As the end of 2019 begins its approach, many contact center owners and managers may be wondering how to maintain their facility’s success through the fall and early winter. These months are traditionally a time of slower sales and service numbers, with the holidays making a brief exception in the otherwise monotonous crawl of the cold weather months. If you don’t want your facility to be one of those that falls victim to this slow-down, follow these tips for maintaining ...

Looking for quality assurance tips to make your call center the best it can be? Look no further than these ten tips, based on the thoughts and experiences of call center industry leaders: Know Which Metrics You Value A great starting point for great quality assurance efforts is understanding the metrics that matter most to your contact center. This is a question to which the answer will vary from facility to facility, so meet with your management team members to determine w...

Social media customer service is the evolution of modern contact center business. If you don’t think so, just browse your newsfeed or timeline on your favorite social media platform and take note of just how many exchanges are happening between everyday users and company customer service representatives each day. It seems that any time someone has a problem or concern, they can quickly reach out to their favorite companies via social media. This is not a trend that your ca...

How many times have you called a contact center or a customer service line only to be met with long periods of silence? Whether it’s the time before you’re connected to a live agent or periods between active conversation with your customer service representative, these stretches of silence are referred to as dead air time - and they can be deadly to a contact center and the company they represent. If you’re like most call centers, you’re always on the hunt for ways t...

Every few weeks, it seems there is another major data breach in the news. Journalists love these stories; with so many people trusting major companies with their sensitive information and having so much as stake when this information is compromised, it makes for hot news when these stories break. The average person on the street is less thrilled to hear this news, though. Safeguarding consumer data security should be a top priority for any company in the modern day. This esp...

The way you speak to your customers is the backbone of how your business functions. When it comes to customer interaction, the call center relies almost exclusively on conversations. The language you use with your consumers - whether they are callers in an inbound center or clients in an outbound calling facility - can make all the difference in how you are received. Here, we will discuss how language impacts customer interaction - and the role of training and technology in ...

Most modern call centers rely at least partially on an IVR system. The IVR - or interactive voice response - system is an integral part of modern customer service. Providing self-service freedom for consumers when done correctly, it can help direct call flow traffic effectively without additional cost - but only when done properly. Could your IVR system be doing more harm than good for your contact center? If you’re using the wrong technology - or approaching the technique...

For those in positions of leadership in the contact center industry, the importance of adequate call center staffing is obvious. Your facility can’t function properly without the staff to make it happen. But striking the right balance between too many staff members on-hand and too few can be difficult, even for a seasoned call center manager. Here, we’ll offer some advice on finding that balance - and creating a call center scheduling plan that makes sense for your facil...

If you’re looking to ramp up call center productivity and agent efficiency this autumn, one of the best ways to do so is to increase automation in your facility. Call center automation can take many forms and can take the burden off the shoulders of your agents in many ways. Understanding how to best implement it - and the “treats” it stands to deliver to your center this Halloween season - can really make it clear just how important this factor is in your center’s su...

With open enrollment on the horizon, business is soon to be booming for healthcare call centers. Whether it’s questions about coverage or concerns about care, these healthcare call centers are always very busy in the year’s final months - and always highly concerned about protecting the privacy of their callers. Unlike the average call center - where consumer data security is already of critical importance - healthcare call centers have additional concerns to address. Th...