July 2020 - VCC Live

Archive for July, 2020

How to handle new and existing customers

Posted on: July 31st, 2020 by Dóra Rapcsák No Comments

As customer expectations are steadily growing, the old way of treating all your customers the same might not be the best idea. In fact, over the past decade, most businesses realized how important it is to categorize clients and treat them accordingly.

It may happen that even today some companies still don’t take under consideration that new customers have completely different expectations than existing ones. Your first interactions will greatly influence whether they will stay with you or leave for the competition.

We collected the main differences between new and existing customers to help you offer the customer experience both groups expect.

First interactions matter the most for new customers

Did you know that new customers complain or ask questions three to five times more than existing customers? If you think about it, it’s not surprising.

As a new customer, you’re trying something new, be it a product or a service. You’re excited about your new purchase and more importantly, very eager to test whether it was worth it.

Starting to use a new product or service (especially in the tech industry) might be confusing. Therefore, new customers reach out a lot more to customer service teams. During this time, you need to be there for them, ready to help in case they have any questions.

As creating brand loyalty with new customers takes time, they are more likely to get upset very quickly if they don’t receive the help they are searching for. As a result, they might complain to their acquaintances and flood your customer service team with angry calls and emails.

Digitally savvy customers require different approaches

If you’ve been running your business for a longer time, you probably serve different generations of customers. The younger generations discovering your company will most likely be a lot more tech savvy than your existing, long-time customers.

Of course, digitally savvy new customers require quite a different approach than existing customers. While your older customers might prefer to be contacted via phone, you can be pretty sure that newer generations, such as Gen Z, will expect you to offer them self-service options.

Your best option here is to provide your customers with multiple channels they can reach out to your business. Self-service IVR systems and FAQ pages are greatly popular among younger generations who prefer to solve their problems on their own instead of dialing a business’ customer service department.

Prepare special offers for your existing customers

As I’m sure you know, acquiring a new customer can cost five times more than retaining existing ones, and 48% of people switch brands for better customer service. It is true that new customers require more attention and special care in order to convince them to stay with your company for good, but don’t forget about your existing customers.

In fact, existing customers easily become frustrated when they learn that new customers are offered better deals. As they have been with your business for years, they expect a special treatment as well.

Creating special offers exclusively for your existing customers might be a great idea as it will prove that being a long-time customer does have its privileges, and as a result, they might end up buying more and remaining loyal to your company.

More resources on providing excellent customer service

If you want to maintain a superb customer service for all your clients, be sure to check out these posts as well:

Customer satisfaction measurement methods that are key to your business
Coaching methods for excellent customer support
Bad customer service can affect your business even more than you think

VCC Live is on the List of GetApp’s Category Leaders as One of the Top Call Center Software Products

Posted on: July 17th, 2020 by Dóra Rapcsák No Comments

We’re proud to announce that VCC Live was chosen By GetApp as one of the top Call Center Software Products in their Leaders 2020 category.

Each year, business applications and software discovery platform, GetApp ranks the leading business applications in certain categories in order to help customers choose the right software solution for their business needs. Category leaders are ranked based on ratings from end-users in five key areas: ease of use, value for money, functionality, customer support, and likelihood to recommend.

We’re proud to be featured on the list as one of the best contact center technology solutions available in the marketplace.

VCC Live’s advanced features are highlighted in our profile on GetApp:

Customizable IVR and scripts
Statistics and real-time monitoring
Customizable predictive dialer
ACD and skills-based routing
Omnichannel communication
VCC Pay over the phone payment

Furthermore, in our many reviews on the site, clients emphasized that VCC Live is a constantly developed system with user and business needs in mind, offering a wide range of solutions and integration possibilities. Clients also noted that the system is easy to implement and learn while most functions are highly customizable. VCC Live’s expert team has a positive attitude towards any upcoming questions and continues to provide support even after the implementation.

About the list

GetApp’s annual Category Leaders rankings highlight top-ranked software products based on ratings from end-users in five key areas: ease of use, value for money, functionality, customer support, and likelihood to recommend. Data sources include approved user reviews, public data sources, and data from technology vendors. To be eligible for inclusion in a category, products must have at least 20 unique product reviews published on GetApp, must achieve a minimum normalized rating in each of the 5 key areas, must show evidence of offering required functionality as demonstrated by publicly-available sources, and must be relevant to software buyers across industries or sectors.

