October 13, 2020
Consumers demand a lot of their broadband providers. They expect uninterrupted network coverage. Superfast broadband. More importantly, they expect you to resolve issues immediately.
80% of customers say the experience a company provides is just as important as its products or services. Yet broadband providers have the highest churn rate of any industry – 52% of people who switched providers in 2019 did so because of poor service levels.
The current global situation has only exacerbated these demands. To stay competitive, you need to become a digital support hero and meet your customer’s needs at every stage. But this isn't just about making customers happier.
Here are six ways being a digital support hero can also increase your revenue.
When call queuing services charge by the minute, costs can quickly mount up. Especially when Interactive Voice Response (IVR) and hold times are taken into account.
Adopting modern digital support channels, like self-service troubleshooting apps that allow customers to diagnose and fix issues independently, can help you keep call queues under control.
66% of customers will try to fix a problem themselves before contacting support. So why not empower them to do so? This saves you money in two ways:
Traditional customer support channels that aren't intuitive for users can slow down agents to the point where even basic queries can't be solved efficiently. This results in longer call queues and increasingly disgruntled customers.
After spending a long time on hold, customers often use the first few minutes of the call to vent their frustrations. But reducing this "vent time" can have a positive impact on revenue.
The easiest way to do this is by adopting advanced digital support tools that require little formal training to use. This allows your support staff to process more tickets and gives them the tools they need to solve issues in a single call – without the need for costly escalations.
Level 1 customer support staff pass between 60-80% of tickets to level 2 agents or field technicians. Usually, this is because they lack either the technical knowledge or tools to fix the problem themselves.
With a next-gen customer care app, you can streamline the transition between the different levels of your support hierarchy.
Relevant information is captured and passed to the next agent in the chain automatically, so level 1 agents don’t need to write up their notes manually between calls. And, because they spend less time writing notes, they can process a greater number of tickets. This also reduces waiting times and the need for call-backs, creating a frictionless experience.
Agents also have access to the customer’s service history. More than 75% of customers expect call center operatives to be familiar with their situation. So, having access to this information isn’t just a competitive advantage – it’s a necessity.
Support agents that can't fix an issue with a Wi-Fi router remotely often resort to sending out a replacement unit. But this is an expensive gamble.
Research conducted by Ovum in 2019 found that 50% of Customer Premises Equipment (CPE) is returned with ‘no fault found’. It's difficult to accurately gauge the financial impact this has on your organisation. But one thing's for sure: needlessly replacing half of your CPE year after year doesn't come cheap.
There’s no guarantee the new unit will solve the problem, anyway. It makes more economic sense to reinvest the money you spend on unnecessary replacements into improving your digital support channels.
With the right tools, you can fix more issues remotely. This reduces waste, maximises ROI, and minimises the amount of material that ends up in landfill.
When replacement equipment fails to resolve an issue, your only remaining option is to send an engineer. It’s even costlier, but what can you do? Once again, your agents probably could have solved the problem remotely if they had the right tools. This is where video plays an important role.
Video gives agents full visibility into the customer's environment. Implemented correctly, virtual site visits like this can reduce truck rolls by as much as 10-25%.
Replacing your current support infrastructure might seem like an expensive and time-consuming hassle. But it’ll have a positive impact on revenue (not to mention customer satisfaction) in the long-term.
Average staff turnover in UK contact centres is 26% – that’s 11% higher than the national average. It’s even higher in the US, where it sits around the 30-45% mark.
Modern digital support tools reduce the impact turnover has on your margins in a number of ways.
They don’t require weeks of training or advanced technical knowledge to use, which keeps onboarding costs to a minimum. At the same time, they’re quick and easy to deploy. This reduces the amount of productive time that would otherwise be lost familiarising your support teams with the new system.
Despite the added challenges posed by COVID-19, customers still expect fast, reliable, and efficient service. In this challenging market, broadband providers have to find a way to satisfy these needs without increasing operational costs.
The latest wave of digital support solutions allows you to do just this. The combination of self-service apps and advanced diagnostic tools eases the strain on your contact centers. This, in turn, enables your agents to deliver quality – and cost-effective – service, at every stage of the support journey.
