Tag: training call center agents

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Telephone Answering Service

8 Common Mistakes to Avoid When Running a Telephone Answering Service

Avoid these common TAS mistakes in running your answering service.

Don’t Let the Day-to-Day Pressures of Running Your TAS Push Aside What Matters More

By Peter Lyle DeHaan, PhD

Running a telephone answering service is a challenging proposition. It seems there’s always too much to do and not enough time to do it.

Author Peter Lyle DeHaan, PhD

Therefore, it’s understandable when the day ends before you complete your to-do-list. But that’s not justification for making these common TAS mistakes.

1. Training Shortfalls

It’s critical to get new hires answering calls and productive as soon as possible. Yet too often the temptation is to rush through training. Don’t do this. It’s short sighted. Instead provide thorough agent training to ensure they’re ready to handle client calls efficiently and professionally.

2. Inconsistent Processes

Review your standard operating procedures (SOP). Efficiency requires consistent handling and processing of client calls. Every deviation is a chance for an error to occur. Having standard processes in place helps ensure consistency and accuracy in the way calls are handled.

3. Overlooking Basic Agent Skills

Don’t forget the importance of call etiquette and customer service skills. It’s the foundation for providing a good service and having satisfied callers. This starts with standard communication skills and proper call etiquette. This is an essential step to provide a positive experience for callers.

4. Aversion to Technology

Another common mistake is overlooking the importance of technology. This doesn’t mean you need the latest, leading-edge tools in your answering service. But don’t skimp in this area either.

Keep abreast of the latest developments to determine the right time to invest in technology. With the right infrastructure in place, you’ll increase agent efficiency and enhance customer service outcomes.

This will provide a better overall service experience.

5. Ignoring Data

Answering service platforms are known for all the statistics they produce. It’s easy to let all the numbers and quantitative output overwhelm you. Yet the other extreme is spending too much time dwelling on these statistics.

It is essential, however, to monitor and analyze call data. There are three areas to address: agent metrics, client results, and overall system performance. Don’t neglect any of these areas.

Use the data to make informed decisions to improve outcomes.

6. Withholding Feedback

Ensure that your agents know how they’re doing. Most of them want to do their job well and are looking for ways to improve. And if they don’t want to improve, why are you employing them?

Give them regular feedback on their performance. This includes both quantitative results and qualitative coaching. By providing ongoing feedback and coaching you will improve staff performance and enhance service quality.

7. Not Prioritizing the Client

The function of a telephone answering service is to answer calls. Therefore, it’s easy to focus on the calls that come into your operation.

While you don’t want to overlook these callers, remember that it’s ultimately your clients you must keep happy. Focus on them.

Yes, this starts with keeping their customers happy when they call and serving them with excellence. But, as you delight clients’ customers when they call, it’s possible to overlook your clients in the process.

8. No Contingency Plans

A final consideration is to plan for the unexpected. Have a backup plan in place to address unexpected events such as technical problems, staffing shortages, weather issues, natural disasters, local emergencies, and pandemics.

Not having an adequate response during a crisis will damage your reputation, frustrate clients, and not serve your clients’ customers.

Conclusion

Though these eight common TAS mistakes may seem like a formidable list of items to deal with—amid the day-to-day challenges of running your operation—it’s essential to make time to address them,

A failure to do so will damage your bottom line and jeopardize the long-term viability of your telephone answering service. Your job—and the jobs of everyone who works there—are at stake.

Address these common TAS mistakes, and you’ll see much of the rest fall into place.

Learn more in Peter Lyle DeHaan’s book, How to Start a Telephone Answering Service.

Peter Lyle DeHaan, PhD, is the publisher and editor-in-chief of TAS Trader, covering the telephone answering service industry. Check out his books How to Start a Telephone Answering Service and Sticky Customer Service.

Categories
Call Center

5 Tips to Create a Positive Call Center Work Environment

5 Tips to Create a Positive Call Center Work Environment

Care for Your Staff and They’re More Likely to Care for You and Your Callers

Staffing a call center is hard. Keeping it staffed is getting harder. With finding new staff becoming increasingly challenging, retaining existing staff is even more critical.

