• Key Contact Center Technology Capabilities Needed to Deliver Outstanding Customer Experiences

    Delivery of truly outstanding customer experience requires 5 distinct sets of functionality: dynamic, personalized dialog; adaptive workflow; unified customer context; consistent experience; and, deeper insight.  Each of these elements focuses on a different aspect of the interaction between you and your customer and brings a different value set. Focusing on any one of these elements will improve the customer experience, but it is the combination of these elements that will differentiate you from your competition. According to a recent Aberdeen Group report on improving multi-channel service, the top 4 goals for the next year are to:

    • Increase customer satisfaction (56% of respondents)
    • Increase revenue (46% of respondents)
    • Increase efficiency and improve processes, and ( 36% of respondents)
    • Increase loyalty and advocacy. (28% of respondents)

    Those all are tied to delivery of outstanding customer service. The top strategic initiative being worked on is empowering agents with better information. Getting the right information to the right person at the right moment is critical to providing outstanding service. That information needs to allow the interaction to be personalized. The agent needs to know who the customer is, what products and services they have purchased, what troubles they have reported, what their payment status is, how they like to communicate, and a myriad of other information. That information should be used to help guide a dynamic, adaptive dialog within a process-based workflow. All of this needs to happen within a unified agent desktop that provides instant access to information the agent needs to address concerns the customer raises during their interaction. This same rich dialog should be able to take place across every channel the customer chooses to use, including voice, web self service, and website-based chat.

    You need to be able to optimize the processes guiding the interactions. To do this, you need to collect every piece of information available about the interaction as it happens, every page turn, button click and piece of data entered. This information becomes the foundation to allow you to analyze not just the success of that individual interaction, but thousands of interactions to see how the process can be improved using techniques like dynamic real time comparison of different processes. The key is to have a platform that lets you collect the information you need to optimize the processes.

    An important side benefit of delivering outstanding service is that when you do, you can actually reduce your operational costs. Contact us to discuss how you can both improve your customer service and reduce your ongoing operational costs. We will discuss each of the five functional sets of capabilities in individual blog articles over the next several months.

    April 3, 2016 Blog Comments Off on Key Contact Center Technology Capabilities Needed to Deliver Outstanding Customer Experiences

    Are Inbound and Outbound Calls Really That Different?

    The way customer workflows are designed and interactions are handled should be independent of the call’s origin – inbound or outbound. When developing a process, focus on how you want the interaction with the customer to flow, not on how the connection is made.

    By driving interactions with repeatable, consistent processes, you are making the entire experience more pleasant for the customer and the agent. Once the connection between the parties is established, there is no fundamental difference between inbound and outbound interactions other than who initiated the contact. Therefore, at RiverStar, we see very little difference between the two when it comes to developing an efficient, effective and scalable process.

    People generally think about outbound calling as needing scripts and workflows, but inbound calls also require consistent processes so that agents can easily identify and address customer issues – in other words, deliver great customer service.

    With 80 to 90 percent of calls initiated by customers, developing inbound processes provides the greatest return on investment. In one case, we simply implemented efficient inbound calling process, which allowed our client, Blue Casa, to increase first-call resolution by 25 percent. Additionally, this same inbound process was fitted for an outbound call process to help new customers with proactive service issues. Increasing the efficiency and effectiveness on the majority of your calls through a process-based approach will result in happier customers and more productive agents.

    The task of addressing inbound call issues may seem overwhelming when compared with those of outbound calls, where you have control of the content. You don’t, however, have to address every possible scenario with a process-based solution. Apply the 80/20 rule to determine the top reasons for inbound calls – for example, placing orders, billing inquiries or troubleshooting – and develop processes for those. Just a few processes will likely cover the majority of your customer interactions. You can also develop a ‘generic’ process to handle the “other” calls. Over time, you can add additional processes as the volume of transactions warrants the effort.

    In addition to being an excellent customer service tool, utilizing  a BPM platform-as-a-service tool will help you collect data so you have reportable results that describe exactly what occurred during each interaction. Anything that you put in a process – clicks, questions, call resolution, etc. – can be captured, stored and reported on. Integrating data from both the process and from the call transaction – such as length of call, number dialed or number of people contacted – will add value to your reports, providing a complete record of every transaction.

