By Kirsten Robinson

Despite the significant technology investments companies make to establish web chat capabilities, staffing it is often an afterthought. Most companies continue to tweak staffing after deploying the channel initially, realizing it demands different skills than phone interactions.

However, for any company implementing web chat, it’s important to determine from the get-go how many chats each rep can handle concurrently in order to maintain operational efficiency yet preserve customer satisfaction. In fact, we get this question all the time from CCC members. Read More »

By Corey Stout

The News of the World’s voice mail hacking scandal signifies not just the importance, but also the need for greater customer privacy in our increasingly exposed world.

The News of the World scandal showed the world that the personal information of both private and public figures was easily accessible. News of the World, a British tabloid owned by media magnate Rupert Mudoch, was accused of spying on celebrities, politicians, and victims of tragedy—including a murdered teen and families of dead soldiers.

With the rise of new, faster, and more sophisticated technology, companies have greater accessibility to information, as does the average consumer thanks to social media. Facebook’s CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, even famously stated this year that he “doesn’t believe in privacy” and that privacy was no longer “a social norm.”

Well, Mr. Zuckerberg, I beg to differ.

As information becomes increasingly accessible, customers want greater security over their private lives and personal information. And now it seems that The News of the World scandal is the icing on the cake (…or maybe pie to the face).

The reactions to Murdoch and News of the World are proof that customers want greater privacy. A flash mob occurred outside the House of Parliament when Murdoch testified. Protestors gathered in front of Murdoch’s New York City home. Even just shifting through the countless articles about Murdoch on the Web – Rupert Mudoch and Media Corruption: Silence No More, Rupert Mudoch: Stubborn, Stupid, or Greedy? You Be the Judge, Murdoch: Liar, Lair, Pants on Fire! – anti-Murdoch sentiment and the public’s demands for greater privacy are obvious.

The News of the World scandal made people misinformed, unaware, and betrayed, which I believe triggered most of the outrage and demands for greater privacy. In the end, I argue that it is not necessarily about the actions that companies take or the changes that companies implement, it is about how they prepare, protect, and communicate to customers. Greater transparency with customers makes them supported, protected, and secure.

Read More »

For many, summertime is often a chance to dust off the books waiting patiently on the shelf read…the ones you bought last year, five years ago, maybe even five days ago at a Borders liquidation sale.  It’s likely that you have one last summer vacation in your future before the weather turns cooler, so the CCC team recently brainstormed a list of books that we’d recommend you pack in your carry-on luggage or beach bag.

Here are some of the most interesting books that made our list:

Emotional Intelligence 2.0 by Travis Bradberry and Jean Greaves
Many of you have now had a chance to hear CCC present our brand-new research on The Next Frontier of Rep Performance.  In this research, we explored several different factors that drive rep performance in today’s customer contact organization—and emotional intelligence, or EQ, was one of those factors (spoiler alert: it wasn’t the biggest driver).  So we’ve been passing this book around the team to brush up on our EQ knowledge.   This was suggested by one of our U.S. members in the telecommunications industry.  It’s a pretty quick read and full of good information.  On a related note, we’ve been drawing A LOT of inspiration from Drive by Daniel Pink as well. Read More »

By Gauri Subramani

This post is the second in a two-part series on bill formatting and paper bills versus online billing.  Read part one here.

When we last left off with billing, we had considered the complexity of changing the format of a paper bill and steps companies can take to make the transition to a new bill layout painless for both customers and contact centers.

With the increasing popularity of self-service and adoption of online platforms for routine processes, many companies have reconsidered channels of bill distribution in addition to bill format and have moved from paper to e-bills.  After all, the Web is the first place that 56% of consumers look to find answers to their customer service questions, and as more people manage their bank accounts and credit cards online, the move from paper to online billing feels like a natural progression.

There are a number of benefits to switching from paper to e-billing.

• Improved cash flow: Electronic payments are faster and thus improve the company’s cash flows and net present value.
• Decreased call volume and improved customer service: Considering that billing questions can account for up to 70% of contact center calls, when customers are able to check their balances and do basic payment adjustments online, call volume drops and reps can spend their time with issues that require their expertise.
• Increased customer satisfaction:  Considering that Generation X and Y-ers think of the Internet as a one-stop shop and perceive paper bills to be relics from another era, online billing is more convenient for them.

