Enhance Employee Engagement By Using Call Center Technologies

These days, call centers are changing.

They are becoming a combination of various digital channels. And, they offer multichannel customer services as well. 

But, the most productive and efficient call centers outsourcing defend your brand and work as an extension of your team. And, they start with the best training. Empowering agents to be their best selves and do their best work is a certain approach to hit KPIs (Key Performance Indicators), work quickly and efficiently. And, they also provide the world-class customer experience that businesses need.

But, it is also true that today customers expect more. According to the Salesforce’s State of Service report:

• 83% of customers want to connect with customer representatives or someone immediately when they call a company. 
• 82% of customers want to solve their problem by talking with a single person.

However, providing better quality customer support to the customers is not an easy task. According to the same research, customer support professionals were not particularly pleased about their company's performance:

• 29% stated their organizations exceed at response time.
• 26% exceed at handle times.
• 22% exceed at first contact resolutions.

Hence providing better training, especially about the latest technologies, can help your customer support representatives to offer excellent services at faster speeds.

Therefore, all these changes require new technology. So, which technology are you going to include to boost your call center outsourcing services?

So, let’s have a deep look at the most important and newest technologies which are in trend.

Call Center Technology Defined

Call center technologies refer to the hardware and software that is used in the contact centers for better customer support, services and experiences as well.

Earlier, telephony was the key of call centers. It has been used to handle both outbound and inbound calls. Tools like VoIP (which enables web calling) and IVR (which enables call routing), have become more advanced and technical over time.

Now, technology in call centers has advanced far beyond phone systems. New digital channels such as live chat and video chat are becoming increasingly popular. And, they focus on a better customer experience.

CRMs and WFO (Workforce Optimisation Software) have become increasingly crucial in call center operations.

Emerging Technologies in Call Center Outsourcing Services

These days, as we know customer services become increasingly digital, Agree? So, two popular principles are approaching:

• Customers are expecting real-time support, services, and engagement as well.
• Customers are expecting to connect with brands at various channels.

Therefore, to fulfill the expectations of customers such as real-time support and engagement, better service, quick response, and multichannel connectivity, call centers need to invest in technologies.

So, let’s have a look at the topmost popular technologies that are emerging in call center services.

1. Artificial Intelligence (AI): 

Artificial Intelligence (AI) plays an essential role in reinventing call centers.

It helps several businesses by providing the fastest and most personalized customer service that redefines the customer experience.

Honestly, providing a better customer experience is the essential task for the organization to invest in artificial intelligence. As per the poll of 2020, 53% of the organizations are using AI for a better customer experience. It can be compared with 48% of organizations doing this to minimize the business costs. Whereas, 39% of organizations are doing this to enhance the company’s revenue.

So, if you want to be competitive and enhance your customer experience, AI is the best call center technology that’s worth the investment.

AI can be used in call centers in various ways.

Conversational Artificial Intelligence (AI): 

Conversational AI, often known as chatbots or virtual agents, is a type of artificial intelligence that automates customer assistance on your website and app. With the help of machine learning and natural language processing, these advanced chatbots can communicate with clients to answer their queries. 

Despite recent advancements, machine learning and natural language processing are still best employed in cooperation with rather than in place of human agents. They are wonderful at answering questions and sending clients to the right department. But, they should always be able to pass off to a human agent if necessary to avoid customer irritation.

Sentiment Analysis:

The tone of consumer messages is analyzed by using this technique. Negatively rated discussions can be flagged to call center managers, allowing them to involve and help an agent improve the customer experience before he declines.

 It can also be used to track customer satisfaction and identify areas for development throughout the customer experience. For example, if you receive a large number of 'negative' messages from a certain website, then this could suggest that the site is unclear and not providing good customer service.

Call Routing:

Although call routing is not a new call center technique, with the help of AI it can improve its accuracy. By better understanding client purpose, sentiment, and the inquiry itself, AI ensures intelligent routing to the relevant department/agent the first time.

