From Customer Satisfaction to Customer Advocacy

Transcription

1 White Paper From Customer Satisfactio to Customer Advocacy Impact of First Time Resolutio (FTR) o Customer Satisfactio ad Sales Performace Baks ad Fiacial Istitutios are ivestig heavily i customer-cetric techologies i a bid to gai customers ad retai their loyalty. Several chaels, with data ad aalytics o each, are ow available to eable upstream activities such as customer acquisitio, o boardig ad product maagemet. However, a key dowstream activity that has a direct impact o a bak s reveues Customer Service through cotact ceters is yet to be tapped as a rich source of competitive advatage. A well-oiled cotact ceter egie ca serve as a persoalizatio egie for the bak ad deliver differetiatio. First Time Resolutio (FTR) through cotact ceters is critical to buildig the brad ad retaiig loyal customers i a competitive market. It ot oly keeps customers happy but also icreases the efficiecy of the delivery team ad reduces busiess cost. This white paper discusses a approach to help baks improve customer retetio rates substatially by implemetig superior customer service processes.

2 About the Author Nirmala Jayati Nirmala Jayati has about 15 years experiece i maagig Customer Service Operatios for Global Baks. Her expertise spas areas critical to customer experiece such as First Call Resolutio ad Chael Maagemet i Customer Servicig. 2

3 Table of Cotets 1. The importace of gettig it right the first time' 4 2. Busiess beefits of a optimized FTR process 4 3. Top reasos for resolutio errors 5 4. Ways to measure FTR 5 5. Improvig FTR The key to movig beyod customer satisfactio 6 3

4 The importace of gettig it right the first time Though most orgaizatios compile a great deal of data to measure customer satisfactio, customer experiece remais uique ad persoal. Providig the iformatio the customer eeds i a timely maer ad i the format of his/her choice ehaces the experiece sigificatly. Hece the cocept of First Time Resolutio (FTR) remais oe of the key customer service teets that promote improved experiece. FTR allows busiesses to assess both the effectiveess ad the efficiecy of the service beig provided. This meas that for a effective customer experiece, the iteractio must be hadled correctly at the first cotact. A survey doe i the UK suggests that a alarmig 30% of the customers who cotact customer service eed to get i touch more tha oce to resolve their issues, ultimately leadig to customer attritio. So how ca a bak get it right the first time, every time? Measurig FTR is quite complex, but oce tracked ad achieved, it becomes a ivaluable busiess tool as it ca be used as a strategic differetiator of the bak. FTR is about uderstadig the customer s requiremets ad improvig process maagemet. Hece a resposive cotact ceter serves as a ogoig relatioship ad brad ehacemet egie for a retail bak, helpig it stad out i a otherwise commoditized bakig market place. I case of customer services at a bak or a fiacial istitutio, the cost of a sigle repeat cotact ca be about 10% of the total cost of the first cotact. Therefore, more tha oe repeat cotact will lead to eve higher costs. If a very uhappy customer takes the litigatio route, the the costs must iclude the cost to the brad image as well. There are also may reasos for customers to repeat calls dissatisfactio with the resolutio, multiple queries ad customer expectatios ot beig met, for example. Busiess beefits of a optimized FTR process First-time resolutio (FTR) represets the ultimate i service quality; it is accurate service at optimum speed, ad matches or exceeds customer expectatios. Whe optimized, icreased FTR rates ca beefit the bak i may ways: Icreased reveues whe a customer issue is resolved at the first istace he/she will be ope to upsell or cross-sell recommedatios, i.e. a happy customer is a loyal customer Reduced query volumes by brigig dow re-cotact volumes (curretly at a average of about 20% 30%) Reduced cost of servicig customer sice multiple cotacts result i higher cost Direct improvemet of CSAT scores a coteted customer is likely to give a higher score o customer satisfactio I additio to these direct beefits, measurig FTR helps improve the overall busiess processes. Deep dive iitiatives with customers result i improved quality ad iovatios i products ad services offered. FTR trackig provides valuable customer itelligece, while FTR measuremet helps uderstad customer pai areas ad provides a opportuity to idetify commo miscoceptios or product issues/problem areas that are ot related to customer service. Hece improved FTR traslates directly to higher customer satisfactio which ultimately impacts profitability by boostig reveues from repeat busiess. 4