    Contact us today to find out how we help you develop integrated processes for any types of customer interactions.

    March 15, 2014 Blog Comments Off on Are Inbound and Outbound Calls Really That Different?

    How the Three Elements of Process Save You Time and Money

    At RiverStar, we believe that every customer interaction is fundamentally a process, having a beginning, middle and end that all aim to meet a specific objective. Incorporating three key elements into your processes will save your customers and agents time and, ultimately, your company money.

    The three key elements of a process are:

    • Efficiency – Making the most of time and resources during the process
    • Effectiveness – Ensuring the result of the process matches the objective
    • Scalability – Developing a process that can handle anticipated volume within the constraints of available resources

    From the company perspective, a process has to be scalable to handle the volume of interactions expected, efficient to minimize cost and save time, and effective in first-call resolution. An added benefit of process is reduced agent training time. Having a structured process dramatically reduces the amount of training required because agents will be led step by step through every interaction. Our clients report a decrease of 50 to 75 percent in agent training time after implementing RiverStar solutions.

    While developing processes can certainly enhance any interaction, sometimes it may not make sense to develop a process. This is where scalability and efficiency go hand in hand. If an interaction only occurs sporadically, the time and resources required to develop a process may outweigh the benefits. However, for interactions that occur hundreds or thousands of times each day, process will ensure consistent handling, enhancing customer satisfaction and increasing agent productivity. Every wasted second eliminated by an efficient process amounts to cost savings for your company and increased satisfaction for your customers.

    While customers will certainly notice the absence of scalability and efficiency, these elements are not their top priorities. They view effectiveness as the most important element of process – do you give them the information they need at the time they need it without requiring excessive action or repetition on their part? With an effective process in place, the answer will be a resounding “Yes.”

    Service Master came to RiverStar with four different systems in place that agents had to navigate for every incoming call. We helped them develop a single, process-driven desktop that became the face of those systems, streamlining agent activity for each interaction. Our solution saved the company 10 percent in average handle time on every single call.

    The combination of RiverStar Studio’s capabilities and the expertise of our team can help you build business processes that leverage your existing technology and can be optimized over time to achieve the results you need.

    Contact us today to learn more about RiverStar Studio can add efficiency, effectiveness and scalability to your processes.

    November 21, 2013 Blog Comments Off on How the Three Elements of Process Save You Time and Money

    Making Customer Interactions Efficient, Consistent Through Process

    At RiverStar, we believe that every customer interaction is fundamentally a process with a very specific objective. Objectives may stem from customer requests — such as billing inquiries or troubleshooting — or company outreach — such as customer satisfaction surveys or upselling. By creating processes around these tasks, you are ensuring consistency and efficiency in your customer service operations, thereby increasing customer satisfaction.

    A process is nothing more than a sequence of logical steps that help you achieve an objective. It can be very simple or very complex, but regardless it should follow a structure, taking the customer from introduction to resolution. As the customer service provider, it’s up to you to make sure the results match the objectives as closely as possible.

    For example, Blue Casa Communications needed a more efficient process for addressing customer issues. While the information that agents needed was readily available, the multiple systems could be cumbersome to navigate. Blue Casa sought a process-based tool to ensure consistent customer treatment, triggered by rule-driven dialogs that guide agents through addressing customer needs. RiverStar worked with Blue Casa to develop a solution that helped the telecommunications company increase first-call resolution by 25 percent. By creating a process with consistent steps and an integrated system, Blue Casa was able to resolve more of its customers’ issues quickly and easily on the first try.

    RiverStar solutions make it easy for you to implement processes for your customer interactions that can evolve over time. We can help you integrate your systems so that they deliver the information your agents need when they need it. We can implement logic and rules that eliminate the need for agents to ask customers for background information on every call. As you gain a better understanding of how the process is impacting your customer service and identify new opportunities for efficiency, you’ll have the ability to enhance and customize the solution even more.

    Contact us today to learn more about how we can help you add consistency and efficiency into your customer interactions using a process-based approach.

