Category: Customer Experience

Agent engagement has always been a critical ingredient for customer satisfaction.
Without it, efficiency, productivity, and customer satisfaction are almost guaranteed to fall. Contact centers have been learning this the hard way over the last decade.
So why is agent engagement more important now for 2022 than ever before? The answer is simple: customers have higher expectations for businesses, now more than ever.
They want:

Immediate service with shorter customer interactions;
greater empathy;
knowledgeable agents; and
flexible communication channels.

Our latest report, Contact Center Trends 2022, covers this important topic as our workforce faces significant labor shortages. Download the full report for free, or keep reading for a taste of what you can expect for the contact center industry next year!

READ THE FULL GUIDE:
Contact Center Trends 2022
(It’s 100% free, we promise.)

What is agent engagement?
Here’s how you can recognize an engaged contact center agent. The more behaviors they exhibit on this list, the more engaged they likely are:

Efficient and diligent.
Positive and motivated in their work.
Eager to improve and/or expand their skills.
Embraces the company’s mission, vision, and values.

Keeping agents engaged will prove essential for contact center management in 2022. We’ll explore this more in the next section…

What does an engaged contact center agent look like? They’re efficient, happy, eager to improve, and knowledgeable about your company’s mission. #ContactCenterTrends2022 #AgentEngagement #CustomerServiceLifeClick To Tweet

Why is agent engagement critical for 2022?
Experts predict the continuation of some 2021 contact center trends and the emergence of new contact center trends for 2022. Agent engagement will be vital in addressing those trends, making it crucial for contact centers going into 2022.
5 Important Strategies for Agent Engagement in 2021
Trend #1: Agent attrition is worse than ever.
Agent attrition in 2020 was worsening; that contact center trend continued into 2021 and will continue in 2022. Turnover has plagued contact centers for a long time. One of your main jobs as a contact center leader is to recognize an engaged call center agent from an unengaged one.
The consequences of overlooking disengaged agents? Plentiful:

Lost employees to competitors.
Lower contact center morale.
Increased costs with training and recruitment.

Around 90% of BPO leaders agreed that agent attrition stagnated or worsened in 2021. Agent engagement will be crucial in managing high call center turnover rates.
Trend #2: Customer support is now a main revenue driver.
The most successful companies adopted the Product-Led Growth (PLG) strategy, an approach where all department activities – including sales, marketing, and customer support – are driven by the customer’s perceived value of their offering. This is why freemium products are on the rise; customers want to experience the product before committing their hard-earned dollars.
According to Microsoft, 90% of Americans use customer service as a factor in deciding whether or not to do business with a company. Contact center agents are perfectly positioned to provide exceptional service experiences to their freemium users. This means customer agents are naturally adopting more of a sales role without the same commission of a sales representative. Without proper incentives to drive your customer support team, your business risks its most vital source of revenue.

FACT:
90% of Americans use customer service as a factor in deciding whether or not to do business with a company. – Microsoft

How companies can promote agent engagement in 2022.
So we know that agent engagement is important, but how can we as contact center leaders promote it? Here are some options.
Embrace remote work permanently.
COVID-19 taught us that remote work is here to stay. This is true for all industries, including the contact center industry. Many BPOs have zero or almost no office space, with only 10% of call centers using only in-office work environments.
Most call centers report 10-40% of their agents working remotely, reinforcing the fact that while brick-and-mortar centers will remain, contact center leaders must continue to embrace a balance with hybrid call centers.

DID YOU KNOW?
“A May survey of 1,000 U.S. adults showed that 39% would consider quitting if their employers weren’t flexible about remote work.” – Bloomberg Wealth

Improved work environments.
You can’t expect agents to stay satisfied with the archaic, grey cubicles from the last couple of decades. To keep agents engaged, contact centers must consider the work environment they provide their employees – whether they’re working from the office or from home – and ensure their setup helps them stay motivated, focused, and productive.
Improvements will look different for each contact center. Collecting feedback from your agents regularly will give you insights on how to best serve their needs. Here are some ideas to get you started:

Physical workspace – consider lighting, noise levels, and spacing between workstations so agents can work without significant distractions. For remote workers, consider providing a stipend so they can optimize their workspace according to their needs.

