Your agents are the single most important asset in your call center. In many ways, they serve as your brand ambassadors, often acting as the first, primary, or only point of human contact customers have with your company.
Improving customer experience is key to attracting and retaining customers. But when you focus more on customer experience than agent experience, the needs of your single most important asset get overlooked. And that’s a costly mistake.
Because instead of better CX, what you end up with are frustrated agents who are more likely to quit and unsatisfied customers with a reason to turn to your competitors.
Further Reading: The Key to Contact Center Success? Focus on Your Agents
Happy agents = happier customers. The math is simple.
But how do you ensure agents have what they need to be happy and successful AND provide outstanding customer service? It starts with an agent-focused CX strategy.
Why do you need an agent-focused customer experience strategy?
An agent’s job is to provide outstanding customer service and support. And an agent-focused CX strategy prioritizes your agents’ well-being, ensuring they have the training, tools, and support they need to do their job—and do it well.
- Protect and grow revenue. When agents are equipped to resolve issues and create positive customer interactions, they have an opportunity to protect customers’ current spend and grow future revenue.
- Get real customer feedback in real-time. Agents who are properly instructed and guided through customer interactions can easily solve the problems in front of them and gather insights into how customers truly feel about your brand, products, or services.
- Improve performance and retain agents longer. When agents’ jobs are straightforward, they’re good at what they do and their work is stress-free. And successful, stress-free agents are motivated to stay and contribute to the long-term success of your company.
- Increase customer satisfaction and engagement. Give customers what they want—efficient, accurate, and uniform issue resolution every time they talk to an agent—and they will continue to be your customers.
How to implement an agent-focused CX strategy.
Here’s what your agents need to provide the best customer experience possible.
Training
Agents who can’t confidently perform their work are more likely to leave. And if they stay, the type of customer service they provide will be minimal at best.
Developing a training program that takes agents’ needs into consideration overcomes the confidence barrier while shortening training time and reducing cost.
- Prepares agents for scenarios they’ll face on calls
- Teaches agents how to use the tools provided
- Creates a safe and inclusive learning environment where agents can—and want to—grow and improve
“Build learning into the work. Personalize training, create those small bites, and build it into the workflow. We can improve the effectiveness and reduce the cost of training by building it into the work.”—Sheri Kendall, Regional Training Manager at Wayfair
Tools
Agent-focused technology simplifies and enhances the agent experience. Instead of making agents scramble through ALL the information on their screen to find an answer, it gives them only the information they need for the present interaction.
- Facilitates a seamless and frictionless interaction with customers
- Reduces stress and increases clarity to maximize agent-customer connection and agent satisfaction
- Reduces errors and call handling time
- Fully integrates to decrease fail-points and data entry
“If your agents are sitting there watching the clock, waiting for the end of their shift, swearing because they have to do things like cut and paste customer numbers from one application to another, then you’re not going to deliver great CX. So using tech to improve the life of the agent is fundamental because then you can focus on the CX side as well.”—Mark Hillary, CX Industry Analyst
Further Reading: How Workflow Management Software Simplifies and Improves the Agent Experience
Company Connection
Building an authentic agent-to-company connection starts in training, but it doesn’t stop there. Interactions with leadership, managers, and other co-workers should reinforce why agents are part of your company and help align them with the shared goal everyone is working towards.
Creating a connected environment means agents understand they belong and are safe, seen, and heard. Here Sheri Kendall talks about what she calls the ladder of psychological safety in contact centers:
Unforgettable CX starts with your agents.
With an agent-focused CX strategy, everyone wins. Agents get exactly what they need to be more effective, efficient, and engaged. Customers get the top-notch, personalized experience they expect. And you get a revenue-generating advantage over your competitors.
