Category Archives: Call Center

Call Agent Job Description and Duties

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woman speaking on headsetWorking in a phone center can be a great opportunity for professional development and personal growth.

The right candidate will have excellent communication skills, good organization, and an eye for detail. We have outlined here some of the different job duties, necessary skills, and qualifications below. As well we discuss what our agency will do to provide support to our call center business services (read more…) specialists.

Job Duties

Your typical day in a call center includes taking phone calls from clients who are looking for some type of customer service. Our extensive training programs will prepare you to gather the required information from the clients, and verify that information in our database. You will then proceed to bring the call to an appropriate resolution, with the goal of providing outstanding service to the caller.

You are expected to gain familiarity with the products and procedures through ongoing educational opportunities. Not only will you need this familiarity to understand the products and procedures yourself, but also to explain them to clients. It is important to have a firm understanding of all concepts before communicating them to our clients so that they feel confident that you are able to assist them properly.


Excellent customer service skills, familiarity with our products, and quick attention to any technical issues you may experience will ensure your success in this area. The goal is to provide the customer with service that will benefit them, so it is important to be able to communicate clearly to meet their needs.

Skills and Qualifications Needed

female call center agentThe perfect candidate for a position in a contact center like https://www.kpiconnect.com will have strong interpersonal communication skills. They will be professional and courteous at all times, and remember to keep themselves customer-focused, putting the customer’s needs first. They will keep in mind that one of their jobs is to provide information and support to customers who may not be familiar with our company’s products or procedures. Previous phone experience is a bonus as it will make your transition that much easier.

Call center specialists are required to have great attention to detail even while multi-tasking. They should be able to obtain information from clients, enter it into the computer, and verify it without losing focus. Strong, accurate data entry skills are a must. Applicants should be comfortable using a computer and a phone simultaneously, and should be quick to learn computer software.

Agent Support

Our goal is for our call center specialists to be as informed and successful as possible. We ensure this by providing regular updates on products, communicating our organization’s mission with you, and offering continual educational opportunities for you to better your skills. We understand that helping our agents to improve themselves will benefit not only them, but the customer as well.

In turn, we ask for our call center specialists to keep the line of communication open at all times. This includes promptly communicating any technical or equipment issues so that they can be addressed, adhering to all standards and guidelines, and recommending any procedural improvements that should be made to streamline the process and provide better customer service.

Overall

Working in a call center is extremely valuable work. Call center specialists provide front-line support between us and our customers, making them highly valued members of our team. Furthermore, call center specialists will never be bored. Between phone calls, data entry, and ongoing training opportunities, there’s always something to do. If you enjoy continual customer interaction in a fast-paced environment, then a position as a call center agent may be right for you. Contact KPI Connect today about joining our team.

9 Benefits of Outsourcing to a Contact Center

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Some Ways Outsourcing Calls Benefits Businesses

Outsourcing some of your phone contact with your customers is a valuable business concept that deserves some serious consideration. In addition to saving money, there are many advantages to a call center as opposed to setting up an in-house option.

  1. Customer Satisfaction: By outsourcing to a call center like KPI Connect Ltd., businesses can offer customer service that is available outside their normal operating hours. This helps to reduce customers having to wait until the next day or the next week to find a solution to their problems. With call centers located in different time zones it has made the opportunity for expanded hours of availability a reality.

 

  1. Ready To Roll: Setting up all of the systems required to handle customer service calls in-house can be a costly and time-consuming task for any business. The immediate advantage to outsourcing these calls to a professional call center is that the facilities, equipment, and training are already in place and being used by other companies.

 

  1. Cost Reduction: While cutting costs isn’t the only benefit to outsourcing customer service (https://www.kpiconnect.com/services/call-center-services/), it is one that comes up most often. Since contact centers serve multiple clients, the costs involved are shared among many, rather than one business footing the bill. This way, clients pay only for the services needed on a transactional or per-hour basis.

 

  1. Profitability: Call centers are great at what they do, and they know how to get the most bang for your buck. Their business model is generally based on costs per transaction, and they have the measurement of per-call costs down to an exact science to ensure maximum profit.

  1. Experience: With years of experience in customer service, contact centers possess a strong understanding of what services are required for a variety of industries. By outsourcing the customer service end, the client can leave it in capable hands and focus on their core business.

 

  1. Efficiency: Due to their experience in the field, call centers can improve efficiency by scheduling more staff to work during peak hours, slashing idle time and lowering the cost-per-call rate. Many businesses find that their customer service call volume increases during seasonal periods or major promotional campaigns. Contact centers have the resources to quickly add staff for these busy times of the year.

