To strengthen the reputation of your startup company as a customer-centric business, you need to resolve support requests effectively. And often, you would want to do that right on the first contact with them. But how do you pull that off? Discover how you can succeed in first-call resolutions with Virtua Solutions.
Why Effective First Call Resolution Is Crucial For Customer Support
To appreciate the effort of improving first-call resolutions, you need to know what you can get from it. Here are some of the biggest gains you get from solving a customer issue within that first call.
Improved Customer Satisfaction
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This is the most obvious benefit. After all, customers don’t want to go through several calls to have everything solved. A first-call resolution will definitely satisfy them. And that satisfaction can lead to not just return purchases but also recommendations from them.
Greater Customer Loyalty To Your Startup Company
Another consequence of effective FCR is customer loyalty. When they feel that you are serious about helping them, they will not think about switching to competitors. As with the above, they are also more likely to become brand advocates.
Greater Agent Satisfaction
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On the other side of the fence, your agents also benefit from completing customer issues on the first call. Helping them know how to resolve calls on the first instance will ease the pressure on them. This also works as a good measure of your best-performing agents.
Reduced Operational Costs
Every support call that comes through your system requires resources. And that includes repeat calls for the same customers. By improving FCR results by 15%, you can reduce operational costs by as much as 57%.
The Challenges Of Doing First Call Resolution
But trying to resolve a customer call on the first try is by no means a walk in the park. Here, your agents will encounter several challenges. Overcoming these will help you get a strong start in handling and accomplishing these calls.
Lack Of Accurate Information
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Effectively responding to and answering customer questions rests in large part on the agent’s knowledge. If they don’t have access to information needed to resolve the issue on that instant, they might need to have the customer call back while they retrieve it. To avoid those return calls, you need to provide agents quick access to customer data and other information to use.
The Agent’s Capabilities
Your agents’ abilities also come into play when it comes to first-call resolutions. After all, support calls are problem-solving exercises. For this, you will need to provide extensive training to help them hone their skills. Monitoring is also crucial to identify areas where they need improvement.
Company Policies
Your startup business’s overall policies can also influence agents’ FCR success. For instance, there might be some policies that hinder them from responding to customers. Don’t just review your existing policies. Come up with ones that give agents more freedom to act.
How Your Startup Company Can Boost First Call Resolution
The first step in improving first call resolution rates is understanding where you’re at the moment. To calculate your FCR rate, use any of the following equations.
FCR=(Total no. of calls resolved on the first attempt)/(Total no. of resolved calls)
FCR=(Total no. of calls resolved on the first attempt)/(Total no. of first calls)
The first equation gives you a picture of your FCR rate in the short term. Meanwhile, the second one gives you a more accurate measure for the long run. Choose one based on the specifics of your organization and what matters to you at the moment.
Improving Your Startup Company Data Collection
To get a more accurate measurement of your FCR rate, you need to have a good amount of data. Ensure that your team can effectively keep track of all the contact resolutions you have made. Each contact resolution entry should contain the different events that occur during that call. All of these will help you better determine which strategies to use for improvements.
When you employ Virtua Solutions, we do our share of FCR tracking for our agents. We share this data with you to help you get a picture of our FCR rate. You can then compare that data with your internal team’s to see potential areas of improvement on both sides.
Once you have the contact resolution data, you can start identifying the issues that result in the delays. You can refer back to the above challenges to see which ones are the most prevalent. Interviewing the agents will also help you hone in on the specific issues.
Lessening The Customer Effort
One strategy you can employ when seeking to increase first call resolutions is reducing the effort the customer needs to make. The trick here is to anticipate what their needs will be and prepare for those in advance. Go back to the customer demographic data to see what their interests are. This will give you an idea of their potential areas of concern.
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You would also want to look for ways to increase your reach. Social media, for instance, is a good alternate support channel since customers can connect with you faster. Note that your choice of channels should match your customers’ expectations.
Improving Your Startup Company Support Agents’ Capabilities
Since they are the ones on the frontlines, you need to make sure that your agents are of the mindset to provide quick resolutions. During training, prioritize FCR techniques to help them better adapt to them. These include:
- Providing self-help options: You can use these to resolve common customer issues quickly.
- Getting more information: Teach your agents how to extract more information from customers with the right questions.
- Providing clear instructions: Demonstrate to them how to deliver instructions as clearly as possible to get a positive customer response.
- Cross-training: This strategy can make it easier for agents to assist teammates to respond to calls.
- Closing calls correctly: Teach your agents what questions to ask before ending the customer calls to ensure that every concern has been covered up satisfactorily.
Once you have these employee training strategies in place, be sure to review them regularly. By comparing the FCR rate at different points after the training sessions, you can determine what works well and what needs to be improved.
Do More For Startup Company Customers Right On The First call
These strategies will help you get a strong start in boosting your company’s first call resolution success. But this is just the beginning, as improving your FCR is greatly tied to improving your overall customer service response. And we can help you here significantly. Contact us and discover how your startup company can do more for its patrons.