The development of discount travel agencies and automated ticketing websites over a couple of years have drastically increased the competition in the travel industry. Live chat is the website tool that lifts your travel agency above the competition with live sales and exceptional customer service. It’s the standout feature that will influence your website visitors to pick you over your competitors.
Irrespective of their size, most of the business houses across the globe fail to serve their customers round-the-clock in the most literate sense. If your business house is also a part of this list, you can’t afford to ignore this piece. The success of your brand lies in your ability to convert a large number of your potential customers into your customers and ultimately, into your loyal customers.
Your inability to serve your customers on a 24/7/365 basis is the reason why you are not as successful as your competitors. Therefore, you should never allow your potential customers to be alone on your website. Before visiting your website, your customers should not look at the watch. You need to be in touch with them before as well as after the sun rises.
The increase in the number of players in the market selling the same products and services has made our lives easy. Today, there is no dearth of options and if you are not just a click away from your customers, there are many who are. So, allowing something as petty as time to be between you and your customers will sooner rather than later be detrimental for your brand.
So, do you need to worry? No! All you need to do is to ensure that you are always present on your website in order to make your visitors feel at home. How? By offering a live chat service to your customers. There is no dearth of live chat service providers across the length and breadth of this world but you need to hire the one who is the best in the business. So, now that you are looking for quality voice chat agents, you should visit livechatagent.com, a leader in serving customers according to their expectations 24/7/365 and make that 24/7/366 if it is a leap year.
Providing technical support is an essential part of managing an IT-related company. Whether it’s computer hardware, software, mobile gadgets or anything in between. Continue reading “Live Chat For Tech Support”
In a business, steady growth or inrush of the leads makes a huge difference. The ambition of every business owner is to turn every visitor into a lead, and that every lead will ultimately become a sale. Continue reading “Live Chat As A Lead Generation Tool”
Last moments can shade an entire memory. Customers generally want to feel protected in their purchases, and that becomes simple when a sales associate makes you feel appreciated. It’s a lesson for all live chat support agents which they need to learn is how you end a chat truly matters. Here are some rules of customer service you need to pay attention to.
Prevent Being Abrupt– Never blurt out a curt “goodbye”. Regardless of whether you mean it with the best intentions, it’s difficult to convey tone over the Internet. It can sound rude and like you are trying to get rid of the customer so you can move onto the next problem on your list. When you end a chat like that, you influence customers like they are nothing but just a problem. Give your customer the same attention you gave her when she initially came to you. She is just as important now as she was then. Positivity goes a far way in transforming site visitors into loyal customers.
Ensure All Their Needs Are Met– The last thing you ever need to do is shutting down a chat with a customer with unmet needs. When you get a feeling that chat is winding down, never think that you have done all that you can for the client–there’s always the opportunity to go the extra mile. Before you end a chat, always throw an additional offer like “Is there anything else I can help you with today?” for good measure.
Express The Gratitude– Expressing gratitude towards your customer is absolutely necessary to ending your live chat session. This lets the customer know that the interaction is more than just about the money. Thanking a customer for their business is thanking her for the relationship she chose to have with you. Customers support your organization and your contribution to society–it’s much easier to feel gratitude when you consider it that way.
Goodbye Ensuring To Interact With You Soon– When you are preparing to end your chat, remember that this was ideally not the last time this customer will be associating with your company or buying your product. Ward off the negativity is a huge part of it, but that’s not enough. Remind the customer that you are there for her, and request her to speak to you again in the future.
Use An Outstanding Script- The most underrated yet simple way to end a chat is to use a live chat script. It may appear too easy, and you may fear that canned closing statements are unfriendly, but until if it’s not well-crafted. Scripts can make things easy for you because you know that your goodbye will be as genuine as you need it to be. This way you can focus on how to enhance your customer service skills instead of feeling like you’re attempting to keep up.
Contact LiveChatAgent
Whether you’re a web- hosting company or an online store, in any case, you probably had to face circumstances where somebody else tries to gain access to an account they don’t possess. Exploiters use influence and social engineering to talk their way into acquiring someone else credentials. Live Chat features help in expanding the security and ensure that only authentic account owners get access to them. Continue reading “Effective Methods to Increase Security Using Live Chat”
Everything you do in business, you do it for the customers. There are thousands of reasons why excellent customer service is worth every penny and your time. Here is the guide to some Live Chat etiquettes on how to conduct a chat and to create the best Live Chat experience for your customers.
Continue reading “Live Chat Tips: Guide to create best online customer service”
They say- Content is the king!
But does that mean it can ensure conversions, all on its own?
The answer is a big ‘No’!
Continue reading “Live chat and quality content: A magical blend for great conversions!”