    October 25, 2013 Blog Comments Off on Making Customer Interactions Efficient, Consistent Through Process

    Are Returns Bringing Down your Holiday Season?

    At RiverStar, we keep a keen eye on return patterns and how companies deal with these returns. Last year, we conducted a Return Management Study and were able to gather a great deal of data around company processes, customer behaviors and customer service activities related to online return management. The conclusion wasn’t pretty: most companies are still in the dark ages when it comes to handling online returns, with manual processes still prevailing. AND, it’s only going to get more complicated.

    Cyber Monday has taken hold and the trend of online purchasing is quickly on the rise. Just released 2010 Cyber Monday sales data shows that revenues have topped $1 Billion for the first time. This increase provides further evidence that consumers are more comfortable shopping online and trusting in the cyber experience and security. However, with multi-channel shopping, comes multi-channel returns. Web self service return management processes will need to be optimized in order to handle the return volume. The good news is that the RiverStar Return Management Study revealed that 2/3rds of the companies surveyed determined that Return Management is a key part of their customer service strategy; concluding that companies are realizing that this process is very important to future success. Not only are these processes key to customer service excellence, they can significantly effect product profitability if the company is not efficient in their workflow and is also absorbing the costs of return shipments.
    Fraud is an additional aspect to consider when it comes to the holiday return season. Fraud is always on the rise and will be again this year, creating an estimated $3.7 Billion in losses for retailers this season. Weighing the scales of customer service and fraud detection is a tricky balancing act. Pull the wrong lever and lose a customer for life.
    Finally, the impact of the return experience greatly affects consumer loyalty. The reference to Zappos is always in play when talk of loyalty appears. The Zappos return policy is so wide open, that the low risk purchase decisions give consumers a reason to premeditate future purchases. It has been clearly cited that great customer service practices can lead to marketing and branding opportunities for organizations. Return management is a huge part of the customer service experience.

    This year, the return window continues to widen, providing consumers an additional length of time to return products. Shopping for the holidays seems to start earlier and earlier, requiring many retailers to extend the return timeframe until January 31. Extending these timeframes requires companies to staff up and be on the ball with their return management practices in order to maintain top levels of customer service and seamless experiences across all channels. It will be interesting to see the satisfaction results for 2010 since the drop in return experience from 2008 to 2009 was so drastic. With customer service becoming a cornerstone competitive advantage, companies must find a way to turn their return processes into consistent and repeatable outstanding customer experiences.

    December 13, 2012 Blog Comments Off on Are Returns Bringing Down your Holiday Season?

    Does Black Friday and Door Buster Deals Influence Customer Loyalty?

    Black Friday is quickly becoming a national pastime; a shopping holiday tradition. In fact, over the past few years, Black Friday has become a major retail earnings indicator for the shopping season around the Holiday Season. In summing up the revenue share of the Black Friday weekend, Marshal Cohen, chief retail analyst at NPD Research Group, states that 25% of the total holiday spend will occur over the Black Friday weekend. But, the real question is whether the Black Friday activity is an indicator of sustainable shopping habits associated with particular brands. In the end, the retailers prefer loyalty and repeat business throughout the year, spending money on more profitable items.

    The “Black Friday” phrase originated in 1966 in Philadelphia, but was really coined as a mainstream term associated with the Christmas Holiday season in 2003 after it achieved the #1 ranking of the busiest shopping day of the year. More recently, the clear objective around black Friday is to start the day off by attracting customers with door buster deals at 5am (or earlier) in hopes of each person walking out of the store with more than just loss-leading products.

    Is there a loyalty factor amongst those that are lining up to barge through the doors at 5am in order to race their way to the best deals? I say maybe, but likely not. In order to understand whether a retailer is really capturing the long term earnings of these individuals, we need to make a few assumptions:

    1. It is likely that any individual waking up at 2, 3 or 4am to get in a line (sometimes in the bitter cold) in order to score deep discounts on products that are limited (sometimes only 2-3 per store), is clearly acting on the motivation of pure savings and nothing else. If savings weren’t the motivating factor, shopping during normal business hours would occur.
    2. It is physically impossible to be in more than one place at a time. People have decisions to make and those that are braving the crowds at 5am are choosing one destination over another driven primarily by total net savings. Highest priority location is based on the best deal, not necessarily the loyalty of the consumer to the retailer.
    3. Door buster patrons face the risk of being trampled and are doing so for the sake of getting a great discount on a particular item(s). Taking such a risk is usually not displayed by a person that is shopping purely for the sake of being loyal to a retail establishment.