Author Peter Lyle DeHaan, PhD

Here are five tips to create a positive call center work environment and boost agent retention:

1. Create a Team Attitude

To foster teamwork and collaboration between call center staff and with your operation, do occasional team-building activities. This will draw them together and grow camaraderie toward a shared purpose.

Though these exercises generally carry an expense, don’t summarily dismiss them because of cost.

Also, look for ways agents can work together to support each other and achieve common goals. For example, instead of just focusing on individual agent metrics, consider collective stats for the entire shift as well.

2. Encourage Effective Communication

Consider an open-door policy to encourage agents to share their thoughts, concerns, and ideas. Listen to what they say. Whenever possible, act on it. And if you don’t or can’t act, let them know why.

Also, seek their feedback on your ideas to solve problems or improve performance. This shows respect and is more apt to earn their buy-in of changes.

3. Provide Ongoing Training

Most call centers do well at agent onboarding and initial training. But instruction should never end. Offer intermediary and advanced training to help call center agents improve their skills, increase their value to you, and ultimately boost their pay.

A related issue is to make agent coaching and career mentoring a priority, not an optional when-we-have-time intention.

4. Reward Achievements

Publicly recognize call center agents’ accomplishments. Praise them for their dedication, successes, and positive attitude—whatever stands out.

Though this may mean money or other tangible rewards, this shouldn’t be the default assumption. Look for low cost, yet meaningful, ways to celebrate their success.

The goal in this should be to encourage, motivate, and boost morale. This will go a long way toward building a positive call center work environment.

5. Promote Work-Life Balance

Stress the importance of work-life balance. To the degree possible, offer flexible scheduling, provide paid time off, and acknowledge the importance of the nonwork portion of their lives. In this, lead by example.

Summary

If you go the extra mile and create a positive call center work environment for them, they’re more apt to go the extra mile for you.

Read more in Peter’s Sticky Series books: Sticky Leadership and Management, Sticky Sales and Marketing, and Sticky Customer Service featuring his compelling story-driven insights and tips.

Peter Lyle DeHaan, PhD, is the publisher and editor-in-chief of Connections Magazine, covering the call center teleservices industry. Read his latest book, Healthcare Call Center Essentials.

Categories
Call Center

5 Tips for Agent Customer Service Success

5 Tips for Agent Customer Service Success

Master the Art of Effective Call Center Communication

By Peter Lyle DeHaan, PhD

Some people think working in a call center is easy because they like to talk. But that doesn’t guarantee agent customer service success.

Instead, successful agents need to work at it. Yes, this is easier for some than others, but no one is born with the ability to readily realize customer service success.

Author Peter Lyle DeHaan, PhD

Here are five tips to pursue to develop agent customer service success:

1. Develop Active Listening Skills

Better customer interaction begins with active listening. This starts by removing distractions and giving your whole self to listening. But don’t just focus on the words they say, but also how they voice them, as well as what they might not be telling you.

Then address their concerns—both those stated and those implied.

2. Tap Non-Verbal Communication

Communication has three components: the words said, the tone of voice, and body language. Most communication occurs through body language, which doesn’t come across over the phone—unless it’s a video call. (More on this in a bit.)

That leaves words and tone. But don’t just focus on the words said. Key in on the tone of voice as well, which carries more communication information than the actual words spoken.

To build rapport and empathy requires understanding the emotions and needs of customers. This means going beyond what they say. Doing so helps provide a more personalized and satisfactory customer experience.

3. Employ Effective Communication Techniques

Agents should use appropriate language, tone, and non-verbal cues to convey messages clearly and professionally. Yes, your body language comes across over the phone.

People can hear you smile. They can also hear you frown. Both impact the way your words come across and how customers receive your message.

Also avoid industry jargon and insider shorthand. Use simple language that customers can understand with ease.

4. Aim to Solve Problems and Resolve Conflicts

Equip yourself with problem-solving skills to efficiently handle customer concerns. This means addressing fully the reason for their call. Don’t just do the minimum and assume it’s good enough.

Each call should end with the customer having full confidence that you addressed their issue. There should be no need for them to call back.

Sometimes, however, before you can tackle their concern, you’ll first need to address conflict.

To master both problem solving and conflict resolution, take classes, go to seminars, and read books to learn how to better deal with difficult or irate customers, resolve conflicts, and de-escalate tense situations.