Being a part of a lucrative market is beneficial as well as tricky at the same time. It’s often seen that people dealing with similar kind of work tend to follow some practices blindly. Also, these practices are not always the best ones but mere myths that need to be busted. Customer service is no different. The key to a better customer experience is identifying these myths and not falling a prey to their consequences at any cost. There are a lot of myths related to this field, that are blindly believed by the people dealing with it. Let’s have a look at some of these myths that have prevailed in customer service for quite a long time now:
Continue reading “Customer service myths to be busted for a better customer experience”
Live chat is a clear preference among the users over more traditional customer service channels like email or phone. It is capable of delivering immediate responses and providing instant query resolutions in real time. Whether the customers crave information or have pre-sales queries or require post-sales support, live chat is the best resolution to all of their queries. As an online channel, this service meets the customer exactly where and when they need it. All these features make support via live chat effortless and more user-friendly as compared to phone or email support.
Continue reading “Live chat software: Simply at your service 24/7/365”
As a matter of fact, not all the website visitors like to engage. They rather like to be engaged. That’s where a proactive chat steps in. These chat invitations facilitate customer engagement so that you do not miss out on any opportunity of conversion. However, proactive chat can be beneficial only if you use it in an appropriate manner. There are certain mistakes that if committed can actually have a negative impact on your visitors. Read on to know what they are:
Continue reading “All that you should not be doing during a proactive chat”
Live chat is undoubtedly an untapped potential to grow your business. A live chat feature on your website can drive numerous benefits towards your business. However, you need to use the live chat software wisely to enjoy those benefits. Here are the best strategies that can profit your business through live chat:
Continue reading “Strategies to benefit your business using live chat”
All the CRM software are specially designed to help businesses meet the overall goals of customer relationship management. As a matter of fact, a CRM software can work wonders for your business provided you choose the right one. Let’s have a look at the best CRM software available:
Continue reading “Here’s a list of the best CRM software for your business”
No business wants to witness customer churn. In other words, every business fears losing its customers but some customers are past saving. These are the ones who’ve made their decision and are about to leave soon. Now all you can do is prevent more of customers from following the suit. How can that be done? Let’s have a look:
Continue reading “Customer churn reduction: Top strategies that’ll help retain your customers”
ASA stands for “Average Speed of Answer”.
ASA is a call center key performance indicator (KPI) typically referenced by managers while assessing their team’s performance, efficacy and degree of accessibility to their callers. It is a term pertaining to the service industry where it is also known as “Average Seconds to Answer” and “Average Time to Answer” (ATA). It is further defined as the average waiting time for a caller before he is acknowledged by a service representative.
The mathematical formula is:
Average Speed of Answer = Total Waiting Time for Answered Calls/Total Number of Answered Calls
Customer satisfaction is associated with an average speed of answer. This is because the time spent queueing is one of the main factors that affect how customers judge the level of service. Low waiting times do not automatically indicate high CSat. Customer satisfaction is understood from the contact center’s perspective. It starts from the instant when the customer is placed in a queue after they have navigated IVR. As a matter of fact, long or confusing IVR processes can lead to a bad customer experience. This is because lengthy IVR processes cause frustration in the customers. Moreover, they make the customer experience much more drawn out than the ASA figures would ideally indicate.
Call abandon rate is yet another factor that affects the average speed of answer data. In the cases where customers end the calls before they are connected to an agent, their calls do not count towards the ASA figure. Various factors may be responsible for the agents abandoning a call. Of all the possible reasons, a prolonged wait has the highest probability of triggering call abandonment. As a result, the worst offenders, in terms of answer speed, are often discounted from the understanding of the actual figure.
Agent occupancy refers to the percentage of time that call agents spend handling incoming calls against the available or idle time, which is determined by dividing workload hours by staff hours. It is a statistic used in calculating the productivity of a call center. When agent occupancy is the final outcome of how staffing is matched to incoming call patterns to a call center, the desired level of occupancy may drive staffing decisions in a sequential work environment. This useful metric can be utilized to measure instant messaging interactions as well.
Utilization rate, also known as call center occupancy, is measured as:
Handle time (talk time + after call work time) / time signed into a queue.
This metric is expressed as a percentage and tells you the amount of time that work is being performed in support of the call center’s queue. It also tells you how hard the call center agents are being driven. Higher the occupancy rate, shorter is the amount of time between calls. According to a research, 80% occupancy rate means that 20% of the time the representative was available for a call and the remaining 80% the representative was either on a call or in after call work status.
Call center utilization or agent occupancy is not controlled at an individual level. It is rather a group, queue or center measure. Also, it is a function of forecasting and staffing, the workload offered by the calls arriving randomly and the handle times. As a matter of fact, smaller groups have lower occupancy than the larger ones. Also, higher occupancy rates do not always correlate to an increased productivity. Therefore, call center agents can generally handle short bursts of increased activity but sustained high occupancy can lead to burnout. You need to know that call center occupancy needs to be considered along with other factors such as overall productivity, error rates, quality scores etc. in order to make the most out of it.
1. Consider agent priorities:
According to a research, agents who have worked in the contact center for more than six months have these top three priorities namely:
i) salary
ii) progression
iii) nice environment
On the other hand, the top three priorities for those who have been in the role for less than six months are as follows:
i) nice environment
ii) salary
iii) company culture
Therefore, incentive planning needs to be done on the basis of these priorities in order to lower agent attrition levels in customer support centers. This further helps you can gain the most out of the rewards that are offered. Apart from this, customer support managers also need to focus on the salaries of jobs which require similar skills to the agent role. Also, they need to make sure that the rates of pay that you offer are competitive.