 

  1. Knowledge: As they are familiar with a number of different clients’ processes, call centers offer a wide spectrum of skills and knowledge, making them adaptable and flexible. They are specialized service providers with particular expertise in workforce planning, quality assurance, technology, and training.

 

  1. Technology: Rather than trying to keep up with current technology in-house, businesses can trust contact centers (What’s the difference between a contact center and a call center?) are always on the cutting edge. Multi-channel customer contact is essential these days and they can handle it all, from cloud-based platforms, VoIP, and web chat to email, SMS text messages, and social media. They also offer data analysis technology that can mine the raw data for valuable insight into a customer base.

guy speaking with contact center

  1. Quality Control: Through monitoring tools, performance assessments, and improvement plans, call centers ensure that they maintain the highest level of quality. Their most urgent priorities are answer time and first-call resolution, whereas an in-house call center may not have the time or resources to devote to such a high standard of quality control.

 

Here at KPI Connect we have been offering these services to our customers for years. We have the knowledge, resources, and expertise to ensure you get great value, and your customers receive excellent service. Call today for more details. 1-877-828-5057

Infographic reviewing benefits of having another company help your customers over the phone.

Inbound or Outbound? What Is the Difference Between the Types of Call Centers?

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There are advantages to both inbound and outbound call centers. Each serves a specific purpose. Each center serves to support a business in marketing and sales. Both inbound and outbound centers are essential to the functioning of an organization. There are clearly defined differences between both types of phone centers. This is a description of the essential functions of each.

Inbound

 

Inbound centers handle incoming calls from clients. Because these services handle the majority of incoming business phone calls, they are very customer service oriented. Clients call an inbound center when they have questions, need a solution to a problem, or are interested in conducting further business with a particular company.

 

(What’s the difference between Contact Center vs Call Center?)

 

  • Tech Support: One of the major functions of an inbound call is tech support. When consumers or businesses have problems with technical issues, they will call a support number for a solution. The tech support agents will run diagnostics as appropriate, and expertly guide clients through the process of resolving technical problems.
  • Customer Support: Clients will telephone an with questions pertaining to a particular service. Inbound calls are essential for providing excellent service and superior customer experiences. Customer support is provided to customers in a friendly and professional manner. Customers call up for a variety of reasons for which they expect agents to be versed in a resolution and possess the ability to provide options.
  • Response to Advertising: This is another customer advantage to this type of service. Clients call to inquire about a posted advertisement. Often this inquiry will generate a sale. The inbound agents are specially trained in the company for whom they are servicing. They familiarize themselves with the products and services the company offers so they are equipped to discuss the products with current and potential clients.

 

Customers invest a lot of time and trust into inbound phone centers to provide them with the services they are seeking. In order to be provided with excellent service there needs to be mutual respect and understanding between agents and clients.

 

Outbound

 

An outbound phone center tends to handle a whole set of different services. Rather than a client telephoning an agent, the opposite occurs with an outbound call center. Outbound centers can be focused on generating and following up with leads and driving sales, or outbound Customer Service tasks. Outbound services are associated with several specific functions.

 

  • Customer Service: Because customer service is critical for most successful businesses, there are some tasks that can be handled by outbound agents. If a company needs to schedule times with their customers, then appointment setting would be a useful solution. Appointment reminders are also a valuable use of an outbound service to minimize lost time due to missed appointments.
  • Market Research: Often they are responsible for conducting market research. This can include telephoning customers and conducting surveys relating to customer service and experience. Surveys serve a variety of purposes and can help companies make improvements in areas where they may be lacking. Market research is essentially the process of gathering information from consumers regarding their preferences and needs.
  • Lead generation: This is a very important function of an outbound agent. One of the essential steps in lead generation is for outbound agents to identify a company’s target market. This is where lead generation is vital. Leads need to be generated for the specific target market. The target market are consumers who are the most likely to purchase or use the product or service. Two main types of lead generation are B2B and B2C. Both serve to drive sales. Companies rely heavily on outbound call center agents to properly generate leads to build a client base and drive sales.
  • Sales: One main duty for many outbound phone agents is to make sales. With the generated leads, agents telephone potential clients to make sales. The main way the agents make significant company sales is through up-selling and cross-selling. Up-selling is the process of attracting customers to a more expensive product than the one they intended to purchase. Cross-selling is the process of persuading clients to purchase additional products to go with the product they originally intended.

 

Outbound call agents are well trained in sales techniques and company specific products so they have the proper tools to make sales. Often the outbound service is the main sales force for a company.

