First Call Resolution

Customer Effort Score (CES) is the new hot metric for customer service. (CES) has been widely discussed since the HBR Article, Stop Trying to Delight Your Customers (July, 2010), where Customer Effort Score was touted as being a better predictor of customer loyalty than Net Promoter Score or First Contact Resolution. While CES is an important metric and arguably the best metric to focus your service operation, there is no such thing as a “magic metric”. Getting results from implementing CES...

Achieve Better Performance Results with SharePoint

Contact centers utilizing SharePoint demonstrate significant efficiency gains, In a a recent report published by Aberdeen Research, “The 2012 Guide on Building a Next Generation Contact Center through Microsoft SharePoint,” some of the advantages outlined include:

* 43% better results in first call resolution rate

* 16% greater agent utilization results, which on average translates into approximately $1,872 in incremental annual cost per agent

*...

What Has Your Quality Monitoring Program Done for You Lately

How do you translate voice recordings into real-time business intelligence? While most contact centers actively record customer interactions, this data is useless until it has been analyzed – a process that can be time-intensive, inefficient and overwhelming. At best, most supervisors have the capacity to analyze only a fraction of the actual data collected.

Learn how to do more with the data you have. This white paper from Aspect...

FCR is one of the best ways to measure the overall performance of your contact center. It tells you how well your service organization handles customer requests the first time. Experts agree that it’s the only true metric that delivers a clear measurement of organizational effectiveness and customer satisfaction. When companies improve their FCR, they also lower their costs, improve their customer and agent retention, and increase their revenue.

Given the importance of FCR and the benefits it...

The main topics of interest at the IQPC Call Center Week Las Vegas were ‘cloud’ and ‘multi-channel’.  Attendees were also concerned with the use of social media.

How customers connect to companies is evolving.  Customers want to connect on their own terms with the channel that suites them best.  Vendors are attempting to respond to the customer’s needs with a variety of new solutions.  Below is a recap of exciting technologies and solutions that were at the event.

360'CRM   is a full spectrum CRM...

 Benchmark research carried out by Ventana Research shows that contact center executives and managers are under pressure to provide the best possible customer service while staying within tight operational budgets. At the same time centers are receiving ever more inbound calls and responding to other types of interactions such as email messages and chat sessions. To demonstrate success, managers must improve the key performance metrics on which they are assessed, especially customer satisfaction...

Features commonly provided by unified desktop solutions are as follows:

Single login/logout - Once the agent logs into the application they have unified access to multiple applications. There is no need to log in and out to access data bases or other applications.

Pre-populated screen pops - Unified desktops rely on the CRM as well as other sources, such as IVR entries and data gleaned from enterprise data bases to fully populate screens before the agent takes the call. All unified desktops pop...

These devices are variously called, "smart desktops," "intelligent desktops," "universal desktops," and "unified desktops."  However, all these products seek to condense required call processing information onto a single desktop application and organize the sequencing of screens to coincide with workflow. For ease of communication we will use the term "unified desktops."Demand for these products is still in the formative stages but growing rapidly.

Behind the interest is the same fundamental...

The following are some more information on the vendors who attended the IQPC event.  

Analytics

For companies frustrated with isolated or disparate data sources, 360'CRM's latest advances in its InSight data analytics tool provides new levels of actionable information for the Call Center or Channel Management practitioner.  InSight not only automatically draws call center performance data in to a common, universally comparable dashboard and report analytics library, it also integrates internal...

The staff of CRMXchange was present at the IQPC Las Vegas Call Center Week. IQPC did a commendable job with the content and speakers in the event. The exhibit hours were long, running close to 11 hours on day one, but the vendors were pleased with the amount of interest that people showed in their products and services. 

We traveled the exhibit hall. Below are some vendor highlights.

Analytics

Contact Solutions – The Continuous Improvement Practice (CI) is based on a unique methodology and supported...

First Contact Resolution, the ability to identify, solve and close the customer’s issue(s) during the first customer/enterprise contact,  may be the foremost KPI in evaluating a contact center/customer care organization’s overall operating performance from a business perspective.

Despite the knowledge that a high level of FCR in the contact center correlates closely with general levels of customer satisfaction and loyalty, low levels of FCR in customer care settings remain a significant industry...

Accurate, timely feedback—whether from customers, employees, or partners—relies on talking to your audience in the right way.  Your contact center is the front line of your business. Positive experiences drive increased advocacy, reduced customer churn and improved agent engagement.

Customer satisfaction in your contact center is not an end in itself. Your customer experience program must deliver tangible benefits and real value that go beyond the contact center and enable you build a more...

One of the major points of contention surrounding FCR is what the acronym stands for: is it first contact resolution or first call resolution? Some would say that first contact resolution is the proper metric, and while tracking all contacts is most reflective of the true customer experience, it is often expensive and sometimes impossible to develop meaningful metrics that encompass all touch points.

Implementing sound practices coupled with an appropriate technology solution makes it possible to...