How to Win Customers Using Conversational Commerce

Posted on: July 16th, 2020 by Dorottya Márton No Comments

Conversational commerce is a concept that should be considered by most business owners. While it was initially introduced as a business tool, it can also be understood as a mindset or approach to customer care. In an age where your customers expect to communicate with you on multiple channels, conversational commerce is an essential part of any business with online interactions.

Read on to find out why!

What is conversational commerce?

According to Shopify, put simply, conversational commerce is the “intersection of messaging apps and shopping.” In other words, conversational commerce enables you to use messaging apps to communicate with customers in real-time with the help of chatbots. Without having to be online yourself, conversational marketing allows you to deliver a seamless customer experience and build customer relationships.

With the help of artificial intelligence (AI) and natural language processing (NLP), you can interact with your customers using their preferred channels, such as Whatsapp, Facebook, or Twitter. Once on these platforms, conversational commerce can be done via chatbots and voice assistants that answer customer questions about your services or products and make personal recommendations.

Conversational commerce is here to stay

Conversational commerce technology enables you to constantly interact with your customers and support them through their customer journey anytime, anywhere. Additionally, conversational commerce technology allows chatbots and voice assistants to make highly personalized recommendations and suggestions to your customers. With data-driven technology, conversational commerce allows your business to provide a unique and personal customer journey to each one of your customers. With social media apps having an engagement rate of 80 percent, the ability to provide a seamless, personalized customer experience and regular, reliable communications is essential for any business wanting to stay afloat. As business to client communications over social media are becoming the norm, you can be sure that conversational commerce technology is here to stay.

Conversational commerce and customer care

Besides enabling a constant online presence in places that matter, conversational commerce also helps avoid shopping cart abandonment, brings customers back to carts, and increases Average Ticket Value (AVT).

Sales chatbots or voice assistants help avoid shopping cart abandonment by helping navigate a webpage, navigate the checkout process, and inform on delivery and return policies. By creating a seamless, intuitive customer experience, conversational commerce technology helps your customers stay on the page and follow through on their purchasing process.

In the case that a customer does fail to check out, chatbots can incentivize them to continue their shopping process. Another benefit is that chatbots are capable of asking customers why they abandoned the sales process. Without conversational commerce, most businesses try to reclaim their customers by sending email promotions. Such communication is not always timely, and will not lead to useful feedback about your business model.

In addition to helping abandon lost sales, conversational commerce helps increase your average ticket value (AVT). By using customer data, conversational commerce is capable of suggesting products that are especially relevant to your customers, and therefore, increase sales numbers. Recent studies show that positive customer experiences lead to 40% more spending among customers. Relying on a single channel of communication and not having constantly available customer support is no longer a sustainable option for any modern business.

Bottom line

With conversational commerce, you can make sure that you are constantly visible on the channels that your customers frequent most often. Additionally, conversational commerce will help you through the entire sales process, by helping avoid shopping cart abandonment, keeping customers engaged, and by increasing AVT.

Studio Moderna Switches to Remote Operations in Four European Countries Using VCC Live

Posted on: July 16th, 2020 by Dóra Rapcsák No Comments

Leading multichannel and multibrand retailer, Studio Moderna, has started to utilize VCC Live in four additional European countries, so that they could quickly switch to a remote working environment due to the Europe-wide lockdown caused by COVID-19.

Studio Moderna is one of the largest telesales companies in Central and Eastern Europe, with a vertically-integrated network reaching more than 360 million consumers in 21 countries.

Most industries, the telesales market included, have been severely affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. Studio Moderna, which relies on a huge contact center workforce, has been no exception. As with the majority of other companies in the industry, Studio Moderna decided to continue with their operations on a remote working basis.

However, as none of their current customer service systems supported remote work, Studio Moderna’s operations in four countries – Czech Republic, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Slovakia and Bulgaria – started to use VCC Live in order to be able to allow their agents to work from home. Additionally, one new country, Estonia, will start utilizing VCC Live for home office purposes in two weeks.

Roland Háry, Customer Success Manager at VCC Live, said, “Thanks to our cloud-based environment and easy-to-learn interface, the implementation process with Studio Moderna went smoothly and we managed to set up VCC Live in all the required countries in only one and a half weeks.”

In addition, Studio Moderna has also been able to utilize some of the services that VCC Live can offer in addition to software development, including systematic training sessions and expert consultancy.

“As Studio Moderna is one of our most prestigious clients,” said Attila Szűcs, Sales Director, VCC Live, “we decided to set up a dedicated team of key account managers, developers, customer service and sales professionals to ensure that moving their operations to the cloud and serving the company’s different requests in each country went flawlessly. We also plan to hold three webinar sessions in order to provide the company with in-depth training on the software, and will also provide them with business consulting services, using our many years of experience in the market.”