2. Consider benchmarking against good agent skills:
The act of benchmarking the skills of new agents against their well-skilled counterparts will help benefit the quality of calls and provide the required guidance. In order to reduce agent attrition, benchmark advisors against their colleagues instead of alongside metric based targets. Further, suggest them what to pick up from them in call quality monitoring sessions.
3. Monitor customer-centric metrics:
As a matter of fact, the most effective call center agents are typically the ones that make a personalized connection with their callers and derive the most satisfaction from their job. Therefore, it is necessary to monitor customer-centric metrics such as contact quality, customer satisfaction, and first contact resolution. Thereafter, measures need to be taken to enhance them. Also, the contact center managers need to ensure that quantitative metrics such as average handle time or calls per hour are not overvalued. This will help increase customer satisfaction and curb agent attrition.
1. Improve the working conditions:
Agent satisfaction is the key to reducing agent attrition. This can be achieved by allowing agents the opportunity to work from home, on a flexible schedule, or in an office with an ergonomic workspace. This will make them more satisfied with their work and achieve a healthy work-life balance. Simply put, if you want that each agent loves coming to work, you need to provide them with satisfactory working conditions.
2. Choose the new agents wisely:
As a matter of fact, if someone left their last role as a contact centre advisor after six to nine months, there is a possibility that they will leave again. This happens because agents who leave after this time often do so as they realise that there was not much room for job progression in their previous role. Hiring process needs to be more specific so as to find the most appropriate agents. So, in order to reduce agent attrition, you need to consider this factor to ensure that they are aware of possible growth within the contact center.
3. Try to find the right balance:
Agents who are good at taking calls may not necessarily be good at managing people. However, keeping them in the same position for too long may frustrate them due to the lack of progression and move on. Therefore, it is necessary to find the right balance to curb agent attrition. For this, consider developing leadership in the contact centre to find agents who have the right leadership capabilities, such as organisation, influence, and motivation. Also, ensure you don’t make the decision based on call handling alone. Moreover, if you are seen to be helping the agents progress their skills by developing their leadership, you can lower attrition. This is because they will interpret your actions as preparing them for future opportunities and their betterment.
1. Provide rewards and internal promotions:
Implementing peer recognition and rewards program is yet another powerful method of curbing agent attrition. It involves ensuring that each agent receives feedback that is directly tied to their performance and that they receive rewards when they meet key milestones. This enhances an agent’s motivation and helps build engagement with their work. On the other hand, filling open positions within call centers by promoting internal candidates can also help motivate them to work better. This can actually be used as an incentive for agents to work harder at their job and be sure to promote top performers.
2. Strive to tackle your advisors’ grievances:
Exit interviews are the ones conducted to gather information on why an advisor is leaving and to learn how a customer support center can stop attrition. Instead of these exit interviews, conducting internal interviews, after an employee’s first few weeks of joining, can help tackle their grievances and know their pain points before it is too late. Thereafter, strategies can be employed to exempt these grievances. These interviews convince the employees that the company cares and supports for each of them. It further boosts their morale and job satisfaction and leads to a lowered agent attrition rate.
3. Ease down the shift swapping process:
The rigidness of the schedule in a customer support center can result in staff missing important external events and lower job satisfaction. As a matter of fact, customer support centers are hesitant to allow shift swaps due to the negative impact it may have on workplace cohesion, contact between supervisors and advisors and service quality. However, working towards lowering the rigidness of the schedule and providing an easy swapping of shifts can greatly enhance employee morale. This can eventually result in a reduced agent attrition.
1.Provide adequate training to all the agents:
Skipping or shortening the training period, based on the fact that some agents need intense training while others do not can lead to the omission of useful experiences. This may further result in feelings of exclusion, inadequacy, and disorganization and in the worst cases, the agent leaving your company. Therefore, you should consider training each agent equally. Make sure that all the agents are subjected to the same training period so they can acquire the necessary knowledge and skills, become acculturated to the company’s values, and cultivate relationships with colleagues. This training period will enhance team collaboration and bond and will further lead to the exemption of agent attrition to a large extent.
2. Schedule the staff appropriately:
One of the most effective strategies in curbing agent attrition is focusing on the work-life balance of employees. This strategy works on the principle of mutual understanding, such that, employees need to understand that the business must meet its customers’ demands, while the business must understand that employees have external pressures as well. Thus, you need to develop a flexible approach creating a number of lifestyle schedule options that give employees more choices, whilst still meeting the business needs. Providing options is a great way of finding a suitable solution and satisfying all.
3. Leverage the power of skill development:
Providing skill development programs is yet another powerful strategy that can help curb agent attrition in customer support centers. As a matter of fact, agents who feel their on the job skill-set is not at all progressive are more likely to disengage with their work and are more prone to leaving. However, all these insecurities can be eliminated and job satisfaction can be increased with opportunities for agents to learn new skills and new technologies. This will help them be more competent and confident, perform their work-related duties and stay longer with your company.
