There’s no doubt about it that call centres are a key component of a company’s delivery strategy – whether it is to get new customers or improve customer relations.
Watch below to find out what the day in the life of a call centre agent is like:
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There are two types of call centres, although some centres include both roles:
- Inbound centres – receive calls and emails from customers, for example queries, requests, orders and complaints
- Outbound centres – contact potential customers to get information or to sell a product
Managers of call centres are not only responsible for the daily running of the centre to guarantee customer satisfaction but also to boost sales. Aside from that, they also have to motivate the call centre agents and maximise operational performance.
There are four key aspects to a call centre manager’s role:
Sales and customer service
Managers have to
- drive call centre agents towards meeting sales targets
- make sure that agents have first-rate product knowledge, and most importantly, the resilience to sell the right products to the right people, and
- make sure that agents have the knowledge and skills to respond to and resolve customer queries quickly and effectively.
Agent performance
- The performance of individual agents is essential to the success of any call centre.
- Managers are responsible to recruit, train, manage and monitor agents.
- Training programmes have to equip agents with good product and service knowledge, as well as customer handling skills.
- There are many metrics available to assess agents’ performance in direct sales, leads and retention based campaigns.
Balancing resources
- Call centres require significant investment in technology and people.
- Managers should always use available resources in the most efficient and cost-effective manner.
- Another challenge is to make sure that the right level of resources is available to meet customer demand, especially during peak-times and follow-ups.
Reporting
- Call centre managers have to report on various aspects of performance to other members of the management team.
- Sales and marketing managers needs reports on outbound sales performance, while finance executives want reports on the operational costs of the call centre.
- The IT team will also need information on operational performance like call volumes to meet the need for additional resources, for example email and videoconferencing.
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