Benefits and perks – providing competitive compensation and perks can help improve your agents’ quality of life outside of work, which will help them bring their best selves to work.

Team culture – ensure your agents feel supported and heard by creating opportunities for touchpoints and feedback. Building a culture based in empathy and compassion will help them emulate the same values towards your customers.

Embrace new technology.
We know that 2022 will continue the shift from traditional customer support roles to a mix of customer support and sales in one role. That and an increased standard for customer satisfaction will require companies to give their agents more support.
Contact centers can offer that support with cloud-based technology – Fonolo’s Voice Call-Back technology is a great example: this simple, powerful tool allows customers to bypass hold-time without losing their place in line. This helps take the load off your agents, so they don’t need to worry about frustrated customers and long queues.
Multichannel options will also be huge, as customers are looking for a seamless experience, no matter what platform they contact you through. Solutions like Visual IVR can help bridge your digital channels to the voice channel without risking customer abandonment.

READ THE FULL GUIDE:
Contact Center Trends 2022
(It’s 100% free, we promise.)
The post Blog first appeared on Fonolo.

No one is going to steal it. Not if it’s actually a big idea.

One thing that big ideas have in common is that they’re almost impossible to give away.

You could have bought Amazon stock for lunch money, been an early backer of Acumen, financed part of Spike Lee’s first movie, had front row seats to Hamilton, bought BTC for $2… you get the idea. Even insiders usually take cash instead of stock options. And early customers almost never race out to build a competitor.

When big ideas show up, almost no one sees what’s possible. All they notice is that change is risky and new stuff might not work.

Don’t worry so much about someone stealing your ideas. In fact, it’s probably worth working harder to get people imagining that they might.

“Will this be on the test?” is a question invented by industrialists. It’s the cornerstone of traditional schooling at scale, because it is such an effective way to indoctrinate kids to become cogs in the system.

And it’s almost an accident that we manage to make progress, because we’ve spent so much time encouraging citizens to maintain the status quo:

Follow vs. lead

Copy vs. innovate

Authority vs. responsibility

Compete vs. cooperate

Comply vs. invent

Answer vs. ask

Correct vs. possible

Fast-growing organizations and bold leaders want to hire people who have the second skill in the table above. And yet we’re working overtime to encourage the first.

What’s on your transcript?

The UK’s ongoing supply chain crisis, with both Brexit and COVID related issues, has resulted in an extremely unwelcome vortex of challenges for the retail sector. This has spared unsurprising concern from consumers and suppliers alike. Warnings of disruption from sector leaders at various points across the supply chain, whether from retailers or shipping executives, has been met by consumer angst and has resulted in a call to action for many in the run-up to…
The post Supply chain crisis: no Christmas presents this year? appeared first on Customer Experience Magazine.

It feels odd to hear the flight attendants remind us to put on our own mask before helping others. That’s backward, isn’t it?

The theory is that if you can’t breathe, it’s probable that you’re going to have a hard time lending a hand.

In our daily lives, the oxygen mask might be metaphorical, and the insecurity/threat might be invented, but it still feels real.

It’s worth remembering that the next time someone doesn’t act in a way you expect. It might be that they’re having a little trouble on their own, trouble you might not even be aware of.

Contact centers have faced some serious ups and downs in the past few years. Just a year ago, we made some bold predictions around the direction this industry would take – and now, the results are in!
While customer empathy, hybrid work, and improved contact center technology were definitely hot topics, there were some 2021 trends we didn’t see coming – namely the shortened customer journey, customer demand for immediate support, and of course, the Great Resignation!
Find out how we scored in our latest resource, Contact Center Trends 2022. As for the upcoming year, take a sneak peek at our predictions below:

READ THE FULL GUIDE:
Contact Center Trends 2022
(It’s 100% free, we promise.)

