Deciphering call center terms and jargon
If you think that these terms are separate services of a call center with no relation to each other, think again. All of these, together as one, turn the customer experience into an extremely smooth journey. As separate components working towards the one common goal, all of them aim to keep the customer satisfied and delighted, which would ultimately result in higher sales. These tools also end up being very useful to the agent and help them handle multiple calls and requests, at the same time.
A brief on these tools is as below:
- Click-to-Call: This is a useful web tool to convert prospects into customers. Click-to-Call feature allows the customers to talk to a live agent while viewing the company website. Customers can select the click-to-call button and the agent will have all the information regarding which page the customer was viewing and giving the agent ample time to prepare in advance so as to handle the call. The agent is thus, able to guide the customer through the query or issue.
- Virtual Queuing: To avoid the long waiting time when a customer calls a contact center, the virtual queue comes to the customer’s and agent’s rescue. Contact centers can decrease the volume of abandoned or dropped calls and get accurate reports on all the calls coming through. The customers are connected to the agent after the expected wait time, or they can request a callback at a later time.
- Virtual Hold: Allows you to not listen to some screeching music anymore! Isn’t that wonderful?! Virtual hold is therefore, the solution to the unlimited waiting time of the past. It reserves the customer’s place in the queue and as soon as an agent becomes available, the system gives them a callback and connects them to the available agent.
- Callbacks: Have you noticed the phone icon on websites which asks you to request a callback? Callback is an excellent tool which integrates telephony with the website and gives the customer the chance to quickly connect to the agent. These can be used to ask queries, resolve issues, report problems, etc. Callback integrates with the web to expand the customer base, and retain the existing ones.
So, How Do These Tools Help You?
It depends on the experience you have with the individual contact centers. While I have personally had some great service from the smaller contact centers, I have also felt angry at the bigger companies for not valuing me enough. Haven’t we all had those experiences?
As a customer, you want to be treated like royalty. Click-to-call and callbacks let you connect with agents when you are browsing the site, and information is made available to you both through the website and through the agent. The guidance provided by the agent helps in better understand the company products and services, and you get an enhanced online shopping/browsing experience.
Virtual queues and virtual hold on the other hand, ensure that as a customer your valuable time is treated valuably by the contact center. “No more waiting†is the motto and the tools and solutions used by contact centers to provide these services to you work only if you do not feel frustrated or angry at the customer care. The freedom to skip the waiting list allows you as a customer to focus on other tasks while the contact center gathers information about you, so that they can serve you in the best capacity.
With the help of an effective technology solution, agents can optimise their time when the system automatically stores all customer information, and alerts the agents of the calls received and waiting in the queue, as well as the priority of each call. And that is a boon for everyone including the customer. May the customer always be the king!