6 Min
Being responsive and getting back to customers efficiently in a timely manner can change the game for your business. Whether you are a telecommunication service provider, banking & finance or into automotive and e-commerce business, customer service is the key challenge across industries, around the globe.
Stats say, “Brands with superior customer experience bring in 5.7 times more revenue than competitors that lag in customer experience” Retailcustomerexperience
Having said that, if agents themselves do not feel happy, it can put a question on the type of experience they deliver. On a flip side, let’s talk about actionable steps that improve agent satisfaction (ASAT) which results in more productive agents and contact centre!
Table of contents
How to boost agent productivity
1. Enhance agent autonomy
Allowing call centre agents a certain degree of authority can have a huge impact on agent and call centre productivity. This mitigates the likelihood that the agent will have to transfer the call to another department streamlining call centre workflow. Agents can utilize time focusing on more complex enquiries or handling new business while managers can think about strategies to deal with more pressing issues.
2. Equip them with the knowledge they need, just with a click
Customers want an accurate yet prompt response to their queries. This isn’t always as easy as it sounds for service agents. This is because most of the time agents have to sort relevant information from different places across the documents, such as databases, manuals and even other agents while the customer waits on hold.
To improve agent productivity and first call resolution, contact centres should look at implementing a knowledge management tool where consolidated information can be accessed anytime. This will allow agents to instantly view relevant up-to-date topics, articles, scripts and other business information that can help them in faster resolution of customer enquiry.
3. eLearning for effective agent up-skilling – Learning as you go!
Agents should have a thorough understanding of their responsibility at the contact centre and the services they provide to customers. Therefore, agent up-skilling through online training is crucial.
eLearning is convenient and efficient as it mitigates agents’ time away from dealing with customers. In addition, because of its flexibility, it can be undertaken during a time that otherwise would be unproductive.
A comprehensive learning programme can result in improved contact centre productivity and agent confidence.
4. Real-time communication helps reduce average handling time (AHT)
Contact centres need to make sure agents can quickly address customers’ concerns with relevant information, or if necessary, escalate calls to the appropriate experts with minimal downtime. With the advent of digital transformation, the utilization of real-time information has also increased that enhances better customer relationship management. A knowledge management system can help an agent with a single analytical dashboard. Advanced content analytics and proactive updates while dealing with customers allow agents to grab information faster and deliver the step-by-step resolution to their problem.
5. Faster onboarding and maximum engagement
Technology shapes our world. Automated onboarding software could be an ideal solution for faster onboarding. In the case of contact centres, training and onboarding requires great efforts, time, and capital. With software so quick, on job training & assessment can be easy. The insights of an agent’s performance are updated instantly which supports maximum user engagement as well.
Components of an enterprise-grade knowledge management platform:
1. Decision Tree
Decision Trees to help convert SOPs & workflows into an intuitive & actionable form to ensure almost 100% accuracy and reduced handle time. Helping overall improvement in agent productivity by assisting them with the next best action.
2. Knowledge base
A single source of truth acting like a centralized repository of knowledge including articles, documents & various files with the intent-based search.
3. Visual Guides
Visually simulated how-to-guides for processes that involve troubleshooting, support, or installation to help agents with the next best step to resolve customer issues.
4. Learning Management
Keep track of process know-how by conducting regular assessments and sharing relevant knowledge articles with agents.
Final thoughts
Customer service representatives are the face of the organization. Empowering them with tools which help them provide faster and accurate is the way forward. A robust knowledge management system organizes all the information into actionable insight and guided workflows. It’s a win-win situation as on the one hand, help in boosting agent’s productivity and on the other hand enhances customer satisfaction.
