Optimized Customer Service is Becoming a Key Priority to Improve the Customer Experience

Nearly three quarters of customer service organizations have begun adopting strategies to optimize the value of every customer interaction, but less than twenty five percent have fully implemented them in key areas, according to a new survey of customer service organizations. The business goals of creating and operating contact centers at maximum efficiency remain a top priority for a large number of businesses, especially in highly dynamic environments, but the goals of complete optimization remain largely unmet. The most critical areas for improvement are in such areas as the ability to effectively cross sell, prioritizing customers according to their status, and matching customers with the best agent.

The global survey, sponsored by Genesys Telecommunications Laboratories, included 1,390 contact center managers and customer service executives from 19 different industries and 76 different countries.

Key findings include:

An increasing number of organizations implement contact center management strategies that simultaneously address effectiveness and efficiency of customer interaction

28 percent of contact centers manage Average Handle Time by actively directing agents to spend longer on interactions during troughs and the reverse during peaks

Only 11 percent of contact centers actively manage cross-selling opportunities

17 percent of contact centers use voice call-back

26 percent expand the agents' roles to include managing interactions through other channels such as e-mail and SMS

Contact center management are integrating all available technology and business process to manage agent productivity, prioritize business objectives and respond to changes in customer demand

The most effective and successful contact centers seek to identify the customers at the first available opportunity - 78% of call centers are identifying customers before connecting them to agents

Contact centers are also assessing the value of the customer interaction, determining the level of service to provide and how to match the customer with the right agent

22 percent of contact centers still do not identify customers before matching them with the appropriate resource

Only 21 percent of contact centers use advanced analytics to prioritize incoming calls based on the value of the customer

Only 35% match their top-value customers to their best agents-instead using an isolated group of high-performing agents

More information can be found at www.SupportIndustry.com.