Is Predictive Customer Service the Future?

Posted on: July 13th, 2020 by Dániel Severa No Comments

In today’s data-oriented environment, using predictive customer service is essential for excellent customer satisfaction and customer care. While there is an overwhelming amount of data out there, most organizations only use a small percentage of their data. However, with the right analytics and AI technology in place, companies are able to take more advantage of their resources. With the help of analytics and AI-powered predictive customer service tools, companies can understand their clients better. Predictive customer service allows organizations to understand what customers are interested in. This enables them to predict their future spending habits, offer personalized ads, and recommendations.

Understanding your customer needs

Perhaps the most obvious but also the most important aspect of predictive customer service technologies is the way that it allows companies to know and predict when a customer or client is looking to purchase, as well as the products that they are likely interested in. Using AI and predictive analytics to better understand your customers can not only help you increase sales, but it can also help you in your branding efforts. By being able to communicate tailored suggestions to your customers, you can make sure that they only receive promotions and offers that are relevant to them. When it comes to contact centers, this means that with the help of omnichannel solutions, your agents will already know the type of client they are talking to along with their specific needs.

Fine-tuning your company resources

Predictive customer service technologies can also help you adjust your own business model. With optimization technologies, you can analyze your customer interactions to help you optimize your pricing models. Additionally, you can anticipate higher or lower volumes of calls, letting you adjust your staffing policies accordingly. When running a contact center operation, this means that with the help of predictive customer service technologies, you will be able to calculate the number of agents needed during various inbound or outbound campaigns.

Rethinking your service model

Analytics can also help you rethink your company’s service model. With enough data, predictive customer service technologies can help you understand your customers’ life cycle stages and help you increase sales depending on these patterns. For example, insurance companies (such as Waberer which uses VCC Live) often use analytics to understand the major life events of their clients, such as a new house purchase or getting a driver’s license. Such technologies enable you to market especially relevant services or products to your customers.

Targeted customer communications can be beneficial for both the client and the company’s side. As a customer or client, predictive customer service technologies allow you to receive communications that are relevant to you, letting you avoid the burden of being spammed with irrelevant offers. On the client-side, it can help you gain insights that would otherwise be impossible. By using a data-driven approach, you can understand your customer needs, fine-tune your company resources, and rethink your service model in order to be able to provide excellent customer service through all lifecycle stages of your customers.

5 Tips for Cross-Selling and Strengthening Your Position With Your Customers

Posted on: July 3rd, 2020 by istvanmasa No Comments

It’s always challenging to find new clients and raise sales as an organization. Therefore, you need to build on any potential partnerships and new sales. One of the easiest ways to do it is by cross-selling. If done correctly, cross-sales will add value to your established client relationships, help your branding efforts, and increase revenue.

Here’s what cross-selling is and why you should care, along with five tips to get you started.

What is cross-selling?

Cross-selling is the practice of selling another product or service to your client, in order to maximize the value of the transaction, both from the client and the seller’s side. Cross-selling often gets confused with upselling. In opposition to cross-selling, upselling is a process that adds to the functionality of a product. Cross-selling can be seen as a horizontal process and upselling as a linear one. Imagine, for example, being in a fast-food restaurant. Upselling is when the cashier asks if you want an extra-large cheeseburger instead of a normal one. Cross-selling is when she asks you if you want fries with your burger.

Cross-selling can help you bring out the maximum in all your client relationships. Here are some of the most common methods for effective cross-selling.

1. Offer extra services

The first step in cross-selling is simply offering extra services to clients. While this may seem obvious, it is important to take a strategic approach. Aim to sell something that might be relevant to the product or service that the client is already purchasing. For example, if you are selling razors, you might want to sell a shaving cream. In the context of software, this can mean tools that complement the functionality of your software.

2. Think ahead of your clients

Think one step ahead of your clients and curate potential offer packages that are relevant to them. You can easily do this by backtracking your previous client interactions. By understanding the specific consumer behaviors of your clients, you can deduce patterns in their purchasing behaviors. Based on data-driven suggestions, it is more likely that you can make offers that are especially relevant to them. For example, omnichannel solutions enable you to backtrack previous client interactions on all your used communication channels, enabling agents and employees to interact with clients while fully understanding their specific needs and preferences.

3. Pitch promotions!

If your company is having a special offer at the time of communicating with your clients, it is also a perfect time for cross-selling. The strategy of bringing your client’s attention to ongoing, special promotions is less intrusive than directly approaching them with it, without any previous context. Therefore, clients won’t feel overwhelmed by your communications. A good example of a promotion pitch is offering an additional service or product with a discount in the context of black Friday.

