Trends in Customer Interaction Channels of an Inbound Call Center
According to research conducted by the Society of Consumer Affairs Professionals (SOCAP), call center companies are rounding out their services to offer a multichannel approach to customer service. By incorporating email, social media, chat and other features, agents are able to more easily engage with the customer and resolve issues efficiently.
Though much in the technology of an inbound call center is changing, reliability on phone support is remaining strong. With about 95% of all contact centers offering inbound call support, communicating with customer service over the telephone shows no signs of slowing down.
Instead, other channels are rising in popularity as supplementary to answering customer phone calls. As Matthew D’Uva, SOCAP President states, “digital channels are becoming less of an option and more of a must for customer care today.” Sophisticated call center services are no longer an extra feature of inbound call centers, as a multi-pronged approach for customer interaction is required to meet customer demands.
To display the evidence of the growing trend among call centers to provide digital channels for customer service, below is a list of the types of channels and the percentage of call center companies that offer the service:
Inbound phone calls — 95.1%
Email — 92.7%
Traditional Mail — 87.8%
Fax — 61%
Interactive Voice Response (IVR) — 53.7%
Online Chat — 22%
As a business owner, the myriad of call center services may seem confusing, but the key is to consider how your customers are likely to contact your business. By working closely with an inbound call center, you can cover all the possible channels to consistently deliver high quality customer service.