and willingness to change and learn from the agents themselves. 

It is important to set KPIs and targets in order to measure the success and update agents on their performance on a regular basis. On top of this, it is absolutely crucial to reward your call centre agents by incorporating a reward programme and competitions to recognise the top performers.

Do you want to improve customer satisfaction and get your call centre to the top? By incorporating 5 key elements into your existing strategy will help improving your call centre operations and make your customers happy 24/7. 

First step to an improved first call resolution is that you work very closely with your agents in order to understand why customers are calling and what kind of support they need. When you have achieved that, only then you can start optimising your operational processes with these 5 tips below:- 

1. Start measuring your performance and service level

2. Improving your listening skills 

3. Invest in agents’ product knowledge and an on-going training

4. Identifying processes that work for you and stop fixing ‘broken’ processes

5. Enhancing internal communications – break organisational silos

Are you looking to set up a call centre and have your contact centre open 24/7/365? Then, we have the perfect solution for your needs! We are a UK based contact centre and we have been operating for more than 10 years helping our clients to handle their important calls; be it inbound or outbound calls. Our staff is trained to deal with all kinds of calls and our contact centre thrives on a friendly and team-focussed culture where colleagues work together assisting and encouraging each other. Give us a call today 0800 088 7878 or click here to request a quote.

To run a successful call handling operation takes a lot of efforts and planning. A good starting point is to set and communicate 3 important goals, establish performance targets and ensure your teams know how to achieve and exceed these targets.

Another important aspect of efficient call handling is managing peak call periods. It is absolutely crucial to have the right amount of staff answering calls during these periods and this can be easily calculated by looking at the callers’ previous behaviour statistics. On top of this, call centre agents should be trained to answer all sorts of calls in order to reduce queues which can so easily cause customer frustration.

We can all agree that consumers today are more demanding than a decade ago. They know exactly what they want and get it when they want it. So, is customer service still important when it comes to brand loyalty? Do they care about customer experience if they absolutely love the product and will always get that product?  According to the Institute of Customer Service (ICS) UK companies fear losing 10% of their customer base over the coming years, at a cost of almost two and quarter billion pounds.

Looking at these predicted numbers we can all agree that we need to invest in contact centres if we want to come out alive. What companies also must consider is trends in customer services and the behaviour of the consumer. Looking at future trends, Customer Contact Association (CCA) have recently published a study in which they point out that the consumers will increasingly use the social channels in order to make complaints but they will continue call to make a purchase.  So, a good advice would be, start investing in call centres – it seems that they are going to boost your bottom line.

Want an extra income? Then read on! 

We are looking for retained workers which we will compensate with a retained salary and annual bonus, as well as with enhanced hourly rate for any training and activations. All agents will receive the enhanced hourly rate plus the additional hour annual bonus, for every hour worked or trained.

Interested? Please apply by emailing recruitment@ansaback.co.uk

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