Jacada Blog

Insurance Providers: Improving Customer Retention through the Contact Center

 

Discover how insurers improve the customer experience across all channels by eliminating desktop complexity in the contact center and amplifying customer retention, loyalty and growth.  Read our white paper here.

Customer feedback that makes you go hmmm

Just when you think you’ve heard it all you come into work the next day and it happens all over again. Everything from, “my kitchen is on fire what do you think I should do” to, “do you think your battery powered screwdriver is strong enough to be used as a motor on my homemade airplane?” (I would hate to be that guy's insurance agent!) From the ridulous to the sublime, the things we hear in the call center often times make you laugh out loud.

One that I have to share is the guy that called in to tell us our cordless battery powered broom did not deliver air at 60mph as indicated on the box. When the agent asked him how he knew our facts to be wrong the caller gave us the following explanation:

"When I drive down the interstate with my window open and hang my head out, the breeze takes my breath away and I can’t breathe. I took the cordless broom and pointed it directly at my face, turned it on, and I could still breathe, therefore, the broom is not delivering air at 60mph!"

Help a customer service agent out - give them a unified desktop from Jacada so that at least when they log these calls, they can be efficient. 

Shameless promotion

Yes, folks its come to this.  

My latest post is a shameless promotion for Jacada.  No more. No less.  Enjoy this 2-minute explainer video to find out more about Jacada solutions!

Or visit Jacada.com for information on all our award-winning solutions and find out how your company can rapidly implement a desktop solution guaranteed to save you 30 seconds on Average Handle Time. 

Improving Customer Satisfaction: Would Miss Manners Approve?

Regardless of the reasons, it’s interesting that it’s often noteworthy when people aren’t rude. Have you ever had an experience with a customer service representative who stood out—or who made you want to give the company repeat business—because the representative was incredibly helpful and courteous? If such encounters happen frequently, they probably don’t stand out in your mind, but chances are, you notice it when you receive really polite service.

The good news is that people do take note when they’re treated exceptionally well when dealing with companies.  In fact, these customers often write about their customer satisfaction online. Public endorsements for your company? Not a bad goal.

Along with the right customer service desktop solution, a well-placed "please" and "thank you" can go a long way toward increasing customer satisfaction. 

What does commercial awareness mean to CSRs?

It’s widely acknowledged that equipping a Customer Service Representative (CSR) with a 360 degree view of the customer is fundamental to customer satisfaction and retention. This can mean the CSR having fast and easy access to a customer profile, contact history, billing, payments, subscription package, tariffs and their complaints. 

Armed with a solid understanding of the customer, the CSR is in a much better position to make recommendations and improve the customer's relationship with the organisation. But is that enough? 

Call scripting for sales-oriented CSRs is generally not a good idea as it stunts conversational selling and customers can feel they're talking to an automaton rather than a person. However, scripts are more effective when the CSR is processing an order, e.g. setting up a Direct Debit where care is required to meet financial regulatory and corporate guidelines. 

No doubt a 360 degree view adds value, but with the pressure to cross-sell and up-sell, CSR’s need commercial awareness more than ever. There’s tremendous value in knowing the net value of the customer to the organisation. Do they spend very little or a lot? What's the sales conversion rate? Sales-oriented CSRs tell us they found it helps to have statistics on their daily performance, team performance and targets on their desktop, and it also makes more competitive with other teams.

It shouldn’t stop there. There’s value in alerting the CSR to nuggets of information such as outstanding or overdue bills, customers that are close to the end of their contract, abnormally high bills, and in one case I saw, a CSR was auto alerted to the fact that the customer could benefit by being on a better contract.

There are ways to effectively bring pertinent pieces of information to the CSRs attention, rather than have them sift through many sources. Check out Jacada JumpStart for more information. 

Karnail Jita - Pre-Sales Consultant, Jacada Inc.

Great Service = More Sales...Winning! (couldn't resist)

That's according to a new American Express Global Customer Service Barometer. Seven in ten Americans (70%) are willing to spend an average of 13% more with companies they believe provide excellent customer service. 

According to an article by Brendan Read on TMCnet.com, many companies are not getting the math. The study said that 60% of Americans believe businesses have not increased their customer service focus, up from 55% in 2010.  Among this group, 26% think companies are actually paying less attention to service. 

