Top Tips for 2024! What is going to make the biggest difference this year? Ready to take your customer service to a new level?
Call centres all over the world need key areas of focus to have a great year. We're talking about the art of selling—yes, even you, the customer service pro, are in sales, whether you're booking appointments or solving problems. You're selling an unforgettable experience that keeps customers coming back for more. And when it comes to your voice, it's not just what you say but how you say it. We'll show you how to turn your voice into a powerful instrument that captivates and connects with callers.
As our world becomes more digital by the second, your prowess with chat and email is essential. We've got insider tips to polish those skills to perfection. So, whether you're riding the wave of high-volume calls or crafting a response that works, we've got the top tips to help you thrive in the contact centre game. Tune in and transform the way you engage with customers—it's more than a conversation; it's an experience!
Find more useful and essential contact centre development from realitytraining.com
Top Tips for 2024! What is going to make the biggest difference this year? Ready to take your customer service to a new level?
Call centres all over the world need key areas of focus to have a great year. We're talking about the art of selling—yes, even you, the customer service pro, are in sales, whether you're booking appointments or solving problems. You're selling an unforgettable experience that keeps customers coming back for more. And when it comes to your voice, it's not just what you say but how you say it. We'll show you how to turn your voice into a powerful instrument that captivates and connects with callers.
As our world becomes more digital by the second, your prowess with chat and email is essential. We've got insider tips to polish those skills to perfection. So, whether you're riding the wave of high-volume calls or crafting a response that works, we've got the top tips to help you thrive in the contact centre game. Tune in and transform the way you engage with customers—it's more than a conversation; it's an experience!
Find more useful and essential contact centre development from realitytraining.com
Speaker 1:
Contact Center Focus the reality training podcast.
Speaker 2:
Hello CCF listeners, or as Bobby likes to call you contact center focus listeners.
Speaker 1:
Marvelous Welcome to 2024. We are going to kick off 2024 in a similar vein to the way we started 2023. One of our most popular episodes of the whole year was our top tips for contact centers 2023. And, of course, we're going to continue that theme now with top tips for contact centers for 2024. So, jeremy, let me go over to you. What tips do you have for our listeners today?
Speaker 2:
My number one tip. I have three. We're going to back between each other, as Bobby's just said, and then, if you keep listening, we have got a wonderful free resource that you can request and be sent. So number one you are all in sales. I promise you you are. If you're listening to this and you run a customer service center. You're in retention, you're sorting things. You're just date booking, organizing delivery of vehicles, whatever it is. You are selling the experience of what you do to that customer. You do that well. You'll retain and grow your business. Stop thinking you're purely in some role that doesn't have a monetary value or revenue generating aspect. It does keep your customers happy. You're selling them your enthusiasm, your experience.
Speaker 1:
You're in sales all of you Now, mine was exactly the same Really Realize that you are in sales. Please realize you're in sales. If everyone did that, then all of you would do better. What's your number two?
Speaker 2:
Jeremy. Number two your voice is an instrument. You are listening to us. We don't meet you. You're not looking at videos of us. We have to project, we have to sound interesting. We are using water, we are eating properly, we are awake, we are warmed up. Your voice can achieve so much more. Study it. Study, tone Study, pausing, spacing, volume. There's so much you can do. It is an instrument. I encourage you. If you sound bad, you probably will be. The tonal difference you can make in your conversations is absolutely enormous, which is why you can have new people joining your teams in contact centers who have all the enthusiasm. Their tone is great, but they've got some technical difficulties, not all the knowledge, but they seem to do well, don't they? That's because they sound interested, because they are. Work on your voice. It is your instrument of your earnings.
Speaker 1:
Now, interestingly, my number two goes a bit against that. Really, I'm assuming that you have reasonable voices or you wouldn't be doing what you're doing, Although, as Jeremy says, they can always improve. My number two is upskill yourself when it comes to things like chat and email. There's only going to be more and more web chat and there's only going to be more and more email. So if you are going to be the person populating those chat boxes or writing those emails, you need to improve the way that you come across to customers in those channels. That's something you can do online yourself. There's loads of online courses. Upskill yourself when it comes to digital contact center operation.
Speaker 2:
CCF is brought to you by Reality Training. Our theatrical and entertaining approach to training means you and your people will change and improve what you do quickly and consistently. Please contact us about change projects and new sales and service models. Go to realitytrainingcom.
Speaker 2:
The final one is manage your energy more than your time. If you're going to manage your energy well, you're also managing your well-being, your emotional well-being, how you feel, and this means being aware of when you're at your best, and I'm afraid it absolutely does connect to the basics. You are working with your voice all day in a contact centre or from home, hybrid working. Whatever you're doing, you've got to get enough kip. You've got to eat properly. You've got to be awake. You've got to have energy. At certain times There'll be high-volume calling times from customers where they all call around this particular issue in time. You've got to have your energy for those key moments. So manage your energy. You'll feel like you've had a much better day. Whether you're an owl, a lark or a third bird whatever you want to call yourself Manage your energy. You'll have a brilliant day. Just be aware of how to do that.
Speaker 1:
Now I've got three here for team leaders and managers, and I think these are crucial for the next 12 months. First of all, what are the predictable wins in your contact centre If you know that you have a high number of calls for a certain product or a certain service and that 95% of the time the answer is yes, if you've got predictable wins, then digitise, if you can, those products and services, because that's going to lower the number of calls that come in, the customer can select those things online and that's going to free you and your people's time up to concentrate on the more complex conversations that need to be had. So my first lesson there for team leaders and managers what are the predictable wins? Once you know what they are, digitise them as quickly as you can. Now number four is a big one and we come across this all the time in contact centre work and it never seems to get solved. So I'm going to put this challenge for you at the beginning of 2024.
Speaker 1:
Right now Terms and conditions and GDPR and security, things around each conversation. Simplify. Simplify those things and your life will improve immeasurably. Each call will take less time, the customer will have a better experience, you will sell more. They will buy more because they won't be bogged down in endless questions which do nothing to advance the conversation at all. Get a working group going of people in your contact centre to look at the T's and C's, to look at the security questions and to look at the GDPR requirements and edit them down to the bare minimum, and if you can get rid of them completely, we believe they do nothing to advance the conversation.
Speaker 1:
And lastly and this is fundamental we are all creatures of habit. We say things a certain way, we sound a certain way. We say things like obviously and basically, and you know, and it's like you know, and how you're doing today, and all that sort of stuff. We hear it all day long. We need to change some of those habits because it's going to make us sound more professional. So, as a team leader and a manager, identify those habits and train them out of your people, because that's also going to speed up your contact centre conversations and make them sound better to all of your customers too.
Speaker 2:
Now the way we're going to help you maximise on these top tips is you are going to request by emailing hello at realitytrainingcom a reset sheet. It helps you know what you should start doing, what you should stop doing, what you should do more of, what you should do less of, designed into a lovely grid by Arla Rain. Request this, then you can reflect on everything we've covered and your previous year's so. Thank you for listening.
Speaker 1:
We're going to have more of these short, sharp and effective contact centre focus episodes for you in due course, but in the meantime, we wish you all the best for 2024. Have a fantastic year and remember there are 30 to 40 podcasts here on contact centre focus that you can use as often as you like for huddles, training sessions, motivational moments and to help you sell more.
Speaker 2:
Jeremy. Ah wonderful, isn't it? Glorious it is indeed. It's this never ending river of support. Just jump on board. Happy new year, take care.