    On the flipside, there is an argument that supports consumer behavior and activity related to Black Friday shopping. Many brand loyal customers will in fact make their shopping rounds to preferred locations during the course of Black Friday. It is not clear to me that this same loyalty motivates the brand loyal consumers toward the door buster savings activity

    Brand loyalty psychology is a vastly studied topic with numerous experts stating studies and research that support the reasons for brand loyalty. Bill Nissim, a brand management expert, cites research from Bloomer and Kasper that outlines the distinction between repeat purchases and brand loyalty. The clear distinction is based off of pre-meditated behavior prior to the action, which determines a loyal patron, versus a consumer that has repeat brand purchases. Of course, we aren’t certain without conducting the right studies, as to whether or not the door buster consumer experience is in fact one that will sustain premeditated future purchases relating to the brand in question.

    The consumer behavior black box model outlines buying patterns and breaks down the buying equation. However, I would jump out on a limb by stating that the key environmental factor in door buster deals is purely price motivation. Of course, with some consumers, it’s the thrill of the chase and the experience of the season.

    So, the original question “Do Black Friday and Door Buster Deals Influence Customer Loyalty?” still needs answering. In reviewing many of the consumer loyalty equations and models, there are very few pieces of evidence that support the activity in creating such an experience to obtain future brand loyalty. Taking the motivational factors of the consumer and placing them against the retailer promotions, I can’t see the mapping between the two activities. In fact, looking at the typical ratio of employees:consumers at any given door buster event, the consumer far outweighs the employee. One basic definition states that customer loyalty is achieved through satisfying, acknowledging, rewarding and following up with the customer. I find it hard to believe that any establishment can effectively and predictably map the long term benefit of customer loyalty to Black Friday. Of course, I’m willing to hear all arguments…

    November 30, 2012 Blog Comments Off on Does Black Friday and Door Buster Deals Influence Customer Loyalty?

    The Verdict is Out: Americans Prefer American Call Center Agents

    My first article on this topic seemed to bring about a good number of discussions in various LinkedIn groups. So, I aggregated all of the comments across multiple LinkedIn group discussions, our web site and a few other sites where we post. There were 41 total responses and here’s what I found:

    Of the people that made comment, it was clear that the overwhelming majority determined that Americans prefer to speak to American Call Center Agents. Nearly 64% felt this way, while 27% disagreed. While these results would not be considered conclusive evidence obtained from a wide spread study utilizing responses across various genders, age groups and nationalities, it is still a viable indication of opinion from people in our space. Ironically, the numbers seem to be in line with a recent (hot off the press) study conducted by CFI Group just a few days ago, citing the move of call center agents back to the United States for the second year running. In fact, CFI Group outlined that “The biggest argument for repatriating a call center is the almost unprecedented level of dissatisfaction associated with offshore agents. The study finds that call center satisfaction is only 58 out of 100 when the call is handled by an offshore agent, compared to 79 for U.S.-based agents.”  The Sample size from CFI Group is much larger, but the results are obviously in sync.
    Additionally, I broke down the responses by source and found some interesting data. I’m not certain that any conclusions can be made from it, but found it to be interesting that certain LinkedIn groups swayed in different directions. Here’s what I found:
    • The Customer Experience Management group comments clearly sided on there being a preference toward Americans: 67%,
    • In the Customer Service Professionals group, the split was 50/50,
    • And finally, in the Worldwide Contact Center Professionals group, 75% disagreed that American’s prefer American agents.
    In each of these cases, the response rate was at least 8 respondents. Again, not a large sample size by any means, but interesting data nonetheless.
    The second half of my analysis covers feedback from the population of responses. In addition to claiming yes or no on the preference, there were opinions as to why this is the case or what can be done to offer a better overall experience to the customer. It was apparent in all of the discussion threads that the following list of items would increase the probability of offshore agent acceptance:
    1. Better overall employment screening.
    2. More training to the agent on products, processes, language and culture.
    3. Hiring individuals without an accent, or at least one that matches the locality of the customer.
    Point #2 hits squarely to the findings by CFI Group which states that “U.S. agents are 34% more likely to resolve the problem on the first call than those handled offshore.”