This brings us to the fifth tip of agent customer service success.

5. Embrace Continuous Training and Feedback

Agent success is not something you learn once. Instead, it’s something you continue to learn.

Be open to regular training sessions to further hone your skills. Embrace feedback to improve your communication skills over time.

This includes learning from your mistakes and receiving constructive feedback from trainers and coaches.

Summary

Follow these five agent customer service success tips to help you enhance your customer service effectiveness.

Read more in Peter’s Sticky Series books: Sticky Leadership and Management, Sticky Sales and Marketing, and Sticky Customer Service featuring his compelling story-driven insights and tips.

Peter Lyle DeHaan, PhD, is the publisher and editor-in-chief of Connections Magazine, covering the call center teleservices industry. Read his latest book, Healthcare Call Center Essentials.

Categories
Healthcare Call Centers

Integrate Call Center Staff

Pursue Agent Cross Training to Produce Better Outcomes and Improve Efficacy

By Peter Lyle DeHaan, Ph.D.

In my post “Integrate Your Call Center” I discussed various integration strategies to pursue. Now I’ll dive into each one of them with more intentionality. First up is to integrate call center staff.

Author and blogger Peter Lyle DeHaan

The key requirement to staffing integration is cross training. Cross training will improve efficiency, increase employee skills, and better serve callers. Cross training also moves your operation closer to FCR (first call resolution), which produces both caller-centric benefits and improved operational outcomes.

Here are some ways cross training can take place:

Channel Cross Training

Many people use the phrase call center, and we all understand what it means. A better label, however, is contact center. This reflects that we no longer process just calls, but contacts. These various forms of contact come to us on different communication channels.

The most common communication channel is voice, as in the telephone. It is ubiquitous and will continue to serve a vital role in our contact center.

Text chat emerges as another critical channel with increasing acceptance and use. Many customers persist in texting even when reverting to a phone call would more effectively meet their objective, both in terms of accuracy and timeliness.

Email communication is another channel. Some rely on it completely and expect contact centers to provide that option.

Social media is a fourth channel that is the default for some, even though it’s not always ideal for healthcare scenarios. And there are other possible channels.

The goal of channel-cross training is to have all operators adept at all channels. Though some may specialize, they need to know how all channels work and be able to function efficiently on each one. This allows you to integrate call center staff and have them move between channels as needed, either according to schedule or on demand.

Call Type Cross Training

The second type of cross training relates to call types. For example, an agent who focuses on taking messages, should also be able to schedule an appointment or take a class registration. Or an agent who functions as a receptionist and spends all day transferring calls, also needs training on other features to better meet caller needs.

Without cross training, patients and callers can easily bounce around from one agent to another based on employee specialty and training particularity. With cross training, however, one agent can address whatever need the caller may have. They could take a message for the doctor’s office, register a patient for a class, and cancel an appointment, all before transferring them to a different department—assuming that’s needed.

Call type cross training allows you to integrate call center staff more fully.

Cross Training Pitfalls

Yet not all cross training is wise. So use common sense when you integrate call center staff. Though you don’t want a highly paid nurse taking a message for billing, there’s no harm in them doing so. Yet you don’t want non-medically trained personnel addressing a patient’s questions about a healthcare concern. This is a disservice to the patient, will likely provide misinformation, and could result in a lawsuit.

Therefore, encourage agents to have a patient-first perspective and seek to help callers in every way possible, while at the same time communicating clearly their limitations.

Conclusion

Embarking on an intentional and robust cross training initiative will help you to fully integrate call center staff. The goal is that, within reason, any employee can help any caller on any request through any channel.

When you do this your patients and callers win, your contact center becomes more efficient, and your agents increase their value to your organization.

Read more in Peter Lyle DeHaan’s Healthcare Call Center Essentials, available in hardcover, paperback, and e-book.

Peter Lyle DeHaan, PhD, is the publisher and editor-in-chief of AnswerStat and Medical Call Center News covering the healthcare call center industry. Read his latest book, Sticky Customer Service.

Categories
Healthcare Call Centers

Cross Channel Training

Consider the Optimum Strategy for Your Contact Center Staff

By Peter Lyle DeHaan, Ph.D.

