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What does an inbound call centre do?
An inbound call centre is a call centre that specializes in providing exceptional customer support. At an inbound call centre, like Telelink, the agents are coached to be customer service professionals. Aside from performing completely different call centre services, the key difference between an inbound and an outbound call centre is the coaching and training styles and the skills of the agents who service the accounts. Inbound call centre services are customer-centric. Every interaction has the goal of a positive customer experience. Listed below are some of the most popular inbound services.
Appointment booking: Ask your call centre service provider if they can book appointments for your team and enter them into your CRM software on your behalf.
Triage & dispatch: Instead of relaying a message, your call centre provider can actually triage calls based on urgency and dispatch appropriate personnel for you. This is most popular in the property management industry where a tenant can call into your dedicated line and describe the nature of their issue. If it is urgent (like a flood that can't be contained with a bucket) the call centre agent can dispatch a plumber right away, thus minimizing any potential damages. If this type of deductive triaging interests you, read more here about our property management specialty division.
Overflow answering for evenings and weekends: Have an awesome receptionist that works 9-5? Instead of hiring an additional 2 people to cover evenings and weekends, you can provide the same great service to your customers no matter the time of day or night for a fraction of the price. That means no more missed calls, fewer customers fleeing for competitors, and better customer service response times.
Order taking: For companies with a less tech-savvy customer base, online ordering can be intimidating. Offer a trusted and secure order line to assist users with making their purchases.
Hotline services: For sick lines, reporting abuse, whistleblower lines, or even "hows my driving" lines.
NPS surveys: Net Promotor Score is the gold standard in customer experience programs. NPS measures the loyalty of customers and helps you make informed business decisions based on real customer feedback. Utilize a call centre service provider to help you execute the survey and call your customers to walk them through a short survey.
Message taking: Providing a live person to take customer messages can improve the customer experience and is cost-effective for your business. Receive urgent messages right away, the rest can wait until tomorrow.
Total call control: Over the past year we've seen more and more businesses struggle with hiring. As a result of the labour shortage, many organizations are opting to outsource 100% of their call management to call centre service providers. -
Why just inbound?
Consider two different phone calls. The first is a tenant living in an apartment complex who has just returned home from a long day at work to find a leaking sink and damaged cabinets. Stressed, tired, and even overwhelmed this person must call their property management company to report the issue and get their leaky sink issue resolved. The inbound call centre agent who receives this call must display empathy, they must take precise notes for the plumber who will be dispatched to fix the sink, and must be reassuring to the caller that his or her problem will be tended to.
Next, think of a busy Operations Manager who is juggling next month's schedule, finding a replacement for the employee who just called in sick, and bouncing between 4 different meetings in one day. Now, this person has an incoming call from an outbound call centre agent who needs to overcome the busy manager's schedule and try to sell him on signing up for a product demo with a scheduling software company. The outbound call centre agent must demonstrate persistence and help display value in a short amount of time, more importantly, they must know how to close.
It would be extremely difficult for both calls to be performed by the same person at a high standard. The skill sets are so different, and the tone and attitude of the calls are almost the opposite. Therefore, most call centres will choose to specialize in one area or the other.
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Advantages of an inbound call centre
Provide a better customer experience: because inbound call centres are customer-focused, one of the most obvious benefits of partnering with an inbound call centre is improved customer experience. Many organizations provide Monday-Friday 9-5 customer service, but calls on the evenings and weekends go unanswered, leaving customers to wander to competitors. In today's world, customers have different expectations for customer service. Customers want to be able to connect with a live person day and night.
Improved productivity and efficiency: One of the least talked about, but biggest benefits of partnering with an inbound call centre is improved productivity and efficiency of your existing team. Instead of chasing phone calls and reacting to what's coming in, existing employees can focus on driving growth, providing proactive service, and less time on administrative duties.
Scale up and scale down: Business these days is all about agility. Enable your team to scale up quickly and take more orders, appointments, and meetings when demand is high, and scale back down when bottlenecks, shortages, and other interruptions slow demand; all without worrying about hiring and laying off employees. Your inbound call centre enables you to run your business with confidence and agility.
Insightful reports: Gleam important insights from call data reports. You'll notice trends you never thought existed, find proactive measures to save money, and gain important lessons about who is calling your business; when they are calling, and what they are calling for - all categorized and delivered in one organized monthly report.
Inbound Call Centre |