The future of billing certainly appears to be online.  So how does your business get there?  Read More »

Note: This post, authored by Corey Mull of our sister program the Marketing Leadership Council, is a great introduction to the ins and outs of Google+.  CCC is assessing the impact this platform will have in the world of customer service more specifically and we will be back in a few weeks to share our thoughts.

A few weeks ago, to almost no hype or pre-arranged fanfare, Google launched a new social network, called Google+. On the surface, it looks and functions a bit like Facebook, but under the hood there are some important differences that could break Facebook’s unchallenged hold on the “strong-tie” social networking space.

There’s been a lot of Google+ analysis out there, some of which you’ve likely already read, so we’ll try to get at the most essential things to know by looking at the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly: Read More »

This post was written by Neha Ahuja, an  Analyst with our broader Sales, Marketing, and Communications research team.

Many of your customers are already visiting your Web site to resolve their issues. But, how many of them are able to really find solutions? Our research indicates not many.

While many companies believe that the challenge lies in getting customers to the Web site, CCC research finds that the problem is actually in getting customers to stay long enough to problem solve.

So, if customers come looking for answers on your Web site, why do they abandon it so soon?  This happens because often, Web sites focus on providing ‘everything to everyone’ and are not designed to guide the right customers to the right self-service channel. Companies need to realize that different customers have different channel preferences and that Web sites need to be redesigned to guide customers to their preferred channels.

Let’s examine how Cisco improved its Web self-service and drove call volumes down by 79%. Read More »

This post was written by Latika Mahajan, a Senior Analyst with our broader Sales, Marketing, and Communications research team.

In a recent blog written by Pete and Lauren, 55% readers voted for Social Media being a viable, long term customer service option. Given the growth of Facebook and Twitter accounts, the percentage of votes will probably only increase, if I had to guess. By linking social media channels with a unique objective (e.g. Twitter for broadcast notifications, and in-the-moment support; Facebook for engagement and discussions), companies are increasingly innovating on how they connect with the “socially-connected” customer to troubleshoot, engage, and build service differentiation. Here are some of my favorite examples of companies working with social media.

Facebook and Twitter are popularly used by the service industry for troubleshooting:

Mindful of Facebook’s viral nature, companies are linking complaints via social media with responses through traditional channels.

• A customer of home furnishing chain Pottery Barn, was fed up with the customer help line and in-store service, so she posted photos of a tabletop explosion on Pottery Barn’s Facebook Page. Within 30 minutes she received a call from a customer representative who worked with her to find a solution. This led to a negative experience turning positive, averting further negative comments on a public channel. Read More »

In unstable economic times, it has become especially important for financial services companies to focus more attention on serving their customers.

Given the unique issues that customer service professionals in the Financial Services industry face – including customer privacy and financial risk regulations – it can be difficult to know what CCC resources would be most helpful.

Wondering what others in your industry are reading? Here is a list of the CCC resources that your industry peers are downloading most often.

Top 3 CCC Resources for Financial Services Customer Service Professionals

1. Engineering a Low-Effort Customer Experience

What it is: A popular CCC download, this research outlines the most effective, up-to-date strategies for customer effort reduction.  In today’s competitive banking landscape, differentiating the customer experience may be a great way to win and retain customers.

Why your peers use it:

• To understand the sources of customer effort.
• To identify ways to reduce both the objective and subjective sides of effort.
• To coach frontline reps to employ techniques to reduce “in-the-moment” customer effort.

You might also be interested in: The Customer Effort Score – a customer experience metric that accounts for ease of customer interaction during a service request. CCC research has found that this is the most accurate measure of loyalty in a service organization.  Read More »

Multi-channel investments remain a big focus for many service and support organizations as they balance changing customer needs and preferences and cost to serve.

But given limited investment resources, the question remains which channels should be prioritized.  Some colleagues recently discussed the value of social media as a channel, but here we want to discuss e-mail and chat specifically.  In question: If you had to choose just one, is e-mail or chat the better investment?

Read More »