    So, in conclusion, I’m not alone in my past experiences and opinion of the matter. I do want to make it clear that an outstanding customer experience can be achieved regardless of where the agent is located or what language they speak. However, it is a growing debate that is gaining press in all forms (fall TV series), attention by the masses, and a move back to the U.S. by major organizations looking to increase their overall customer experience.

    August 29, 2012 Blog Comments Off on The Verdict is Out: Americans Prefer American Call Center Agents

    6 Pieces of Research Every Customer Service Pro Should Know

    Looking to make your point in a presentation about customer service? Trying to sell the case to the boss about why he or she should really care about the customer experience? Considering a foray into social customer service? How about some facts and figures about Social CRM? Stats make a good argument, and help give you instant credibility. On top of that, they are interesting and fun to read. Here are a few that you may find valuable whether you are making the case to the executive team or simply writing a blog post.

    1. Good customer service = Bottom line results.

    • Stat(s): A majority (61%) of Americans report that quality customer service is more important to them in today’s economic environment and will spend an average of 9% more when they believe a company provides excellent service.
    • Source: American Express Global Customer Service Barometer, August 2010

    2. Poor customer service = Lost customers.

    • Stat(s): 17% will leave you after a single service mess up; 40% will leave you after two blunders and 28% will leave after the third mistake. That adds up to an overwhelming 85% of your business that could potentially be lost due to poor customer service.
    • Source: BIG Research, Jun 2010

    3. Declining consumer use of telephone as a support channel = increasing use of self service as a support channel.

    • Stat: 45% of consumers prefer to communicate with customer service over NON-telephone channels (i.e. web self service, social media, email, etc).
    • Source: Ovum, Genesys “Global Cross Channel Survey”, March 2010
    • Stat(s): 36% of online US customers crave self-reliance for service. That preference is even stronger among younger customers: 46% of 18- to 29-year-olds and 42% of 30- to 42-year-olds prefer to be self-reliant. Only 28% of respondents prefer to resolve a service issue by speaking to someone on the phone.
    • Source: Forrester Research
    4. Multi Channel Customer Interactions = Need for integration and process centric technology platforms
    • Stat: 85% of the contact centers observed by Gartner indicated that the multiple interaction channels are not synchronized.
    • Source: Gartner, February 2010

    5. Delivering integrated and actionable Insights to a Unified Agent Desktop = Reduced Agent Training Time.

    • Stat: The technology behind interaction guidance involves systems that extract data regarding the customer and the products owned by the customer, and suggest the best flow for the dialogue. Automating the assembly of actionable information on the Agent Desktop can result in agent training time dropping 25% to 40%.
    • Source: Gartner, February 2010
    6. Social Media Monitoring and Engagement = Mainstream consumer and enterprise adoption by 2014.
    • Stats: By the end of 2014, 45% of contact centers will have integrated some type of social media support – monitoring social networking sites for mentions of a company/product, responding to blog or Twitter posts with an invitation to participate in a survey, incorporating tweets as a means of communicating directly with the contact center (currently, between 6.5% of contact centers have a Social CRM Strategy in place).
    • Source: DMG Consulting, July 2010
    • Stat: 79% of the Fortune 100 are already present and listening (over social media platforms), using at least of one of the main social platforms to communicate with their customers.
    • Source: Burson-Marsteller Evidence-Based Communications Group

    These are just a few pieces of research that can help guide your customer initiatives. Making note of them may help you stay away from becoming a bad customer service viral phenomenon.

    August 23, 2012 Blog Comments Off on 6 Pieces of Research Every Customer Service Pro Should Know

    Do Americans Prefer American Call Center Agents?