5 Top reasos for resolutio errors There are several reasos for the failure or the iaccurate resolutio of FTR. These reasos are either people-related or busiess-related. People related Typically, ot hirig the right talet or failig to provide them with the adequate ad accurate traiig are the key reasos for FTR failure. Also, if the agets do ot have sufficiet access to iformatio or do ot have the proper authority to take decisios, this might delay resolutio. Busiess systems uable to support the agets FTR also requires that the systems support all the ecessary access requiremets for the aget to resolve the issue. For istace, if the aget does ot have access to the customer s various relatioships with the bak, he/she will ot be i a positio to get a holistic view of the customer s query ad resolve the query to the customer s expectatios, which could lead customer re-cotact ad frustratio. The system must also be able to prioritize queries based o the relatioship of the customer i terms of vitage, customer profile, product profile, usage patter etc. Ways to measure FTR FTR is usually measured by dividig the umber of resolved queries closed i the first iteractio by the total umber of queries, ad is quoted as a percetage. However, this method is highly cumbersome ad allows for maual errors i the case of maual trackig of customer queries or complaits. Depedig o the volume of queries, implemetig a CRM tool is the ideal solutio to esure the itegratio of all the customer service chaels ad trackig the queries through all these chaels. Most CRM tools have the facility to track a query with uique referece umbers, makig it possible to track all iteractios pertaiig to the same customer ad query, across ay chael of commuicatio ad also likig to repeat cotacts. The followig are some effective ways to measure FTR: Trackig of repeat cotacts: Repeat cotact trackig eables the busiess to track the ature of the query, the reaso for repeat cotact ad thereby provides data for aalysis ad for implemetatio measures to eforce FTR. It is a powerful tool that eables data collectio that ca be used to determie the root causes of problems. For accurate measuremet of the FTR rate it should be esured that the repeat queries beig tracked exclude those customers who have called despite accurate resolutio or those who have logged i simultaeously through differet chaels. CSAT surveys: A survey may be set olie, alog with the respose, to capture customer s feedback o the respose ad resolutio of the query or complait. Depedig o the severity of the issue, a callback may also be iitiated to esure that the customer is satisfied with the respose ad resolutio provided. Here agai, to measure FTR correctly, data collected should iclude resposes based o the resolutio of the query ad ot o the perceptio of the customers. Quality team to esure samplig of resposes: Based o the availability of resources ad the cost ivolved, the bak may choose to have either 100% quality checkig of queries ad resposes, or do a samplig of cases to assess if the query was resolved i the first iteractio. Various aalyses of the results - aget wise, query type, customer profile based etc. may be doe to serve as iputs to traiig ad call quality. 5