Trend #1: Customer intelligence.
As a call center leader, you likely have a host of data sitting in your system waiting to be leveraged. From performance metrics to customer feedback, contact centers have a wealth of intelligence at their fingertips to inform their processes, operations, and strategies.
So why are we only now using customer intelligence efficiently? Customers today want information at the same speed as their social media communications — instant. We argue that these modern customer expectations force contact centers to focus on daily interactions over data analysis.
Fortunately, there are a few trends on the horizon that may free up contact centers from the daily grind. Artificial Intelligence (AI) is now advanced enough to help crunch the data and make predictions and optimizations in a fraction of the time. What’s more, it can assist agents by automating the tedious parts of their work, allowing them to focus on building quality customer interactions.
Trend #2: Remote contact centers.
Many call centers adopted a hybrid work model after the COVID-19 pandemic. Only 10% of contact center executives reported no remote work options. Most contact centers already have 10-40% of their agents working from home, with relatively flexible working arrangements.
2022 will see the rise of completely virtual-based contact centers. And, many businesses will continue to hire third parties to manage their agents. Plus, implementing remote call center software is easier than ever before, The biggest challenge that will come with this trend lies in maintaining and investing in strong security protocols.
Trend #3: Improved work environments.
With looming headlines of the labor shortage, contact centers must invest time and money into agent engagement to reduce agent attrition and attract new talent. One way to do this is to invest in their work environment.
Every contact center is different, and therefore their needs will be as well. Consider the agent experience and focus on addressing pain points. For instance, offering competitive pay and benefits, flexible shifts, and creating workspaces that support focus and productivity.
Monitor the impact of your changes by measuring KPIs such as agent attrition and CSat. Happy agents result in happy customers!
Want to see more trend predictions for 2022? Download our latest report, Contact Center Trends 2022.

READ THE FULL GUIDE:
Contact Center Trends 2022
(It’s 100% free, we promise.)
The post Blog first appeared on Fonolo.

CXM is delighted to announce that we will be hosting a webinar in partnership with Capita, a consulting, transformation, and digital services business. The main topic is the urgent need to simplify digital self-service and create proactive strategies that sustain customer confidence in your business. On November 24 at 11 AM, UK time, you will have…
The post CXM and Capita are hosting a webinar about the need to simplify digital self-service appeared first on Customer Experience Magazine.

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We generally adopt a posture of optimism or pessimism as a response (or reaction) to external events. We see how things are unfolding and make a decision about what to expect. We feel like we need to justify our response based on the facts on the ground.

But that doesn’t actually explain why different people, similarly informed, might adopt an optimistic mood or a pessimistic one.

In fact, that mood is a choice. And it’s one that determines how we’ll behave.

Optimism is a tool that permits us to solve problems more effectively. If used wisely, it brings enthusiasm, inspiration and hope to projects that benefit from them.

[And pessimism is a tool as well–it can help you with budgeting, scheduling and other projects. If it works for you, that’s great. Choose your tools wisely.]

As a universal default, either mood will certainly lead to misguided energy and poor decisions. But if we can be thoughtful about optimism as a tactic, the focus and energy it brings can solve problems that others might simply walk away from.

Our pessimism might not be an accurate diagnosis of the past. It might simply be a way we’re using to produce a future we’re not happy with.

Some of my most recent conversations with executives have revealed that ESG initiatives are among their top priorities. In this two-part series for Customer Experience Magazine, I’m exploring the role experience management leaders can play in bringing ESG strategies to life. Part one saw me explore the foundations of experience as the essence of a…
The post Four reasons why experience should be the core of any ESG strategy (part 2) appeared first on Customer Experience Magazine.