Why Your Customer Service Strategy Should Include Online Chat

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Why your Customer Service Strategy Should Include Online Chat and MessagingYou’ve probably already noticed: There is a major shift towards messaging in the customer service game. While call centers remain important, many brands are moving towards online conversations with customers over SMS, social media, and live chat. Need proof? Look no further than Shopify’s roll-out of Apple Business Chat to over 80,000 merchants. Or, look at WhatsApp Business, recently announcing that the app is now being used by 5 million small business owners.

From SMS to live chats, it’s clear that messaging is becoming an important part of any brand’s sales and customer service strategy. So, what’s all the hype about? Let’s take a look at a few reasons why messaging is becoming increasingly popular and how implementing a chat feature can benefit your business. Continue reading →

Cleaning Up a Customer Relationship Mess: Going Back to Basics

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Cleaning Up a Customer Relationship Mess Going Back to Basics FonoloPeople like shiny new things.

The same cannot always be said about pesky new software updates and releases to the platforms and apps that have become fixtures in both our personal and professional lives.

Good-natured developers and designers may have the best of intentions, arguing that their changes take us to a new, higher state of being where everything and everyone is better.

The problem is that these changes are often unpopular, sometimes to comedic levels – except that for the customer, it is no laughing matter.

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New Survey on Service Level: 80/20 Is Still Going Strong

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New Survey on Service Level 80 20 Is Still Going Strong FonoloWhen it comes to metrics for tracking call center performance, service level is the undeniable king of the hill. It’s a measure of how quickly calls are answered by agents. The most typical target is “80/20” which means 80% of calls are answered within 20 seconds.

Although many industry experts criticise this target – no one even knows exactly how it was originally chosen! — it continues to be the default. A new survey from Call Centre Helper confirms that the reign of 80/20 continues, but there is more to the story.

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Who are you #OnHoldWith? The Top On-Hold Offenders in the Retail Industry

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Who are you #OnHoldWith The Top On-Hold Offenders in the Retail IndustryBuild a deck. Outfit a room. Fill a prescription. Get a birthday card. Purchase a television. Scoop up school supplies. Order a couch. Snap up a subscription. Spend. Spend. Spend. Wash. Rinse. Repeat.

In every facet of a customer’s life, there is at least some encounter with the retail space, an investment of their funds in DIY projects, in personal healthcare, in family activities, in leisure, or in bare necessities. The retail industry is buoyed by this reality and is much obliged to exchange a customer’s hard-earned dollars for goods and services, but oftentimes is ill-equipped to serve the masses of consumers when they things go wrong with a product, service, or delivery. And make no mistake: Things always go wrong.

 

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20/20 Vision: The Best Advice for Contact Centers in 2020 – The Experts Weigh In

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The Best Advice for Contact Centers in 2020 – The Experts Weigh InEvery year we ask: What can contact centers do to bolster their productivity, efficiency, and customer service offerings in the future? How can they survive and thrive in the face of so many variables? Well, it’s that time once again: We invited some of the top contact center experts from Ada, J Arnold and Associates, The Belding Group, Callzilla, Expivia, and other vibrant CX and CS avenues to offer us and you, our dear readership, their best pieces of advice for contact centers in this increasingly complex customer age.

As you read on, you’ll notice some pertinent themes arising for the coming year, some established, and some brand-spanking new: Leveraging AI and self-service in an increasingly competitive contact center space; optimizing training and education for employees; keeping the ‘human’ element of customer service in mind when incorporating new channels; being strategic with automation; and more. This year’s soundbites are rich with well-researched insights that a) act as a warning; and b) can help your contact center win.

 

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Industry Voices on Avaya’s Next Move

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Industry Voices on Avaya's Next Move via Fonolo

It was hard to turn anywhere last week and not see news or commentary about Avaya. Their CEO announced that Avaya is in “advanced discussions with multiple parties” for a “strategic transaction” and that the process will be concluded in 30 days. As the behemoth of the call center industry, with $3B in revenue and 150,000 customers, whatever this move will be, it will have broad repercussions. We wrote about it last week.

While we wait for the shoe to drop, here’s a quick summary of comments from around the industry.

 

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Four Strategies to Help Your Team Resolve Customer Service Complaints Quickly

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Four Strategies to Help Your Team Resolve Customer Service Complaints QuicklyWant to order pizza for dinner? It will be at your door in 30 minutes. Looking for a date? An app can help you find that special someone. Need some work done around the house? You can summon a handyman that same day. In today’s world, we don’t have to wait too long for just about anything.

Today’s consumer doesn’t just want same-day delivery, they want same-day resolution to any inquiry or complaint they make with a company. According to a report by HubSpot, consumers want service that is both fast and personalized. This means that customer service teams and call center agents are tasked with rapidly resolving tickets without letting the quality of their service drop.

Here are a few strategies that can be implemented to ensure that customers experience a resolution that is both quick and satisfactory.

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Four Metrics that your Utility Contact Center Needs to Track

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Four Metrics that your Utility Contact Center Needs to Track Following widespread industry deregulation, the energy and utilities sector has become increasingly competitive.  With more and more choices available to customers, providing quality customer service is more critical than ever. Customer loyalty is no longer guaranteed, with negative experiences driving ratepayers to the competition: 43% of utility customers who have a negative experience are still members after a year, compared to 74% of those who’ve had a positive experience. It’s a perfect storm of high consumer expectations, a host of new challenger brands, and online price comparison sites.

In this new era, customer service has become the battleground for organizations in the utilities sector. Those that win on this front are retaining customers and growing revenue. Those who lose are losing big. For example, in 2018, British Gas announced the loss of 340,000 customers and a 20% drop in profits.

Those looking to regain some ground through their customer service offering must first equip themselves with the data necessary to make informed decisions. What metrics should you measure, though? Here are the four key performance indicators (KPIs) your call center must be tracking.
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Avaya Endgame?

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Avaya's Wild Ride through Bankruptcy

It’s been known for months that industry behemoth Avaya was interested in finding a buyer. Private equity suitors include Apollo, Pemira, and Searchlight (according to this Bloomberg report). There is also interest from Mitel, first reported in April and then reported again – more definitively – this week. (We wrote about an Avaya-Mitel tie-up here: Ghost of Nortel Comes Home.)

During last week’s earnings call, CEO Jim Chirico said that there would be a decision about the company’s fate in 30 days. That’s the strongest indication yet that we’re truly in the “endgame” for Avaya. It’s fair to say the whole industry is on the edge of its seat right now.

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3 Ways to Prepare Your Retail Contact Center for the Holiday Rush

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3 Ways to Prepare Your Retail Contact Center for the Holiday RushHere’s a sad (but true) story: The dog days of summer are almost at an end. As customers and clientele begin to re-emerge from their sun-soaked vacations, and step firmly back into reality and back-to-school or back-to-work shopping, contact centers in the retail industry and beyond will no doubt see a sharp influx in customer inquiries, emails, messages, and phone calls. Their volume will rise on every channel, and callers will be expecting exquisite and timely customer service regardless of the demands of the busy season. And, too, the numbers don’t lie: Last year, Black Friday yielded over $6 billion online, with Cyber Monday surpassing that number at $7.8 billion. (To say that customers are active during these shopping days is a gross understatement.) As we mentioned in a recent article, “calls to businesses rose more than 375% over the past two holiday seasons.” Continue reading →

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