    Yes, a touchy subject. I’ve seen some write ups on this topic, but always wondered about the PC factor and the risk of going live with such opinions. However, since we are in the business of creating outstanding customer experiences, I think this topic is one worth exploring further.

    Last evening, I called Capital One because I misplaced my credit card and was in a panic, wondering who has it and how many charges they tallied up on my behalf. With the rampant surge of identity theft, I didn’t want to take any chances. So, I dialed up the 800 number on my statement and after going through the prompts, I landed a live agent. At the point of hitting the last number on my phone’s dial pad, knowing I would be talking to someone live, a wave of anxiety passed over me. Wow, anxious about who I was about to interact with?!?!? What’s wrong with me?

    After assessing the experience once the call was over, I realized that this wave of anxiety was tied directly to my fear of having to talk to someone in another country. In a mere second, my subconscious had me thinking: will this person be able to handle my issue? will I have to explain myself twice? will I be put on hold again to talk a level 2 support person? will I get frustrated in this call? will I, will I, will I??? Wow, all this in split-second time? Is it me? Am I a freak?

    As my blood pressure jumped and my heart started racing all in that tiny window of time, it was diffused back to it’s normal biological state just as quickly. Yes, (what appeared to be a localized agent with a southern accent) picked up the line and said “Thank you for calling Capital One, how can I help you?” PHEW! A huge sense of relief passed over me and I felt that whatever issues I had would immediately get resolved. In fact, they did. My card was canceled, a new card was issued and I would have it in 5 business days.

    I thought about why this anxiety fell over me in this particular situation. I can likely contribute it to one of a few experiences I’ve had recently; namely with Intuit. About 6 months ago, I called Intuit and ended up being on the line with someone half way around the world (not that there is anything wrong with that…). Outside of the poor line quality, the communication barrier, lying to me about his real name (I’m pretty sure his name wasn’t Chuck) and his inability to answer my questions in a reasonable time frame (was searching the same knowledge base that I had already searched), the call was great! Right. What a horrible experience.

    So, do I associate the poor experience with the location of the agent, or the solution that they are using? Well, I’ve had multiple experiences like the one with Intuit and I think there is a conclusion to this trend. I’m sure that as the world becomes smaller and the English language continues to be a viable second language in other parts of the world, most of my anxiety will dissipate. Although, the cultural differences are a completely separate topic to be saved for another posting.

    I still have a way to go to rid myself of offshoreagentphobia. Maybe one day, I can be free of the fears that control me in those times of my customer experience needs. Oh by the way, I found my credit card in the side pocket of my racquetball bag. Too late though; another is already on its way.

    (There is great hope for the offshore contact center. Stay tuned for a follow up to this posting with a few suggestions.)

    July 20, 2012 Blog Comments Off on Do Americans Prefer American Call Center Agents?

    Humility Is a Great Customer Service Strategy

    How many times have you had to listen to explanation upon explanation as to why you received a poor customer experience?  My guess is more times than you have heard, “Sorry, we made a mistake”.  Until companies are run by robots, there will always be mistakes.  Simple mistakes can be costly to a business, but mistakes that cost you a customer can be a permanent loss of future revenue, let alone the damage to your reputation should the customer create a YouTube video or publish a tweet to their 20,000 followers.

    Social media has only enhanced the need for humility.   For example, look at the humility shown by Domino’s Pizza in their new ad campaign that uses traditional media, YouTube, and Twitter to win back customers. They have the CEO admitting that their pizza was not good, with screenshots of tweets that claim “Domino’s pizza tastes like cardboard”.  I have no empirical data as to the results of this “humility” campaign, but I can say that I have ordered a Domino’s pizza because of it. Let’s be honest, being from Chicago, Domino’s can’t compare to Lou Malnati’s and Gino’s East, but for $5.99 you’ll be happy with it.

    It would be interesting to see how Domino’s is leveraging technology to improve the customer experience and the role it played in admitting to their faults. Unfortunately we cannot program a “humility” module into our software. However, an effective customer experience platform can help you identify the customers that need to hear “sorry”.  With that first step, you have a great customer service strategy.

    January 21, 2012 Blog Comments Off on Humility Is a Great Customer Service Strategy
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