6 Deep dive iitiatives: I order to aalyze the repeat queries, a deep dive should be coducted to kow why the customer has cotacted the orgaizatio more tha oce. Root cause aalysis helps idetify the reasos why the customer issues were ot resolved i the first cotact or why they crossed chaels. Aalyzig the customer s iteractio patters for repeat cotacts results i developig better customer profiles ad a more persoalized customer experiece, thus cotributig towards FTR. Improvig FTR The key to movig beyod customer satisfactio Improvig FTR ot oly results i customer satisfactio but also i log term customer retetio ad evetually, customer loyalty. Give below are some key aspects that must be addressed to improve FTR. Aget skill sets ad traiig Gettig the right resources with good commuicatio skills ad comprehesio ability plays a importat role i uderstadig the customer s request. Also, traiig right is the matra to focus o to ehace skill sets ad process/product kowledge. A traiig academy that focuses o both cotet ad quality must be i place to esure trackig of cotiuous traiig eeds ad delivery of better results. Ehaced quality moitorig: Quality moitorig is a ecessity i ay orgaizatio that aims to deliver the best ad be a market leader. The evaluatio of the resposes for both resolutio accuracy ad quality should be mapped to the traiig requiremets to ehace the aget s skill sets. Based o the busiess requiremets, a idepedet quality team may be formed to evaluate the resposes ad esure a structured feedback mechaism is i place. Empowermet of agets: Havig the authority to take decisios while resolvig a customer s query icreases the efficiecy of the agets ad reduces turaroud time for the customer. Empowermets based o a delegatio matrix will ehace performace ad reduce the reroutig of queries. System ad chael ehacemets: Accessibility of iformatio is vital to a aget while respodig to customers. Developig a system of kowledge provides easy access of iformatio to the customer service executive. Self-help optios made readily available to customers: Self-help optios ca esure that the customer gets quick resolutios ad also decreases the query volumes. Iformatio, demos ad FAQs should be made readily available at kiosks, ATMs, ad websites; i additio, these should be user friedly ad address most of the simple ad frequet queries. Process ad product ehacemets: Last but ot the least, deep dive aalysis should result i overall busiess ehacemet. It should ot oly provide recommedatios to improve service but also improve the product offered ad the operatios ivolved i deliverig the product or service. While the key activities i the Customer Service life cycle iclude iboud ad outboud callig, the effective use of commuicatio chaels (olie, chat, Skype etc), aalytics to assess customer satisfactio ad cross-sell effectiveess, service ad help desks etc, a lot depeds o the issue resolutio process desig itself 6

7 High quality 'Customer Service' improves cross sell ad up sell sigificatly ad ca be a rich source of competitive advatage with direct impact o a bak s reveues. This ca serve as a persoalizatio egie for the bak, deliverig differetiatio from the back ed. Improvig First Call Resolutio from <50% to >80% ca have the followig impact: C-SAT improvemet from <75% to >85% Improved sales performace ad DSO Icreased reveue through more cross sell, upsell ad advocacy Reduced cost of customer service ad collectio losses Hece First Time Resolutio (FTR) is critical to buildig the brad ad loyal customers, ad eables Baks go beyod Customer Satisfactio toward Customer Advocacy. 7

8 About TCS BPO Busiess Process Services (BPO) at TCS is about maagig & executig busiess operatios. Our domai expertise helps deliver core busiess processig across idustries, aalytics & isights ad support processes such as accoutig, HR ad supply chai maagemet. TCS parters with customers to accelerate co-trasformatio, ad geerates busiess value for customers through delivery excellece, risk maagemet ad through iovative models such as Platform BPO which delivers process as a service. With aual BPO reveues of greater tha US$ 1 billio, TCS is oe of the largest BPO providers with 35,000+ employees servicig 175+ customers across the globe. Cotact For feedback o this article ad more iformatio, please cotact us at: bpo.imo@tcs.com Subscribe to TCS White Papers TCS.com RSS: Feedburer: About Tata Cosultacy Services Ltd (TCS) Tata Cosultacy Services is a IT services, cosultig ad busiess solutios orgaizatio that delivers real results to global busiess, esurig a level of certaity o other firm ca match. TCS offers a cosultig-led, itegrated portfolio of IT ad IT-eabled ifrastructure, egieerig ad TM assurace services. This is delivered through its uique Global Network Delivery Model, recogized as the bechmark of excellece i software developmet. A part of the Tata Group, Idia s largest idustrial coglomerate, TCS has a global footprit ad is listed o the Natioal Stock Exchage ad Bombay Stock Exchage i Idia. For more iformatio, visit us at IT Services Busiess Solutios Outsourcig All cotet / iformatio preset here is the exclusive property of Tata Cosultacy Services Limited (TCS). The cotet / iformatio cotaied here is correct at the time of publishig. No material from here may be copied, modified, reproduced, republished, uploaded, trasmitted, posted or distributed i ay form without prior writte permissio from TCS. Uauthorized use of the cotet / iformatio appearig here may violate copyright, trademark ad other applicable laws, ad could result i crimial or civil pealties. Copyright 2012 Tata Cosultacy Services Limited TCS Desig Services I M I 06 I 12