#contactcenterworld, @Semafone

Author: Gary Barnett, CEO, Semafone

The contact center industry is in a state of significant transition. An increased focus on omnichannel customer engagement, coupled with the growing adoption of new technologies such as cloud computing, artificial intelligence and analytics, is shifting the way many contact centers operate. When used correctly, these emerging technologies can help call and contact centers transition from being viewed as a cost center, to becoming a thriving profit center – driving increased sales and customer retention. The difference between an effective, efficient and profitable contact center and one that operates as a cost center, can often be boiled down to one thing – the utilization of call analytics. Without the business performance insights gained through analytics, a contact center can make the same mistakes repeatedly, resulting in fewer sales or a broken customer experience.

Traditional contact centers, which have relied primarily on verbal communication over the phone, have long used data to measure their customer journeys, improve the customer experience and increase operational efficiency. Basic performance indicators such as average handling time, wait times, first call resolution and call abandonment rates have provided contact center managers with data points that help them understand the customer experience. However, these data points only provide limited insights. Data means nothing without proper analysis. Research from McKinsey & Company shows that the use of advanced analytics within contact centers enables organizations to reduce average handling times by as much as 40 percent and boost the conversion rate on service-to-sales calls by nearly 50 percent. The firm also found that analytics helped contact centers increase self-service among customers by as much as 20 percent and reduce employee costs by as much as $5 million.

Benefits of Modern Contact Center Analytics

Today, contact centers can utilize much more advanced analytics technologies than the simple wait time and call handling time measurements of the past. Whereas in the past, the data analytics available to a call center were delivered after the fact (when it is too late to act upon), today’s advanced analytics solutions can provide real-time insights into where customers are in their purchasing process. For example, modern call analytics solutions can provide contact center agents the ability to view when the customer is inputting their payment card information, or when they are having an issue. They can provide contact center managers the ability to view the percentage of successful payment transaction calls completed at particular times of day. This information can be shared with sales and marketing managers within the organization to better understand the optimal times for running marketing and/or debt collection campaigns with a payment call-to-action.

The insights provided by advanced call analytics can help contact center managers:

• Improve Quality of Service & Customer Experience – modern analytics can help identify points of friction for customers and highlight potential resolutions.
  
  
• Reduce Costs – by gaining real-time insights into the customer’s journey, agents can operate more efficiently and even intervene to help the customer, thus reducing callbacks and other operating costs.
  
  
• Track the Customer Journey – today’s customer journey is complex with multiple points of entry; analytics can provide better insight into the full path customers take to get to a sale.
  
  
• Maximize Upselling Opportunities – with a clearer insight into where customers are along their journey, and agents can more easily identify opportunities for upselling.
  
  
• Effectively Plan – analyzing purchasing and payment patterns can help organizations identify the peak times for campaigns and promotions.
  
  

Implementing an Analytics Program

The maximum benefits of modern analytics solutions can only be reaped if an organization is able to take a holistic view of timely data. Timely data is key, as a good analytics provider understands what data is important to deliver immediately, versus historically. Without real-time data, the information is only available after it is too late to act on.

However, too often, the contact center operates in a silo separate from the rest of the organization. For maximum benefit, businesses must eliminate silos and merge data into a single source for greater interpretation. Breaking down these silos enables an organization to take a holistic approach to maximizing operational efficiency, rather than attempting to solve individual problems retroactively.

To implement a holistic and proactive strategy, you must first outline your goals. An organization-wide transformation can only occur if solutions and processes are created to support business initiatives and activities. Tailor your contact center KPIs to your organization’s definitions of success rather than cookie-cutter terms.

Another common challenge that organizations face when adopting analytics solutions occurs when contact center managers and business leaders find themselves looking at too much data without the proper tools and technical expertise to analyze this information. Look for solutions that include intuitive and graphical dashboards and those that enable contact center managers to create customized views of the data and trends they will need to access regularly. Unnecessary clutter can both confuse and hinder decision-making.

Implementing an effective analytics program doesn’t just happen on its own. It takes heavy lifting and buy-in from across the organization. Despite the challenges of implementing a truly effective analytics program, the benefits vastly outweigh the negatives. Keep these key considerations in mind in order to implement your analytics program. With the intelligence gained through powerful, real-time analytics, businesses can improve sales and marketing campaigns, provide a better working environment for agents, reduce agent turnover and increase customer satisfaction with a positive brand experience. This not only helps contact centers increase efficiency and profitability, but also helps pave the way for their ongoing digital transformation to become the omnichannel, customer engagement center of tomorrow.

#contactcenterworld, @Semafone