4. Educate

Many clients might not fully understand the full value of a service or product that they are not yet using. Try to inform your clients about the benefits of services that might complement their already existing product or subscription. This will also help your branding efforts, as it enables you to show your expertise within your industry.

5. Match services with client goals

Although it’s important to try and maximize your client interactions, it is important to always keep quality customer care in mind. Just because you offer a product or service that would be complementary to the one that your client is already using, does not necessarily mean that your client needs it or is interested in it. Aim to establish a personal relationship with your customers and try to understand their personal or business goals. This way, you can relate to them, making sure that you are delivering a personal service, specially catered to them. While this might seem counterintuitive, such an approach will guarantee long term trust and loyalty to your brand.

Cross-selling is an important definition to keep in mind when aiming to strengthen your relationship with customers. By cross-selling, you are able to bring out the maximum in your client interactions. However, as with everything, a strategic approach to cross-selling is key.

Make sure to offer extra services or products that are relevant to your clients, think ahead of them, by curating services or product packages based on their needs, make sure to pitch promotions, and educate your clients about your products and services. Last but definitely not least, make sure to match your cross-selling aims with the goals of your clients. The combination of these elements will not only help you increase sales, but also help your branding efforts and strengthen your relationship with your customers.

The Business Advantages of Remote Call Centers

Posted on: July 3rd, 2020 by Dóra Rapcsák No Comments

Remote call centers are increasingly becoming a norm, partly due to the times of uncertainty caused by COVID-19 and also as businesses are more and more recognizing its benefits for the business.

Let’s take a closer look at the business advantages of a remote call center!

Cost reduction

Perhaps one of the most important business advantages of remote call centers is that they are cost-effective.

Renting an office space and purchasing all the necessary office and IT facilities are extremely expensive. By utilizing remote call centers, however, you can significantly reduce costs related to office space and IT infrastructure. Also, additional costs, such as transport, employee catering, and utility costs can be avoided.

Furthermore, in every call center, there are peak times when customer calls suddenly skyrocket. During these peak periods, a remote call center can easily scale up by adding part-time remote agents. And as part-time home-based agents receive reduced benefit packages and vacation time, again, additional cost savings can be made.

Last but not least, did you also realize that agents too can make savings by working from home? As gas prices and the cost of public transportation rise, traveling to and from work is getting more and more expensive. A remote call center allows agents to save on these expenses.

Employee Retention

As the numbers suggest, running a remote call center will also help you retain your workforce.

According to a survey conducted in 2019, remote workforce is getting more and more popular with 66% of companies allowing remote work and 16% being fully remote.

The survey also explains that 85% of remote workers say it was their own decision to work remotely, mainly in order to be able to make their own hours and live a more carefree life.

Considering that these days flexibility is high on the list of employees’ priority, these results are not surprising at all. Most of employees are already used to completing tasks virtually from anywhere, so you can be sure that they will appreciate if you offer them the opportunity to work from home.

Remote work also allows agents to save some time as they don’t need to commute. It’s no surprise then that only 20% of those who work from the comfort of their own home would rather go back to working in a company office.

Attracting Talent

Employees these days are more focused on individuality, and like their career to reflect this. In fact, the new generations, especially Gen Z, increasingly reject traditional working hierarchies and expect to be offered the possibility of remote work.

In fact, remote work is now often one of the top priorities for job seekers when choosing a job. According to 2019 Zapier Remote Work Report, 57% of candidates say remote work is one of their most preferred perks to be offered by an employer. Furthermore, 68% of Millennials said remote work would greatly increase their interest in specific jobs, making remote work a great perk for companies to attract talent.

Attracted by relatively high salaries and flexible working hours, many of the younger generations will start their careers in a call center, so it’s definitely worth thinking about switching to a remote call center.

Are remote call centers the future?

What will the future bring to the home-based workforce model? The numbers suggest remote work is actually the future of work.

Two-thirds of knowledge workers think the office will disappear by 2030. 71% of Millennials think the traditional office will be replaced with most positions done remotely (source: Zapier).

According to workers, the end of the office is near. And while we certainly do not know what the future will bring, one thing is sure: most employees prefer to be offered the possibility of working remotely.

Need a remote contact center solution?

VCC Live’s virtual contact center software gives your agents the tools to perform, keeps things productive and secure, and enables you to develop your workforce – all with nothing more than a laptop