2. Omnichannel Software:

According to the research of Microsoft in 2017, 66% of the customers use various channels for better customer service.

Therefore, there are two things for the businesses. Firstly, today customers are expecting fast and better services, so to meet the customer’s expectations businesses need to provide multichannel customer service. Secondly, for better service customers jump from one channel to another, so in that case, companies need to ensure that the channels are connected to provide one unified experience.

This means companies should offer omnichannel customer service. As a result, customers can easily switch the contact channels without repeating their problems. For example, when a customer sends a message on Facebook then there are chances that it can be a live chat and it can escalate in video chat as well, all within the same interaction.

Businesses should use omnichannel engagement platforms to get this consolidated customer experience (CX). This technology offers multichannel customer service (all in the same place) to the call centers. And, it also allows call center agents to easily shift the channels from one to another for better interaction and to fulfill the customer’s needs. 

3. Self-Service Channels:

This channel is the better option for both customers as well as businesses. By using this channel, customers can get the answers more quickly on their own. Thus, the requirement of call center agents is no more. 

Around 70% of customers want businesses to offer a self-serve customer service option. It means self-service channels are now essential for all the call centers.

The self-service channel refers to online support. There is no need to directly connect with the call center agent. It means that there are various options of self-service to choose from.

4. Reporting and Analytics:

For a call center, data is everything. This is the main reason why analytics and reporting are a key call center technology. In between website analytics to interaction reports, there are different ways where data can enhance customer experience and performance of call centers as well.

Firstly, when you connect your call center system with an analytics tool like Google Analytics, it is a great way to get a complete view of a customer’s journey. It will provide a complete view of how a customer interacts with your website and at which place he needs customer support. So, by using this, call center agents will be able to solve customers’ problems more effectively and efficiently.

Secondly, interaction-based analytics make managing demand and evaluating performance a breeze, resulting in a more productive call center.

For example, if a company receives a huge number of chat requests then interaction-based analytics helps to know how many live chat inquiries are received daily. It will help managers to assist and organize procedures. Additionally, they can also control demand on a per-hour basis, lowering queues and wait times, if they know what the busiest times of day are.

5. Tracing Real-Time Customer Journey:

These days, every call center wants to provide quick and personalized customer service. In that case, real-time analytics plays a vital role. So, real-time customer journey mapping is a popular technology that is used in call centers.

While speaking with a consumer, call center agents can see their journey across your website. It helps agents to get a complete review of the customer journey. And, it also provides session data such as 'time on page' and 'clicks.’ So, the agent can acquire a better picture of the customer's intent and inquiry. This enables call center agents to resolve customers’ issues more quickly.

If the customer is logged into their account then this technology becomes even more useful. When a user registers in, personal information such as the customer's name is delivered in real-time to the agent, allowing them to provide more personalized service.

6. Video Chat:

In this era, video chat customer service is rising day by day. The demand for video chat customer service will increase by 400% from 2019 to 2020. Meanwhile, there is no chance of slowing it down. 

Video chat is a fantastic approach to deliver online face-to-face client support, especially as remote sales and digital shopping become more common. Furthermore, video chat software is a very adjustable call center solution that can be suitable to any particular customer's demands.

For example, it can be used in two-way i.e., customer and agent see each other, or one-way i.e., the customer only sees the agent. Additionally, it works on all devices which means the customer can use it on their mobile, tab, laptop, and computer at their convenience.

You can also combine video chat with shared screen and co-browsing to create a completely interactive customer care experience.

Read More: How to Identify Your Business Call Center Outsourcing Needs?

Bottom Line:

The most essential thing in every business is call center technologies. The reason is that they play a vital role in providing better customer service, support, and experience as well. Before implementing technology, you should consider which technology is suitable for your call center. And, if you invest in the right technology then it provides various leverages and also helps to improve the company’s revenue.

These days, customers prefer to connect with brands at various contact channels. So, it is essential to the call center outsourcing services to offer multiple contact channels for better customer engagement.