Compelling Trends you Need to Follow About a Call Center in 2021
The splendid evolution of digital marketing and artificial intelligence (AI) has increased customer expectations. Today, customers demand more in terms of response time and solutions. How you respond to your customer is directly proportional to the customer experience. Hence, in this extremely competitive world, you need to ace the ongoing trends to your business.
This guide brings you all the techniques and trends that will drive you to optimal customer experience. So without any further due, let’s dive into the trends that will overcome all the difficulties you face and enhance your business in the true sense.
The Top Trends you Need to Bring in Your Call Center in 2021
Omni-Channel Communication
In layman terms, Omni-Channel means an integrated system where all potential modes of communication between a company and it’s customers are available – phone, email, social media, web chat, mobile chat etc. There is no denying how convenient the omni-channel approach is. The consistent demand for the Omni-channel communication makes it a trendy process that is set to grow further in 2021. Customers don’t like contacting through a single medium and prefer choices. Giving the flexibility to choose the channel of contact according to their preference is a solid way to win your customer’s heart.
Offer your customers the adaptability to contact you in either of the ways. Be it on social media, live chats, email, SMSs, or more. Implementing an Omni-channel approach creates a seamless interaction between your customer and the call center agent. Improves your customer experiences and gives your agent to understand the future probabilities in terms of how your customer likes to get in touch with you better.
AI Voice bots and IVR
An interactive voice response IVR system may look abstract, yet when mingled with Artificial intelligence (AI), it can actively resolve problems and provide better customer service 24/7. AI has uplifted the essentiality of IVR and turned the future of call centers thrivingly. However, not to confuse that robotic tools and AI aren’t going to replace humans in your call center. They are here to complement them in the daily tasks.
Isn’t it frustrating when you get to listen to “press 1 for sales,” “press 2 for existing service,” and so on? Customers get annoyed with this; with AI-enabled IVR and bots, get rid of it. With AI, you are able to identify the voice commands and revert quickly to the queries through voice and texts.
Since verse communication is a fundamental process that takes place with everyone, the evolution of voice bots will remarkably align with the entire calling process. Undoubtedly, This implementation will be the most spectacular AI-based communications that can be a part of call centers.
An Enacted Business System
To acquire the best, you need to connect all your business systems accurately and efficiently. In this digitally-driven era, you need to upgrade your working procedure with the best tools suitable for your call center. Business tools are in high demand as they present you with the appropriate data and records.
So, to get all the customer records and data in one articulated place, you need to enact your business with the tools like CRM, BI, or ERP systems.
Therefore, one of the primary elements to set yourself ahead of your competitors is to integrate your call center business system. This will enable your call center agents to understand the customers better and respond accordingly.
Cloud-Based Communication channels
After the Covid-19 pandemic, working remotely using cloud-based communication channels has become the new normal. It is estimated that over 50% of call centers plan to use cloud-based technologies in times to come. And why not? After all, cloud and remote-based technology have many perks. It is affordable, reduces the admin cost and also offers great flexibility from a location standpoint.
With this, contact center agents can perform better. They can handle the calls flexibly, and your center management will not be restricted to a specific location. Cloud technology will make your business more extensive beyond the bounds of geographical borders and time zones.
The major benefit of a cloud system is it’s functionality with mobile phones that stands out. The call center agent may or may not be available on the computer with a mobile app and VoIP; they can handle the customer’s call anywhere and anytime via a Smartphone.
Analytics and Reporting
Data analytics and reporting are crucial for a successful call center. Interestingly, approximately 90% of call centers consider customer journey data analytics essential for the call center business. The high popularity of analytics and reporting software emerges as one of the most useful trends and technologies you need to look at in 2021.
Perhaps, it is true that the call center relies on the agents and supervisors and their skills of how they all perform and the customer’s experience with your firm. Manual functions have their respective status, yet with advanced analytics provided in real-time, it can make your business even more effective and efficient. With these, you can make changes real time.
Call centers are implementing advanced analytics programs to create dashboards with statistics that impact their businesses. The display of statistical dashboards on user interfaces helps call center operators and managers to check and provide real-time updates on customer experience and other parameters.
Digital Transformation
Gone are the days when your service or products’ quality and price differentiated you from the competitors. Today, the customer also considers a good response from you that gives them a pleasing experience, ultimately creating a healthy relationship with your company.
This means you need to overhaul the customer interaction strategy besides your products/services’ quality and price. And this is why; digital transformation needs to step into the call center environment. For delivering a great experience, you need to utilize innovative technologies and machine learning for the change in your call center working process.
The use of unified communication and collaboration has helped the call center management leverage the whole business system’s collective knowledge.
Social Media Engagement
While checking out the best trends, you cannot ignore the power of social media platforms. Over the years, the demand for social media networking sites has been raised, so why not use such a powerful medium to give you a great ROI and customer experience?
According to the surveys, nearly 53% of the world’s population is active on social media. With this, it is clear that handling your queries and inquiries on social media will result in fruitful consequences. Some stats say that 72% of companies using social media reported that their social media activities have increased and these activities involve the customers reaching out to the product or services and companies. A customer expects you to get your business active on social media so that they can reach you anytime.
If you want to win the race, you need to take your social media platforms seriously. LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram, and other social networking sites have shown a great result in recent times.
Final Thoughts on the Trends for Call Center
The future of call centers is exceptionally bright. AI technology, chatbots, analytics, cloud-based technology and other advanced tools have crafted a better opportunity for the call center industry. The emergence of these trends is surely for the better and you should not lag behind without implementing these compelling trends to your business.
The contact center trends are to entice and support customers in an approach that is never like before. With the trends mentioned above and technologies, you will witness great progress in your business, offering your customer a happy experience.