At one time call centers handled calls and nothing else. They had one channel. That was it. Now most call centers handle more than just telephone calls. They’ve become multichannel. Contact center is a better name for them.

Author and blogger Peter Lyle DeHaan

Along with phone calls—which is still the predominant channel at many operations—we’re now seeing text chat, web support and assisted browsing, email response, and a multitude of social media platforms to monitor and engage. In addition to these is a possibility of handling two older channels: mail and fax.

Although there may be some overlap, each channel requires a separate set of skills, which means supplying channel-specific training. Do you want to cross train all contact center agents so that any employee can handle any contact, regardless of the channel and when needed?

Or do you want specialists that excel in one area? Or is a mixture of both approaches the best strategy for your operation?

Here are some considerations about cross channel training:

Channel Specialists

Contact center specialists, such as telephone agents or text chat representatives, handle communications through one channel and one channel only.

Because they specialize in that channel, they excel at it and can serve customers with greater effectiveness, proficiency, and speed. A specialist will be more efficient in their channel than a generalist.

This is ideal for some operations, and its ideal for some agents. These employees relish consistency and find comfort in knowing what they will do at work each day, each week, and each month.

For them, they counter the repetition of their work by embracing the unexpected variety from one call to the next or one text to the next.

For agents who like a variety of tasks, specializing in one channel is a horrific prospect. If you don’t offer a way to counter their boredom, they’ll leave as soon as a more suitable job becomes available.

Channel Generalists

Contact center generalists receive instruction on how to handle communication on each channel your operation offers. This means that every employee receives cross channel training. They relish the opportunity to learn and master each channel.

They have a flexible mindset and see benefits of enjoying a varied workday.

Having a contact center staffed with generalists provides the most responsive configuration, with any agent able to handle any channel at any time.

This is ideal for time-critical communications that don’t tolerate interaction delays, such as the telephone, text chat, and web support. (Having a delayed response with email, social media, mail, and fax isn’t an issue, providing they’re handled in a reasonable time.)

Selective Cross Training

The discussion between contact center specialists and generalists, however, isn’t an exclusive one. You can have a mixture of both. You can even have partial cross channel training where an agent receives training on some channels but not all.

For agents who want to handle the same type of communication, let them specialize. Don’t force them away from something they like into something they don’t want to do by cross channel training them.

All that will do is taking a successful agent who happily serves you well in one channel and turning them into a disillusioned employee who seeks a different job.

Other agents, however, will clamor for the opportunity to receive training on and handle every communication channel you offer. And they’ll be the first in line to explore opportunities with new channels.

There’s a middle ground, however, where agents may want to and benefit from receiving cross channel training on specific channels with similar skill sets.

One example might be the text chat and email channels, which both need quick and accurate typing skills. But they may shudder at the idea of talking on the phone. Conversely a phone agent may also enjoy text chat, as both have back-and-forth interaction with the contact.

In these cases, let agents select which channels they want to receive training on. Be sure, however, that cross channel training is optional and not expected. Embrace those employees who want to remain one-channel experts.

Cross Channel Implementation

Regardless of the degree of cross channel training in your contact center, there are two implementation strategies for your cross-trained agents.

One possibility is with agents assigned to a particular channel for the day, with the understanding that you may reassign them to another channel as traffic warrants. This switch may be for an hour or two or for the rest of the day. Regardless, staff always begins the day on a scheduled channel.

The other approach is a universal distribution of contacts, with any customer communication going to any agent regardless of the channel. This makes scheduling the easiest and offers the most responsiveness to customers, but it may come at the cost of optimum efficiency.

Conclusion

If your call center handles other communication channels, or is thinking about it, consider how you want to approach it. You can adopt a specialist mindset, pursue a generalist tactic, or embrace a mixture of the two.

The point is to consider the cross channel training strategy that’s ideal for your operation, your customers, and your staff. Balance their needs to provide the best outcome for all stakeholders.

Read more in Peter’s Sticky Series books: Sticky Leadership and Management, Sticky Sales and Marketing, and Sticky Customer Service featuring his compelling story-driven insights and tips.

