Michael MaozMuch of the last ten years we have driven down the cost of customer service with almost no inkling of the impact it has had on customer loyalty and retention. Now that the economy is shaky I am getting asked on how to cut costs even more, but rarely is anyone measuring the full picture of what the cuts would mean. Here is a better idea: start improving your processes. Begin by creating maturity assessments of how well you are doing at each of your service interactions. How often does a CSR have to look around and decide how to tag a case? Figure out how to route an action? Look for the right resource? Multiply that by the number of agents and the number of interactions, and you have wasted money lying on the floor. What about your IVR? How effective is it? Why does it fail? What should you do? Do you have the proper customer segmentation schemes in place?
How about agent productivity? When is the last time you really innovated around work shifts and collaboration and social interaction? How about this: read MIT Professor Alex (Sandy) Pentland’s new book, Honest Signals, and find out about some new and simple methods for boosting productivity without spending money. Imagine: happier and more engaged agents doing more to make the right moves and delight customers – and all you need to do is unravel what makes them tick. I can almost guarantee you the opportunities for improvement are huge.
What about your knowledge management? How effective is your web content? Your search capabilities? The consistency with which you analyze the usefulness of the information you put out on your website or in front of the CSR? You are likely spending too much time and duplicated effort on something that should be taken to a different level, and better understood, and better ranked by the end consumer of the content – not ranked by IT.
Basically: I have seen four or five efforts that cost very little money that are having a high impact on agent morale and effectiveness, and on customer satisfaction and loyalty – all in projects going on now in the teeth of a recession – by innovative service organizations.
Don’t wait until this is over and say that you were helpless to do anything. There is plenty to be done: just ask the customer.
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3 responses so far ↓
1 Esteban Kolsky February 25, 2009 at 12:35 pm
ah, yes. asking the customer – the final frontier.
nice entry, and i concur… fully!
2 Steve Gershik March 3, 2009 at 1:47 pm
One thing is certain: there is still a LOT of inefficiency baked into customer service processes at companies, large and small.
But I’m dying to know Michael — what are the four or five efforts you’ve seen at companies that cost little money and make a huge impact?
3 Jason Mittelstaedt March 4, 2009 at 2:45 pm
Hey Michael, great post.
I couldn’t agree more. As Jack Welch put it in his address at the World Business Forum last fall … “a crisis is a terrible thing to waste.” Personally, I believe the current economic crisis could be just what the doctor ordered in terms of helping organizations regain a focus on the one that ultimately pays the bills … the customer! A business environment that encourages thrift isn’t a bad thing either, this helps managers to roll up their sleeves and focus on the near term, tangible actions they can take to meaningfully improve their customers’ experiences. You provide a great list of suggestions above on how specifically to do this.
Thanks for the book recommendation too. I’ll check it out.