Turn the Power On In Your Call Center

By Barbara Burke

The bar is raised. Customers expect more than ever when they call. The average utility customer doesn’t compare the level of service they receive from your call center to another utility. Instead they make comparisons to companies who provide stellar, even legendary, service such as Nordstrom’s, LL Bean and Southwest Airlines. When utilities go beyond taking care of the customer’s “transaction” to caring for the “relationship”, they create long-term loyalty and opportunities for incremental revenue.

It’s All About The Relationship

When a customer makes a call to their utility they want to feel that they are valued. To a customer being valued means being treated as an individual, not just an account number. Besides getting their call answered quickly and their transaction handled efficiently, today’s customers expect the representative to:
• be knowledgeable -- have all the necessary information at their fingertips.
• have the authority to make decisions on the spot.
• resolve their issue without being transferred.
• respond with a solution that is personalized to fit their situation
• inform them about value-added products and services
• offer suggestions on how they can save time, save money, increase convenience and enhance their peace of mind.

In fact, recent research shows that customers who sign up for services such as budget billing or auto draft are significantly more satisfied than customers who purchase just energy. The more products and services a customer has beyond the core product of energy, the stronger the relationship and the less likely they are to change providers.

Other industries have found that extending the relationship beyond the core product creates loyalty. A rule of thumb in the banking industry states that when a customer has five products and services with the institution they are much less likely to switch to a competitor.

Turning the Power on in Your Center

There are a number of ways to empower your agents to practice solutions-oriented customer service:
• Your agents must have access to all available customer data and be given the green light to actually complete orders for full range of products and services. This allows agents to make the right match of customer needs to value-added services and products. There’s no surer way to frustrate a customer than to transfer him to someone else in order to get his need met.
• Give your agents the space they need to create real relationships with your customers. That means shifting the emphasis from the quantity of calls answered to the quality of the customer experience.

• Understand that customer service representatives work best in a team environment. Customer service professionals are, by the very nature of their work, team players that thrive in a collaborative, cooperative setting. Your goal should be to constantly emphasize and bolster the success of your agents as a team.

• Ensure that management plays an active, visible role in supporting the shift to a pro-active solutions approach. This gives agents the message that the organization—at its highest levels— values the contribution front line agents make to creating positive customer relationships.

• Consider bringing in an outside expert to assess your call center’s level of function. Utilizing an experienced consultant can expedite the integration process and prevent costly missteps.

• Empower your agents to work with staff in other areas of the company to find customer solutions. If an agent is trying to solve a billing problem and bumps up against resistance in the billing department, you risk canceling all the good work he’s done to that point.

Keep 'Em Laughing

Clearly customer service is a serious business. But remember that your customer service professionals work most effectively as a team and the happiest teams are frequently the most productive teams. The happier your agents are, the more willing and able they will be to forge enduring relationships with your customers.

So don't be afraid to inject liberal amounts of humor into your agents' workdays and be sure to involve senior managers in the fun. A vice president visiting the center dressed in a hula skirt can do great things for morale -- depending of course on how good his legs are.

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