Peter Lyle DeHaan, PhD, is the publisher and editor-in-chief of Connections Magazine, covering the call center teleservices industry. Read his latest book, Healthcare Call Center Essentials.

Categories
Call Center

How Long Should a Call Take?

By Peter Lyle DeHaan, PhD

My wife and I recently moved. There were the typical myriad of details to attend to, including arranging for utilities. I had three calls to make: one for natural gas, one for electricity, and one for water.

Author Peter Lyle DeHaan

I called the electric company first, as I assumed this would be the easiest. They had provided us with natural gas at our prior home for a quarter of a century, so we had an existing relationship with them and an excellent payment history. Pulling up our account and tying it to our new location would be easy – or so I reasoned.

After navigating a slew of options on the automated attendant, I was finally routed to a person to begin my quest. One of his first questions seemed most promising: “Have you ever done business with us in the past?”

I was ready. “Yes!” I gave them the address, the dates, and our old account number.

He typed on his computer, mumbled a lot, and finally asked me to repeat the information. The fact that our old service was for natural gas confused him. “We don’t provide natural gas at your new house,” he said.

“I know that, but you do provide electrical service. That’s why I’m calling.”

I’m not sure if he gave up looking for my records or actually found them, but he eventually launched into a string of questions as if he was setting up a new account. I watched the clock as the call dragged on: five minutes, ten minutes, fifteen minutes, and climbing. He also put me on hold a few times. As the call reached the twenty-minute mark, he announced he was done.

Whew! I needed to psych myself up before making the next call, one I was sure would be much more involved. Summoning my resolve, I bravely called the natural gas company, one I’d never done business with.

For the gas company, the call started out much the same. There was an IVR tree, and one of the first questions the rep asked was, “Have you used us in the past?”

I braced myself. “No, we haven’t.” I expected to hear a sigh. I did not. She asked my name, address, and social security number. Before I knew what was happening, my account was set up. It only took a couple of minutes.

I then called the township who handles the water. A person answered the phone and transferred me to the “water department.” The person there was out, so I left a voicemail message with my name, address, phone number, and reason for my call. When I didn’t hear back by the next day, I called again. This time he was in. “Oh, I set it up yesterday when I got your message; you’re all set.”

Setting aside the township, my experience with the electric and gas companies are in contrast. Why was it so easy to initiate service with my natural gas provider and so time-consuming with my electricity provider?

Both are large concerns. I’m sure they track the efficiency of their call center reps, including average call length. Though one call took about ten times longer than the other, I’m sure the rep wasn’t ten times more efficient. I’ll place the blame on agent training, the technology infrastructure, and operational processes, all of which add up to about ten times less efficient.

Though the rep might be criticized for his long call time, the real blame resides with the call center management and its technology.

Make sure your reps aren’t at a similar disadvantage.

Read more in Peter’s Sticky Series books: Sticky Leadership and Management, Sticky Sales and Marketing, and Sticky Customer Service featuring his compelling story-driven insights and tips.

Peter Lyle DeHaan, PhD, is the publisher and editor-in-chief of Connections Magazine, covering the call center teleservices industry. Read his latest book, Healthcare Call Center Essentials.

Categories
Call Center

“One Moment Please, While I Disconnect Your Call”

Peter Lyle DeHaan, PhD

The success rate of agents transferring calls is not good. In fact, based on my experience, successful call transfers actually occur less than half the time.

The most common result is being disconnected. When a disconnected caller calls back, the happy caller has likely become irritated, the irritated caller has become irate, and the irate caller has become abusive.

Author Peter Lyle DeHaan

You can tip the odds in your favor, by following some common sense, but often overlooked steps:

Training

The proper transfer procedure must be covered in training. Additionally, the trainee should be able to experience the transfer from three different perspectives: the caller, the agent, and the recipient.

All too often, agents are deprived of seeing the call transfer process from the standpoint of either the caller or the recipient. Doing so gives them a better understanding how errors affect others and evokes empathy.

Practice

To master a skill, it must be practiced until it becomes rote—prior to attempting it with a real caller. Plus, for agents not frequently transferring calls, ongoing practice is wise.

Consistency

Most switches provide multiple ways to transfer calls. Pick the most universally applicable method and teach it to all agents. Get the trainers to concur that this standard method will be taught and no others. Finally discourage agents from using different approaches and seeking shortcuts.

