Call Recording Center

Who are your best agents? Do you know? Are you sure? Do your best agents (at least the ones you think are your best) have the longest or shortest handle time? Does handle time even have anything to do with the level of service provided to your customers? If these are your best agents, do they handle all products/services with the same level of competency? Do they close all sales, always up/cross sell? How can I share their skills with the rest of my agent population? I could go on all day. This is just an incredibly small portion of your business that will open up with call recording.

How Should I Record Calls?

But how should I record... everything, a sample, give agents the ability to Record-On-Demand? Well... it depends. What do you want to measure? Do you need to have all calls available, just in case, or will a random sample be enough? What data do you need to have indexed to those calls? What would you like to have indexed to the calls (it may be easy and sometimes it’s cheap or free)? Do you need to follow the call as it transfers through your company?

Recording systems can provide virtually any type of recording you may need, although not all systems can provide all types (total, sample, record-on-demand, selective, business rules driven). Your telephony environment also impacts how a system can be implemented as well. But, there are always ways to get what you want. Just be sure whoever you talk to listens to your complete list of requirements before they launch into the benefits of their system. Be sure you discuss the benefits of each type of recording in your application. Don’t be afraid of paying for total recording, in a lot of cases it is less expensive then random sampling.

Choosing a Call Center Solution Company

Your contact should be able to fully describe the integration without too much change on your existing systems. For example, if you don’t have a Computer Telephony Integration (CTI) package you shouldn’t have to get it, there shouldn’t be additional wires setting on your agents’ desk or fill your IT department with servers. If they can’t break it down to terms that you can get your arms around, thank them for their time and move on. It’s not that complicated.

If you already have a recording platform in place but want to incorporate a Quality package your current provider may be able to supply it. If not, there are packages available that can be added to any existing recording package. Some may not totally integrate with your recording platform, others may. Some items this package needs to include to produces actionable results:

• Forms that will enable you to incorporate your existing form (I hope you’re currently using one).
• You really need to be able to grade questions by Yes/No, Pick List, Sliding Scale and Text to accurately evaluate a specific skill.
• The ability to weigh questions/sections in very important.
• Subsection scoring provides the ability to target general skill sets for training. Subsections also break down the call into manageable pieces.
• A robust reporting package is a must (graphical display of data, various relevant templates, trending reports, etc.).
• The ability to deliver results to your agents, in a timely manner, will positively impact your center.

Benefits of a Call Recording System

Let’s get back to the output, the good stuff, of a recording system. How do you benefit from it? Regardless if your center is an Inbound, Outbound or Blended environment the skill and knowledge level of your agents impact every metric in your call center.

Improving the skill and knowledge level of your agents will positively impact each, and every, metric.

• Handle time
• Time in Queue
• Customer satisfaction
• Revenue
• Service level
• Hold time
• First call resolution
• Call escalations
• Whatever you measure — go ahead, plug your KPI’s in here
• Even agent retention

You try it. Pick one of the above. I challenge you to find one that won’t improve with the skills of your agents.

Please keep in mind, there is more to this process than just recording and evaluating agents’ interactions. If you record calls and have your supervisors or Quality staff evaluate them, don’t stop there. Up to this point you have only collected data and parked it. This is where the real impact of your system is realized. Now you need to be able to pull that data, in a format that means something to you, and deliver it to someone empowered to act on it. Who needs training, and all those other questions I asked when we started this conversation.

But that’s not all. There is a wealth of information here. These are your customers. What are they saying?

If you listen, what will you find?

• Proactively address developing trends
• Better understanding of customers and their issues
• Product enhancements
• Adapting process changes (reducing handle time and maybe even call load)
• Impact of latest advertising campaign
• Reaction to new features/services
• Comments regarding competition
• Better, targeted training — OK I cheated, this is part of the above, but I»m sure if you ask Marketing, Product development, Executive Management they’ll give you a list as long as your arm.

Indexing calls with business data can provide great information that can be shared across the entire enterprise. If the ‘‘other side’’ of the house wants to hear what the customers are saying it is easy for them to access and play.

How about incorporating a couple of marketing questions right into the agent evaluation form? Your supervisors are reviewing calls for quality purposes anyway; put a couple radio buttons, drop downs, even text. It will only take a couple of seconds and now Marketing can pull reports based on this data. Pretty cool!

The great thing about this information is it is real. No third party survey, no questionnaire, just your customers talking to your agents. Listen to their tone of voice, what are they asking, what are they saying about your processes/products/services. In their words, where does your company really stand with them? Now you got something!!

Learn More

For further information, or if you have call recording questions, Contact Us for a no-obligation consultation with a call recording expert.