Other stats include: Some 59% of Americans would try a new brand or company for a better service experience. Customers who have a fantastic service experience say friendly representatives (65%) who are ultimately able to solve their concerns (66%) are the most influential. 

Needless to say, good customer service makes a difference! Jacada can help improve your bottom line by streamlining and unifying the agent's desktop.  Automated sign-on and notes, knowledgebase integration, broadcast messaging, quick links, single view of the customer and a unification of multiple applications are just a few of the ways Jacada WorkSpace Unified Desktop can help your company. Contact us for a demo today or click here for more information.

What do customers hate most about contact centers?

Do customers have the most problems with people or processes in contact centers?

Four out of five of the 770 million complaints were about processes customers experienced. Only 20% of customers complained about the people who helped them.

This research (from Customer Contact News) is a good reminder to regularly review the processes customers experience with your contact center. Ask agents for suggestions on how to eliminate one step or combine several. A streamlined process will boost employee and customer satisfaction. Jacada WorkSpace is an award-winning unified desktop that will streamline processes and optimize efficiency.  Contact us today for more details and learn how your contact center can benefit!

Patterns, patterns everywhere

Patterns are everywhere.  You see them in the weather, nature, mathematics, art and science.  And in call centers too (of course). Info will be accumulated and analyzed daily, weekly and monthly and virtually all contact centers capture such data as AHT, FCR and call volumes. These patterns or models for services could be exploited systematically to invest in new or improved services. Many design patterns for customer service experiences are abstract qualitative depictions that create positive outcomes for customers. So, by looking at the info gathered over time, the call center can begin to see customer and call trends.    

Instead of thinking about the total call time as “average handle time,” let’s call it Average Interaction Time, or AIT. The formula for AIT can be defined this way:

AIT = Average Process Time + Average Nurture Time + Average Wrap Up Time

Average Process Time is the time it actually takes for the CSR to navigate systems, find data, update information, calculate payments, research a knowledgebase, etc. Average Nurture Time is the time the CSR actually spends understanding what the customer really needs, recommending additional services, building a relationship, being empathetic – whatever is needed to improve satisfaction and retention.

By reducing Average Process Time and, in many cases, automating or eliminating Wrap Up Time, the CSR has more time to Nurture, yielding happier customers and greater opportunity for the contact center to add value in terms of revenueand customer retention. And, by the way, training costs are greatly reduced. The CSRs are happier, so they stay longer and deliver better customer service. Give AIT a look and then look at your CSRs’ desktops to see if Jacada can help. Observe the complexity they’re forced to deal with on every call. By reducing desktop complexity you can give your CSRs the time they need to deliver real value to your business.

No doubt about it, companies know issue resolution is important— The Customer Contact Council estimates improving issue resolution can save millions of dollars each year and mitigate customer disloyalty by at least 219%.  But recent conversations with several companies suggest that when it comes to identifying first contact resolution (FCR) improvement opportunities, many companies are headed down the wrong path.

Is your company on the right road?  

Check out this article and find out. If you need help, contact Jacada for more information and let us walk you through our solutions. 

Survey says...

In a recent survey, nearly 70% of customer service organizations report they’ve invested in a knowledgebase for their contact center, but that same percentage report that the knowledge base does not contain the information necessary for agents to solve customer issues. For companies with more than 10,000 employees, 43% report that information that contact center agents need to access to resolve customer issues resides in more than 20 systems.

Other stats include:

• Respondents listed case handling time (50%), customer satisfaction (49%), and first contact resolution (FCR)(49%) as the top three challenges
• 30% of participants estimated the impact of knowledge base operational challenges at somewhere between $100,000 to $1 million per year, including 6% who put the cost at $1 to $5 million
• For companies with 251-500 agents, 83 percent cannot find the information in the knowledge base

These stats point to the need for a unified desktop or process optimization solution that streamlines the multiple applications a customer service rep needs. Making a few changes can lead to effective agents and satisfied customers. Check out Jacada's unified desktop solution - Jacada WorkSpace integrates across multiple channels of communication and allows your CSRs to concentrate on the customer interaction rather than the navigation of the contact center desktop applications and complicated systems.