Methodology

Decide on one philosophy for transferring calls. A blind transfer is the quickest, but least professional. With it the agent dials the number, connects the caller, and hangs up before the call is answered.

In an announced transfer, the agent dials the number, tells the recipient about the call, connects the caller, and then hangs up. A confirmed transfer is one step beyond an announced transfer, in which the agent stays connected long enough to insure that the recipient can address the caller’s needs.

Verify

Transfer lists need to be periodically checked—by dialing them. Frequent verification is the only way to purge wrong numbers and ensure agents have accurate information.

First-Call Resolution

If you pursue first-call resolution, the need to transfer callers is greatly reduced. Perhaps that is the best solution of all.

Read more in Peter’s Sticky Series books: Sticky Leadership and Management, Sticky Sales and Marketing, and Sticky Customer Service featuring his compelling story-driven insights and tips.

Peter Lyle DeHaan, PhD, is the publisher and editor-in-chief of Connections Magazine, covering the call center teleservices industry. Read his latest book, Healthcare Call Center Essentials.

Categories
Call Center

Call Scripting the Caller Experience

By Peter Lyle DeHaan, PhD

At one time all call centers used a free-form philosophy of recording caller provided information and communication, be it an order, a message, or an information submission. Free-form documentation is analogous to a paper phone message pad, with the agent filling in whatever blanks deemed appropriate, in any order preferred. As such, there is great discretion in how the forms are completed. The free-form approach works well for simple transactions that have a high variability of outcomes. Plus, for the diligently focused agent, free-form is faster. To excel in a free-form call center, however, higher standards in agent screening are necessary, with greater emphasis on training mandated.

Author Peter Lyle DeHaan

In today’s customer-centric world, the caller experience is of increasing importance, and the free-form approach to call processing is increasingly deficient in meeting the need. If callers aren’t delighted with the process, their treatment, and the results, they will quickly take their business elsewhere by merely picking up the phone. In an effort to exceed customer expectations, managers have focused on agent training, retraining, and more training. The outcome of all this instruction, however, does not always produce the preferred results to the extent desired. Therefore, a second convergent tack is needed to supplement all this agent training: the application of assisting technology.

As call processing became more complex, the free-form approach to caller interaction and data collection became increasingly error-prone and less advantageous, as well as problematic in an age requiring standardized databases. Enter a technology solution: call scripting. Call-scripting software allows the flow of the call to programmed, or scripted, for the agent. In essence, call control is embedded into the call processing system, with consistency and quality as the welcome results.  Additionally, the proper implementation of a scripted call platform into the call center results in agent screening, training, and supervision becoming less critical than in a free-form environment. Still, preplanning a call via scripting does not negate the need for proper agent hiring, training, monitoring, and evaluation, but it does make those efforts simultaneously more effective and more likely to achieve optimal results.

Properly configured call-scripting software can produce the following outcomes:

  • Increased data consistency
  • Improved quality
  • Greater caller satisfaction
  • Fewer errors
  • Embedded intelligence into the script
  • Simplification of complex tasks
  • Quicker agent training
  • Call flow branching based on caller input or requirements
  • Enforcement and validation of data in real time
  • Prohibition of entering conflicting data
  • The ability to handle far more complicated transactions with better results
  • Screen pop information based on entries
  • Pre-populated fields based on prior information gathered, or even prior calls
  • The ability to control the disposition and dissemination of the information after the call is complete

Programming a call script does require more thoughtful effort than configuring a free-form solution, but the extra effort invested one time, at the creation of the script, pays dividends over and over, day after day.

See our listing of call center vendors that provide call-scripting software.

Read more in Peter’s Sticky Series books: Sticky Leadership and Management, Sticky Sales and Marketing, and Sticky Customer Service featuring his compelling story-driven insights and tips.

Peter Lyle DeHaan, PhD, is the publisher and editor-in-chief of Connections Magazine, covering the call center teleservices industry. Read his latest book, Healthcare Call Center Essentials.

