Inbound Call Centers Can Become Outbound Money Generators
Many companies that have developed in house call centers for customer service and support have found that these assets can also add to the bottom line. The way to get this done is to train phone agents and reverse the flow of calls. That is, change from getting incoming calls to processing outgoing call connections.
Consider this…
Many credit card companies have call centers that generate more than half of all new revenues and income.
Retail banking is starting to move from a service to sales model.
At the very least, many companies are testing the idea of cross selling or promotional selling to customers who call in for service. The risk of course is alienating the customer who asks for help with a product and the focus back on selling something else. Of course, cross selling can be a benefit to the customer if, after satisfying the customers initial issue, other offers or products are discussed.
To be truly effective, companies must first focus on delivering consistent and high quality customer service. All the happy talk and “your important to us” fluff sent to customers must have a solid infrastructure of good customer service behind it. It’s not enough to sent a greeting card to the customer claiming how important they are to the company only to provide poor service when there’a a problem .
It’s only after a positive experience can anyone expect a customer to consider additional products from a company. Unfortunately, today’s business focus is on doing LESS for the customer which in many cases limits the up sale potential to current customers calling into a contact center.