 

Advantages to Outsourcing

 

Both types of call centers are commonly outsourced, which provides a lot of benefits to a company. The functions of both types of call centers are both costly and time consuming. Many companies experience a lot of advantage in outsourcing their call centers.

 

  • Cost effectiveness: Outsourcing phone centers provide their own employees and training structure which saves companies a lot of money by not having to employ and train their own.
  • Increased Productivity:A huge advantage to outsourcing is the ability of established centers to focus on core functions such as sales, customer service, and lead generation. Agents are trained specifically for these functions which helps companies reduce the work load of their in-house employees.
  • Brand Representation: Agents are specially trained on the products and services of each company. They become well versed with the ins and outs of each company so they can effectively attract the target market and make and close sales
  • Analysis and Collection of Data: An outsourced center has the ability to train employees in data collection and analysis. This specialized area trains them to understand company trends, collect data based on client spending habits and experiences, and analyze this data to ultimately drive sales.

 

When companies use inbound and outbound call centers, they are entrusting their customers and clients will experience an excellent level service. The differences between the two cell centers are very specific and each serve a crucial function to a company. Both are customer based, but with very different specific goals. Whenever customers interact with a representative on the phone, they deserve quality service by competent agents, and that is exactly what the receive. At KPI Connect we have extensive experience offering both types of service, and we would love to discuss solutions we can offer your business.

infographic discussing difference between outbound and inbound call centers

What’s the difference? Call Center vs Contact Center.

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Traditionally many companies, especially telecommunications companies and service organizations, have used call center agent companies. As the name implies, call centers handle calls. You may also have heard about contact centers, but what are they? Which one is best? Let’s look at call center vs contact center and see what the difference is between them.

Difference Between Call vs Contact

 

The main difference between a call center and a contact center is that they offer different services.

These services have been used for many years and only deal with phone calls. The calls are both inbound and outbound as they are known in the trade, or incoming and outgoing to you and I. When you phone up your bank or your phone provider, you are almost certainly speaking to an employee in a call center. The call center could be owned and operated by the company, or an external organization. The emphasis within a call center is on the calls, and their success is monitored through their call statistics like how quickly are calls answered or how many calls are dealt with per hour.

In customer service terms, a ‘contact’ is somebody who has contacted the organization through any means. Therefore a contact center deals with communication in all types whether it be the phone, email, coupon or social media. If you enter a competition to win a box of chocolates, your entry whether on a torn out coupon from a magazine, email, or website, the entry goes to the contact center. They pass the details to the chocolate company and you are now a contact so you will receive information or marketing from that company. Contact centers monitor their success on statistics around the number of contacts and the channels used i.e. phone, coupon, web etc.

Although the terms are used interchangeably, you can clearly see that there are differences between the two. So which one should you use?

 

 Offer the Following Services:

 

  • Telephone Customer service for incoming calls.
  • Telephone Customer service through outgoing calls.
  • Handle heavy volumes of telephone contact.
  • Telephone technical support i.e. a helpdesk.
  • Telephone support for order placement and status.
  • Telephone surveys of customers and potential customers to provide better service.
  • Can be on-site, off-site, or virtual.
  • Agents often adhere to a specific customized script.

 Benefits of Using a Phone Center.

Very large companies often have a phone center service as part of their business. If you are a company dealing with a large number of incoming and outgoing phone calls, then a call center is vital. Call centers are particularly beneficial to businesses, as it means they can concentrate on their business while the time intensive phone queries and interactions are handled by someone else.

 

  • Handle large numbers of incoming calls.
  • Deal with large numbers of outgoing calls.
  • Tend to be experts at what they do as they concentrate on one thing.

Contact Centers Offer These Services:

 Incoming customer service for all contacts in multiple formats; mail, email, social media, phone, web queries, live chats.

  • Outgoing customer contact through multiple formats; mail, email, social media, phone, live chats.
  • Contact centers are normally operated by an external company like KPI Connect specializing in being a contact center, not a specific business.

 Benefits of Using a Contact Center.

Contact centers handle large numbers of queries through all types of media. Contact center agents require good people skills due to the social media transactions they carry out. A thoughtless comment on social media can easily go viral.

  • Handle queries on different communication channels.
  • Deal with heavy volumes of mixed media contact.
  • Generally available 24/7.
  • Works well for businesses in different countries and time zones.
  • Other forms of media usually are more cost effective than phone calls.
  • Live chat is growing in use and customer satisfaction as it becomes more successful.

 Contact Center, or Call Center, or Both?

Both call centers and contact centers provide customer service, but as you can see, both perform different functions and there are benefits to both. Depending on your business needs, you might require specific services from one or the other, or possibly even both.