Categories
Call Center

A Perfect Answer

By Peter Lyle DeHaan, PhD

How often have you called someplace and wondered if you reached the right number? All too often, calls are answered hurriedly, haphazardly, or incompletely. Or perhaps the agent seems out of breath by the time they complete a lengthy, tongue-twisting answer.

It is vital that all calls be consistently answered in the same way, regardless of location or agent.  Here are three parts of the ideal way to do so:

Greeting

The greeting serves to set a positive tone for the call. It is simply “Good morning,” Good afternoon,” or “Good evening.” The greeting tells the caller that the phone has been answered—and that it is time for them to listen.

These words signal that it is time for the caller to listen, but it is not critical if they are missed.

Company Identity

This is simply the name of your organization or client, such as, “Acme Call Center.” It lets callers know who they’ve reached, confirming that their call has gone through correctly. Say the company name as it would be used by and most familiar to those outside the organization.

Therefore, drop legal suffixes, such an Inc, LLC, and Ltd.  Also, avoid abbreviate the company name; saying “ACC” when everyone knows you as “Acme Call Center” will only cause confusion.

Agent Identity

The final element is your first name. It adds a valuable personal touch. It is much easier for a caller to get mad at an anonymous voice, than an identifiable person. Using your name allows you to build a rapport and establish a track record with the caller.

As the last word of the answer phrase, it is also the one most easily remembered by the caller. Omitting your name implies an avoidance of personal involvement; ending with your name, signals confidence and competence, which are critical in problem solving and customer service situations.

Avoid Unnecessary Information

It is all too common for people to tack on the inane phrase, “How may I direct your call?” A direct response to this senseless question would be “quickly and accurately.” This is a waste of time.

Putting these elements together, results in the perfect answer:

“Good morning, Acme Call Center, this is Peter.”

Read more in Peter’s Sticky Series books: Sticky Leadership and Management, Sticky Sales and Marketing, and Sticky Customer Service featuring his compelling story-driven insights and tips.

Peter Lyle DeHaan, PhD, is the publisher and editor-in-chief of Connections Magazine, covering the call center teleservices industry. Read his latest book, Healthcare Call Center Essentials.

Categories
Call Center

Answering the Call

By Peter Lyle DeHaan, PhD

A few weeks ago, I did something outrageous. I stopped answering my phone. Although that is a bold, foolhardy step for anyone in business, it is heretical for someone whose entire professional career has revolved around the telephone. However, before you plan an intervention on my behalf, let me assure you that this was a short term situation and I am once again totally accountable to my phone, dutifully answering its ringing with Pavlovian consistency. Here’s what happened.

Author Peter Lyle DeHaan

Over the past few years I have noticed what many of you have experienced in your call centers; I was not getting as many phone calls as I used to. In fact, there are days when I only get one or two calls; occasionally, no one calls!

I am fortunate to be in a unique position in that I am privileged to communicate with a wide range of CEOs, directors, and managers at outsource call centers. About five years ago, the overwhelming concern of inbound centers was that call volume had dropped off and revenue was down, way down. It seemed to happen unexpectedly and no one was sure why, but most had their theories. Interestingly, this information was always shared with me confidently. Seemingly, each person was seeking confirmation that this was an industry wide dilemma, while at the same time declining to publicly acknowledge that they had been affected in like manner.

Since then, at each hint that a rebound was eminent, something would happen to squelch it – bad economic news, a terrorist attack, a war, and more than a few natural disasters. However, there has now become some divergence in the empirical feedback that I receive. Although most reports continue to confirm that call traffic is languishing, some indicate that it has leveled off, and a few claim to be experiencing a robust rebound, asserting that business has never been as good or more promising. Although a skeptic might maintain that such grandiose statements are nothing more than an attempt to talk oneself into prosperity, I prefer to believe that some call centers have indeed successfully navigated these troubled waters.

Perhaps the most buffeted segment of call center outsourcing work has been the outbound arena, specifically, consumer calling. With the combined effects of a public outcry, political expediency, and the enactment of state and ultimately a national do not call (DNC) law, outbound calling to consumers has, by most accounts, been devastated. Some call centers elected to cease all outbound work, migrating to inbound (thereby diverting work from existing inbound centers, resulting in a smaller slice of the pie for everyone – compounding the issue of lower call volume).

