Metrics is a great tool for setting goals and tracking progress toward those goals. Metrics assist more improvement — by removing necessity subjective instinct and sub-optimal guessing. They also promote responsibility by providing transparency into performance and creating feedback channels.
Furthermore, industry standards for these indicators allow contact centres to compare themselves to the competition fairly. Furthermore, they can improve the customer services as well as the income of the contact centre.
So, what are among the most important metrics that every call centre should track?
And, in terms of these indicators, what exactly are the industry standards?
#1: Quality of service and response times
Typically, most call centres attempted to adhere to the 80/20 rule, which states that 80 per cent of calls should be answered in 20 seconds. However, according to the Call Center Helper Survey of 2019, many call centres are now striving to handle 90% of callers in 15 seconds.
According to a current HubSpot study, 90 per cent of customers consider "instant" responses from customer support to be vital. This expectation must operate as a motivator for call centres to enhance their response times.
Now, what are the “ideal” reaction time metrics? These differ by channel, as per Call Centre Helper:
· 100% of emails are replied to within four hours, and 80% are addressed within 15 minutes.
· 80 per cent of live chats are replied to within 20 seconds.
· Using Social Media to define, but a great benchmark is to answer 100% of enquiries within 60 minutes.
· Text messages Apps - 80% of texts are answered in under 40 seconds.
How to improve
To automate common email replies, use a customer testimonials management platform. A social engagement platform can find relevant, effective posts on social media and add them to a case backlog for quick follow-up and solution. A self-service chatbot is an excellent approach to reduce response times in live chat and SMS. They can discover quick answers thanks to in-context assistance and an integrated knowledge library on the agent desktop, which reduces responsiveness across these channels. Users that normally require human interaction can reach an operator with no wait time if they use a self-service portal, which minimises call volumes.
#2: AHT-Average Handling Time
The overall duration of a single client transaction is known as average handle time. It covers chat time, wait time, and any transaction-related follow-up responsibilities.
AHT is a valuable statistic for assessing agent productivity. However, since a shorter AHT does not always imply effective resolution, it might be misleading. As a result, it's critical to look at other measures such as FCR and CSAT in addition to AHT.
How to improve
To reduce the length of interactions, find strategies to reduce hold times, and reduce the time spent on tasks such as information retrieval, data entry, and event follow-ups. To do so, record and evaluate calls to identify gaps and potential reasons (e.g. inadequate training).
Make cheat sheets for common call types or FAQs to give agents quick responses or directions. A good call centre agent script also can assist agents to provide efficient customer service, minimising AHT and optimizing the call-handling process.
Agents can instantly access key client information and obtain a 360° picture of the customer lifecycle with a single agent desktop, allowing them to provide prompt and effective support while reducing AHT.
#3: FCR-First Contact Resolution
The first-call resolution rate (FCR) represents a contact centre's ability to address the problems of the customers the very first time they call to speak. It isn't always straightforward to quantify FCR in today's Omni channel customer care environment since determining which engagement was genuinely the customer's initial encounter might be tricky.
Despite this, the industry standard for FCR is 70–75 per cent.
How to improve
It's best to judge a problem's FCR based on the initial contact, irrespective of the channel involved. FCR should be calculated on two levels: average and per channel. These indicators can help you assess channel efficacy and identify gaps that require attention - expanding chatbot knowledgebase, improving website layout, and so on.
CRM integration, along with solutions like click-to-dial, can help to speed the support process and boost FCR by providing relevant customer data, perspective, and insights.
#4: Case Escalations
An escalation from that of an operator or agent to a manager is referred to as an instance (or call) elevation in this section. It is a problem that requires to be addressed right away since it could signal major skills or certification inadequacies in an agent.
The standard for case escalation in the sector is: 10% of the population (of cases)
How to improve
Another tried and tested technique is to arm agents with the information and context that have to effectively address issues to the satisfaction of customers. Click-to-dialer, operator scripts, and CRM as well as other connectors (ServiceNow, Zendesk, etc.) can all be beneficial.
A Supervisor Desktop is also another technique for reducing escalations. This application provides supervisors with actual statistics on agent performance, allowing them to monitor agents' results and make the appropriate actions to re-skill or training and developing the "back-benchers."
#5: Call Quality Analysis-QA scoring
QA scoring is a method of evaluating the call quality of a call centre. It entails evaluating recorded phone calls and contrasting them to pre-set parameters for professionalism, courtesy, and greets, among other things.
It's a popular statistic with a 75-90 per cent industry norm, i.e. scoring four random calls every month.
These industry criteria are not met by many customer services. This is significant because the QA score is a valuable tool for identifying common issues, improving agent performance, standardising and benchmarking communication processes, and improving user experiences. It's also a crucial tool for tracking progress and determining the measures required to continually achieve the optimum client experience as they do it in call center in Kenya.
How to improve
Peer feedback workshops, in which agents examine one another's calls at random, can assist boost QA scores. It can be a weekly activity, with the scoring agent offering input on each scored call (this can be a rotational function, with each agent designated as the scorer for a week). This effective strategy can help you avoid problems with the QA team. It's also a fantastic method to foster a coaching, training, and constant improvement culture.
Before We Wrap Up...
Now you have an excellent place to start tracking the relevant KPIs for your call centre in 2021. However, keep in mind that additional measures such as max occupancy, shrinkage, client retention, and desertion rate may be valuable as well. Identify the most appropriate things and compare them to industry standards regularly.