IP-Enabling Your Contact Center: Leveraging Flexible Standards for Streamlined Communications
[ Source: AT&T ]
January 2008-
As enterprises increasingly are discovering, Internet Protocol (IP) technology enables more than cost-effective telephony. It also facilitates a range of new capabilities that enhance business operations and reduce expenses. By leveraging a converged voice and data infrastructure to IP-enable their contact centers, businesses can reduce expenses, streamline communications, more efficiently, distribute and manage call center resources and provide new enhanced services, plus a host of other benefits. This white paper explores the three key enabling ...
Best Practices in Inbound Customer Service Operations
[ Source: Alcatel ]
January 2008-
Despite advancements in inbound calling contact center capabilities, the growth of the stature of contact centers, and the billions of dollars that have been spent on CRM and contact center technologies, the vast majority of contact centers are still viewed by corporate management as cost centers that during lean economic times are targets for cost cutting. This paper demonstrates that good management practices combined with the best technology can lead to Best Practices and real ...
Best Practices: The Path to a Black Belt in Customer Service
[ Source: Alcatel ]
January 2008-
In this age, it is important for companies to focus on their customer service operations and undertake a program of improvement, much like undertaking the practice of a martial art. The study and implementation of Best Practices provides a good guide for the path. Like any practice, there is no final destination in this journey. It is a journey of continuous improvement in the service of customers. Well-run contact centers balance operations between the goals ...
Improving Agent Productivity: Getting Maximum Business Value From Every Agent Interaction
[ Source: Alcatel ]
January 2008-
Agent productivity is one area where the return can be easily improved. Since, the majority of contact center costs lie in employing agents, any increase in their productivity can significantly enhance the return on investment. This paper from Genesys Telecommunications Laboratories discusses the metrics that define agent productivity and the various ways in which it can be improved. It also includes actual case studies of Genesys customers around the world illustrating the benefits of the ...
Let ""Change Management"" Guide Your Center in the Evolution From Service to Sales
[ Source: Alexander Communications Group ]
January 2008-
The idea of transitioning from a 100 percent service-oriented customer service process to one that handles a mix of service and sales or of inbound and outbound calls is one that many companies are considering. They want to influence the service contact to increase revenue, to add value to the customer service center, and to make it more of a profit center and less of a cost center. One problem, however, is that many companies attempt ...
Get Your Comp and Metrics Aligned to Create Meaningful Change
[ Source: Alexander Communications Group ]
January 2008-
Performance metrics for the customer service center as a whole must also be associated with the new way of doing things. For a sales-oriented or hybrid call center, particularly one that is making outbound calls, profitability is the key factor, and metrics might include such things as outbound contacts per hour, average time spent per contact, average revenue per contact, number of call attempts, sales lead accuracy rate, and others.
Rising Expectations, Technology, and Retention Are Among the Challenges for 2006
[ Source: Alexander Communications Group ]
January 2008-
The year 2005 was intricate enough for many customer service managers, with technology changes, outsourcing, hiring and withholding issues, and other factors that crowded into the customer service center. The year 2006, it seems, will be no different. Managers will face more technology alternatives more staffing headaches, and will be part of a discipline that’s changing as fast as the business world it operates in. In fact, that’s one of the challenges that customer service ...
Call Center Scheduling Is Critical for Your Success: Here’s What You Need to Know to Make It Easier
[ Source: Alexander Communications Group ]
January 2008-
Leading customer service departments consume early-arning systems to respond quickly to rising call volumes, according to a report from Best Practices, LLC. Best Practices of Chapel Hill, North Carolina, conducts work based on the belief that organizations can chart a course to superior performance by studying top companies’ best business practices, operating tactics and winning strategies. Companies that fail to plan for call volume fluctuations risk providing inadequate service and alienating loyal consumers. In fact, ...
How DHL Measures Its Customer Service Performance
[ Source: Alexander Communications Group ]
January 2008-
This paper focuses about the topic ?How DHL Measures Its Customer Service Performance?. The basic metric that DHL uses to gauge agent performance is calls per hour. DHL has all of the other metrics associated with call center performance - average handling time, for instance. Strategically, DHL has decided that its productivity gains will come not by driving reps to handling more customers in less time, but by allowing customers to choose alternative channels
Eight Steps to Creating an Incentive Program for Your Customer Service Reps
[ Source: Alexander Communications Group ]
January 2008-
Incentive programs that offer rewards such as cash, travel, or merchandise in return for exceptional performance or performance improvements are common among salespeople but less common among customer service organizations. But incentive programs have been used successfully to improve performance with many different types of employee groups, including service staff. With more service organizations trying to add an additional sales element to their service department, incentive and recognition programs are likely to grow even more ...