Workforce Management Featured Article
Speech Analytics, WFO Make Contact Centers Smarter
Call centers traditionally have existed to perform just a few simple tasks. That includes accepting customer orders, contending with customer complaints, and helping answer customer questions. And outbound call center campaigns would (and still do) reach out to customers with product and services offers.
Such tasks and operations still exist today. But call centers have evolved to be contact centers – allowing them to interact with customers using voice and other mediums including chat and email. Contact centers also are becoming more sophisticated in their ability to analyze and act on customer behavior.
Speech analytics and workforce optimization tools can help enable that. They do so by aggregating and analyzing past buying behaviors of customers. Speech analytics can even provide clues as to what customer experiences have been like in the recent past.
Is a high-value customer frustrated and likely to churn? If that’s the case, perhaps someone should reach out to them with a better solution or a free offer.
Has a caller expressed interest in a specific product? In that case, perhaps their account manager should contact them about that solution. Or, at the least, the company should make sure they’re on the target list for campaigns related to such solutions.
Advanced contact center tools also can highlight:
• which customers have been spending a lot lately;
• which customers haven’t purchased anything in more than six months;
• which customers only shop when there’s a sale; and
• which types of products are more likely to sell when they are marked down.
“The more you know about your customers, the more you can customize offers that are more likely to appeal to them,” Monet Software (News - Alert) notes.
It adds that contact centers may want to seek agents with marketing backgrounds. “These are the employees best suited to take on a more sales-oriented role,” the company adds.
“A workforce management solution is essential in these efforts,” it says. “With WFM agents can pull up past purchases, the caller’s location, and previous contacts. With speech analytics, agents will be in a better position to tailor each call to a customer’s preferences.”
Edited by Maurice Nagle
