Tag Archives: crisis management

How To Provide Exceptional Customer Service Throughout The Holiday Season

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How to Provide Exceptional Customer Service Throughout a Holiday SeasonIt’s the most wonderful time of the year! For most retail companies, the fourth quarter of the year is the busiest and most crucial part of the year for business. This can put a lot of pressure on customer service workers who are not only dealing with a higher volume of tickets but also, potentially, a more stressed shopper. 

It’s important for retail companies to have plans and strategies in place when heading into the holiday season to ensure that customer service workers have the tools and resources they need to maintain a high level of customer satisfaction despite the influx of calls, chats, and emails from consumers looking for the perfect holiday gift (often, at the last minute!). 

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How to Prepare Your Call Center for Seasonal Call Spikes: Utilities [Guide]

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How to Prepare Your Call Center for Seasonal Spikes: UtilitiesIt’s no secret that once upon a time, utility companies could get away with less than stellar customer service. Nowadays, increased competition means that customers have more alternatives than ever before, and are willing to switch providers if they are unhappy. Even utility companies that operate in a de facto monopoly have regulators mandating certain customer service levels with corresponding CSAT scores.

While utility companies can certainly do their best to control customer service metrics like CSAT, they do not control the weather. Hot or cold, call centers in the utilities industry experience drastic spikes in call volume due to seasonal weather changes and unforeseen weather events. A widespread outage caused by a winter storm or a heatwave can completely overwhelm your organization’s customer service department and its phone lines.

While it would be easier to neglect the customer experience in favor of the “just get it done” mentality that stems from such a drastic increase in call volume, it’s important that your call center aims to please, especially during the busiest seasons of the year. After all, this is how customer relationships are made or broken.

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How Call Centers Can Manage a Brand Crisis

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How Call Centers can Manage Brand CrisisThink a crisis will never happen to your brand? Think again.

2018 proved that reputation-damaging blunders are more prevalent than ever, their devastating effects amplified by the related complaints and commentary buzzing on social media. From Hawaii’s fake missile crisis to the death of a French bulldog aboard a United Airlines flight, many organizations have recently found themselves on the defensive, doing their best to mute negative conversations surrounding their brands. As Ashley McCown, president of PR firm Solomon McCown & Company, notes, “The longer the public has to wait for a response from a company or individual after a crisis, the harder it is to convince it that you’re taking the issue seriously.”

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