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Contact centre customer service survey 2008
02/07/08
Genesys
Telecommunications Laboratories has announced the results of its
latest research on how contact centres can improve the customer
experience.
The survey,
which polled contact centre managers and customers, shows that
offering a more personalised service should be a contact centre's
top priority. This challenge can be addressed through an
'intelligent Customer Front Door' (iCFD) approach to routing that
identifies both the caller and the purpose of the call - but over
half of contact centres still employ DTMF (Dual Tone
Multi-Frequency) systems that force customers to wait through many
options.
The research
also reveals that only five per cent are using speech activated
systems, which enable callers to voice their requests and 'jump the
queue'.
While speech
activated systems are a step forward from DTMF, only 22 per cent
offer this as a personalised service, which to a certain extent
identifies the customer on the call. This could be identifying them
by their account number or calling the customer by name - extended
knowledge which makes the customer feel valued and improves the
customer experience.
"iCFD is the
next generation of call routing," commented Bruce Eidsvik, VP of
Voice Portal Sales at Genesys. "It not only identifies the caller
based on his or her name or account details, it also intelligently
maps the intent of the call by collecting context information from
the back office system. For example, in the case where a customer
puts a call into his or her insurance company to check on the status
of a claim recently submitted, the iCFD system would, once initial
identity and account number verification checks have been completed,
do a "data dip" into back office information and see that the caller
logged a claim only five days ago. It would then assume that the
customer is looking for an update on the claim and would first ask
'Are you calling for a progress report on your recent claim?' If
that were not the case, then all other available call options on the
system would be put forward to the caller thereafter.
"We believe
that a personalised, intelligent service is key to improving
customer satisfaction," Bruce Eidsvik continued. "Yet our results
show that over 50 per cent of contact centres are not using
personalised routing as part of their applications. As automated
menus rate among the worst offenders for customer frustration, now
is the time for contact centre managers to begin looking for new
solutions. To date we have been working most closely with IBM and
SpeechStorm as partners in this project. Their expertise helps to
analyse the obvious route of the call, instead of listing menus for
customers to choose from, which reduces wait times and improves
customer satisfaction. If the option they want comes up first,
customers are more likely to think of phoning the contact centre as
a convenient way of getting in touch, rather than see it as a chore
which will inevitably frustrate them."
Nick Gibson, editor
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