Castel Blog

Who hasn’t heard this disclosure when calling a business via phone? Keeping in mind that a good percentage of customers will use the phone for ‘first contact’ with a business is key insight into reasons for their repeated or ceased business.

Barry Moltz, author of Getting Small Businesses Unstuck, states, “The most common complaint from customers is not that they are dissatisfied with the product or service they bought, but rather the post sale customer service. This is why 86 percent of customers take their business elsewhere.” Imagine 86% of your small business customer base going to your competitors because your customer service levels post-sale fall short of the expectations of people you’ve already met, made contracts or signed deals with? WOW!

Recording customer calls may help bring to light customer service issues your business is missing each day. We rely upon our esteemed customer service representatives to provide only the best quality service to our customers, but how do we make sure? There are many solutions available to businesses of all sizes, whether your customer service team is made up of just one representative, or thousands. Simply put, ‘checking tape’ can assist your business in determining why customers are staying or leaving you.

Remember, it’s not just what we tell our customers, it’s how we tell them…and who is making sure our tone and delivery is meeting our business’ expectations? Our customers!
 

Most call centers that record or LIVE listen to agent calls do not have the resources to evaluate 100% of those calls. The QA analysis is labor intensive, time consuming and typically results in only an extremely small percentage of calls being reviewed/scored.   For example, the goal for many call centers may be to evaluate 3 to 5 calls per agent per month. Not only is this a small sampling, but makes providing timely feedback to agents very challenging.

As more companies are embracing customer-focused quality (customer delight), a company’s scorecard should focus on key metrics and improving value from customers’ perspective.  The ability to analyze 100% of contact center calls is possible, as well as systematically scoring calls for emotions, words and phrases. The need for a human to score in post-call is no longer necessary. Companies may create a ‘call profile’ to which each call will be measured against and scored. As the scorecard or histogram is available immediately following the call, agents may receive nearly instantaneous feedback from a supervisor. Keep in mind, LIVE analysis may have already been provided to that agent during the call as well!
 

Tracking appreciation on LIVE calls between customer and agent can be tricky, but it is possible. Technology today can monitor and track specific words and phrases, as well as emotions associated with what speakers are truly feeling. As a customer I can say THANK YOU sarcastically, I can say it with hesitation, or I can say it with genuine feeling of contentment. Truly capturing the words and emotions relating to the statement is a great opportunity and proof of best-in-class customer service.

Recently I stumbled across some of these phrases shared by businesses, that I think are pretty catchy:  “From the company ranked #1 in customer loyalty”, “Americas Most Convenient Bank®”. Personally, I feel these phrases lines are descriptive of both of the businesses using them and I’m confident these businesses try to secure confirmation of such when agents are speaking with customers.

As businesses continue to review opportunities to deal better with customer complaints and suggestions, they may also require agents to make a closing statement to customers such as, “…have I addressed all of your questions today?”, or “…did I provide you with quality customer service during your call today?” As customers, let’s be sure we comment honestly, and when appropriate, say THANK YOU!

Barbara Burke (customer care expert http://barbaraburke.com/its-really-pretty-simple/) shares that among other characteristics desirable in a supervisor, agents look for a supervisor who is fair and will not play the ‘favorites’ game. This often comes into play when being reviewed after a customer/agent call.

Complaints of favoritism rise as agents believe their reviews to be more subjective rather than based upon objective analytics, “She likes her better than me” or “They are friends out of work, so of course she scored her higher.” Take agents’ criticism of unfairness added with the need for those agents to change their behavior and now you’re looking at a real challenge!

Many of us personally, can attest to the difficulty in being successful ceasing our own ‘poor’ behaviors. So how are we to help our employees change their behavior while on the phone with customers? Implementing call center solutions such as voice and speech analysis can assist agents toward successful change. Using a solution that listens for specific words and phrases to be said during the course of a call, and having the ability to be notified when those words have been stated, increases the likelihood of successful change and encourages positive behavior!

Overall, solutions like these can reduce business risks and provide reporting to show increased performance due to behavior change. Remember, reviews can include constructive criticism, but don’t forget rewards and positive reinforcements, too.
 

Since installation at Northstar Location Services Buffalo NY contact centers in October, the results were even better than expected. Aaron Castle, COO stated, “We were very aware of the application’s benefits prior to installation, however the immediate effects have transitioned into department-wide improvements, including increased employee morale and decreased customer complaints.” The call centers are now experiencing a 54% decrease in customer calls to their Quality Assurance Team (Resolve It! Professionals). Agents are managing escalated customers much more effectively through the use of the Castel Detect™, as its agent dashboard appears right on the agent’s screen. In addition, unresolved customer issues have decreased as well.  Castle adds, “This application has enabled our agents to better identify escalating issues which equates to more quickly resolving issues, collecting payments more efficiently, reduced call time and stronger agent/customer relationship.”

Miss a payment, maybe two and you may receive a call from your creditor. What if the only number you provided to your creditor at time of application was your cell phone number?

Most of, if not all, collection and predictive system companies are working on some sort of a program or application to identify and scrub for cell phone numbers to eliminate them from predictive and power dialing.  Penalties for using such are severe and enforced based upon recent TCPA rulings affecting creditor collection and bank account receivables businesses.