#contactcenterworld, @c4auk

Many big name brands have been closing their doors, Debenhams, Select, HMV, Toys ‘R’ Us UK, Maplin are amongst them. This raises the question, what can an organisation do to survive when faced with a situation where they need to urgently save resources, but still provide a good service?

To save money, companies will begin to reduce their level of staffing, usually the last members employed will be among the first to go, meaning it can be difficult for remaining employees to handle the demand of the workload. This can lower morale and productivity further, affecting the survival of the organisation.

By laying off members of staff, the organisation can reinvest the money that they have saved on wages, this can be used to pay suppliers and procure solutions that will help bridge their staffing gap. This can include web chat software, which can be acquired on a monthly subscription, so if the worst case scenario was to happen, the company can cancel their agreement and only pay for what they have used, rather than be tied in and having to pay upfront.

How does Web Chat Software Increase Productivity?

Web chat allows several users to be logged into the system at the same time, which can be scaled up or down to reflect your staffing levels. Each available operator can take multiple chats, as each visitor will have different requirements and typing speeds, allowing a representative to be composing a response to one whilst the other is writing their message.

Where an organisation may have needed 30 representatives to answer phone and email enquiries as they could only handle one at a time, the company may now be able to reduce their staff to 10 operators handling chat enquiries, as on average a user can handle 3 chats at any one time. This is potentially 20 salaries that can be reinvested.

Operators can increase their productivity by speeding up their chat responses; this is achievable in a couple of ways. Firstly some solutions will show the visitor typing in real time; therefore representatives can start to gain an idea what the enquiry regards and begin to form how they are going to respond. Web chat systems can also provide a library of answers that have been agreed by management and are accessible to the operator during chat, providing them with a full reply or one that they can tailor to fit the question. By having quicker response rates, an operator can reduce the amount of time they are in that chat for, allowing them to handle a new enquiry sooner.

It can also increase productivity if the visitor is speaking to the correct department/representative, rather than being transferred. Web chat can be set up to direct the visitor to the relevant department either automatically with the chat button on a certain page assigned to a specific team, or with a selector on the pre-chat form where the visitor can choose who they want to speak with. This increases the chance of the enquiry being answered first time and reduces involving multiple operators.

Web chat can be implemented at any time to increase productivity whilst helping to save resources and reinvest into the company. 

#contactcenterworld, @c4auk