Call centres and customer help desks play an integral part in any business. These centres used to be offices crammed with workstations and headsets. However, things are changing. As technology evolves, the way we communicate with customers shifted from traditional methods of communication to instant messaging and live video conferencing.
The pandemic forced businesses to adopt new ways of communicating with their customers while maintaining a human touch. Combining the best technologies with an attentive approach, businesses can now provide an omnichannel customer experience.
Live Chat
Customer satisfaction ratings tend to be higher for live chat than other types of customer support channels. Recent studies found that customers who use live chat are 2.8 times more likely to convert and spend over 60 times more than those who don’t. 64% of people would rather message than call a business, which is why call centres should start investing in live chat channels such as instant messaging and social media.
Live chat enables your agents to deliver real-time service and offer proactive assistance to customers. Automated live chat can also answer common customer queries such as opening times, product information and pricing, resulting in a more productive workforce.
Video Chat
Companies are moving towards video chat to offer personalised engagements with their customers, especially for more complex queries like technical support. Agents can only explain so much over the phone or via live chat. Video conferencing enables the agents to see what the customer is doing, which will provide for better guidance through screen sharing tools.
Remote Working
Remote working became a necessity due to the pandemic and businesses discovered that planning for a hybrid model is not as difficult as once thought. Platforms such as 3CX allow a call centre agent to turn his desktop or mobile phone into an office extension by simply adding a headset. By leveraging the one number concept, employees’ personal contact details remain private, and all calls to the office are free of charge.
Cloud-Based Technologies
Cloud-based technologies enable agents to access call centre systems from anywhere in the world, as long as they have an internet connection. Cloud-based technologies will offer greater flexibility as well as keeping customer data more secure than traditional on-site data centres.
Cloud-based call centres can lower overhead expenses as it offers a set monthly subscription which means you will only pay for what you use.
Read more on How to reduce your call center’s cost per call.
How we can help you make the Switch
There are a few things to consider before switching to new applications. First, you have to look at what tools your customers and employees rely on? For example, would your customers like to speak to your support team via video conferencing and screen share? Can you boost efficiency in the workplace by giving your employees the proper tools to collaborate better on projects? Does your business operate remotely?
Adopting new applications can seem daunting, but, luckily we are here to assist you with tailored solutions specific to your organisation’s needs.
Simply request a callback, and one of our friendly advisors will be in contact with you for a free assessment and answer any questions you might have.