Other outbound call centers elected to make the switch from consumer campaigns to business calling, something that I can personally attest to. Before the national DNC law, I would only occasionally receive a sales call, from the Fraternal Order of Police or a high school student selling an ad in their organization’s program. That has changed. Now I receive all manner of telemarketing calls. I am sad to report that these call centers have learned nothing from the motivation behind the DNC legislation. They are employing the same tactics with business calling that caused the demise in consumer calling such as inadequately compiled lists, poorly trained agents, badly written scripts, and overly aggressively programmed predictive dialers. I’m all for a smartly targeted call, dispensing useful and relevant information – but that’s not happening. These firms still insist on employing the old numbers game, quantity over quality.

On all too many days, I receive more inept telemarketing calls than “real” business calls. To make matters worse, often the dialing rate is seemingly set too tight and I get dead air or am disconnected. It is one thing to get interrupted by a useless phone call, but it is even more infuriating to be interrupted so that a machine can hang up on you. Outbound call centers need to be careful. The same lackadaisical business practices that resulted in the government regulation and legal restrictions of making calls to residential numbers could easily be extended to include business numbers.

Even more troublesome is that the political fodder gained by enacting laws limiting outbound calling has emboldened legislators to turn their attention to inbound calling. The spate of these various proposed restrictions would be laughable, if not for the seriousness of the politicians proposing them. These laws could end up regulating how you staff your call center, what technology is used and how it is programmed, the location of your office and staff, and your hours of operation. Furthermore, they could mandate statistical response rates, customer satisfaction levels, and even invoke penalties for long hold time. The offshore outsourcing of call center service is often a prime target in these proposed bills, but the wording is often vague or general enough to include outsourcing within the United States.

However, I am digressing; let’s go back to my story. My phone had rung for the fourth time that morning and thrice in 15 minutes. Each time I was met with silence; there was no one there! I was working on last month’s column – you remember, “The Ripple Effect” – and wanted to write without needless interruption. In frustration, I did something that I had never considered before. I decided to stop answering the phone and let voicemail handle it. Although I received many more phone calls throughout the day, no one left a message. There were some hang ups and dead air messages, but no people, not even breathing. It wasn’t until the afternoon the next day that someone left a message. After three days of letting voicemail screen my calls, I had amassed only three messages. What about the rest? Were they all telemarketing calls? Were some from people who didn’t feel their call was important enough to leave a message? If so, why were they calling? Frankly, it makes me wonder if I even need to have a business phone line! (Forgive me for my academic musings – yes, I do need a phone.)

Even with this spike of telemarketing calls that I have received, my overall incoming call volume is still down. At the same time, email communication has soared. The increased quantity of email is attributable to both spam and “real” messages. It is not uncommon for me to spend an hour or more each morning responding to the email messages that came in during the night. On Mondays, it sometimes takes all morning to handle the weekend’s deluge.

So where does this leave the outsourcing call center? Call volume is down, regulation is present, and more is looming. There is an apparent shift from telephone to email. Some possible solutions have already been alluded to. Many outbound centers have switched from consumer calling to business calling (just make sure you do it right). Those who are opting to continue doing consumer calling are needing to navigate regulatory restrictions, spending increasing amounts of money to ensure compliance, and take measures to protect themselves from increasingly large fines and damages if mistakes occur. These facts favor larger call centers (think economies of scale) plus they produce a nice barrier to entry, thereby reducing competition.

It is counterintuitive, but now may be the right time for some call centers to get into consumer calling. Interestingly, in the past few years, some inbound centers have successfully begun outbound work. Their key, seemingly, is focused around carefully selected and crafted niches, the details of which they are reluctant to share.

Another switch, or diversification strategy, is for outbound centers to move to inbound work. Many have done this and although it is presently a much safer arena in which to operate, this advantage may not last for much longer.

The real call center opportunity, however, may reside in the Internet. More on that next month.

Read more in Peter’s Sticky Series books: Sticky Leadership and Management, Sticky Sales and Marketing, and Sticky Customer Service featuring his compelling story-driven insights and tips.

Peter Lyle DeHaan, PhD, is the publisher and editor-in-chief of Connections Magazine, covering the call center teleservices industry. Read his latest book, Healthcare Call Center Essentials.