May 12, 2015
In a move that will be seen as both a solution for customers and a challenge for managers, contact centers will—sooner rather than later—be making a major shift toward ‘advanced analytics.’ While this may sound daunting at first, it’s a logical step given how customers are currently interacting with contact centers.
In a recent blog post, inContact Communications Manager Gavin Gustafson analyzed the concept of analytics and how it can be used to benefit both callers and call center agents. To provide background information, he drew on some recent work by inContact partner CallMiner’s (News – Alert) Jason Napierski.
“For contact centers, developing a ‘big picture’ understanding of customer interactions across the entire lifecycle is critical to providing exceptional experiences for customers,” Gustafson noted. “One way to do this is through the use of contact analytics, which captures unstructured data from recorded calls, emails, chat transcripts, or other customer interactions to identify trends and the root causes of issues.”
He then went on to list some of the benefits of contact center analytics and why organizations should be adopting them:
Unified View of Customer Interactions: “With contact analytics in place, companies can use a single system and process to analyze contacts across all channels,” Gustafson observed. “The benefits of using this type of software are twofold: 1) Contact centers can develop a unified view of all types of customer interactions (resulting in consistent analysis across channels), and 2) Companies can track the entire customer journey (regardless of the channel used), which can help identify the root cause of repeat contacts and poor first-contact resolution.”
Performance Measurement: A distinct benefit of contact analytics systems is their ability to measure various performance indicators by detecting the presence of certain language characteristics. “Armed with this type of automated scoring, contact center managers, supervisors, and agents can proactively address issues or knowledge gaps to improve performance through additional training or coaching,” Gustafson said.
Customer Experience and Satisfaction: “According to a recent survey by Censuswide, 70 percent of U.K. customers speak to an average of two to five customer service representatives before resolving a single issue,” Gustafson notes. “Whether implementing real-time monitoring or post-contact analytics, analyzing interactions across channels allows companies to measure and improve the customer experience across 100 percent of contacts. The end result? Increased customer satisfaction, reduced customer churn, and an improved customer experience overall.”
In short, change is on the horizon. It will be the proactive managers who recognize the trend and stay one step ahead of it. Those who don’t are bound to be left behind.