Wouldn't it be great if you could make your call center operations more efficient and provide better customer service? Well, that's exactly what call center automation is all about. Recent studies done by Gartner indicate that contact center labor costs are expected to be reduced by an incredible 80 billion dollars by 2026 due to automation in call centers.
In this blog, you’ll learn how call center automation is changing the game and how adopting automation and AI will give you the competitive edge your business is looking for while cutting down costs and boosting your productivity.
Keep reading!
Table of contents:
What is Call Center Automation?
Call center automation refers to the use of technology to streamline and enhance the efficiency of call center operations. It involves implementing call automation software and tools to automate repetitive tasks, manage workflows, and improve overall customer service.
Call center automation is the key to cutting out the time-consuming tasks that hold agents back. By eliminating busy work, productivity soars and call center efficiency skyrockets. Not only does this benefit agents, but it also leads to happier customers. With improved metrics like first-call resolution and speedy responses, customer satisfaction reaches new heights.
Why is Contact Center Automation Important?
Call center automation plays a crucial role in improving efficiency and productivity. By automating routine tasks, such as updating customer profiles, resolving tickets, and transferring calls, agents and supervisors can focus on more important tasks that require personalized attention.
This results in a streamlined call center operation that not only reduces staffing needs but also enhances the overall customer experience. With call automation software in place, agents are freed up to handle higher-level tasks, ultimately boosting profitability.
What Does Call Center Automation Statistics Say?
According to recent call center automation statistics:
Task switching costs 40% of productivity, which may be decreased by automating most processes.
According to Harvard Business Review poor data costs US businesses $3 trillion every year.
According to 31% of business leaders, call automation software is the key to reducing labor costs.
70% of the business leaders report that they spend 45 minutes to 3 hours on repetitive tasks, from an 8-hour workday.
Employees estimate that automating tasks might save them 240 hours per year, while company leaders feel that automating tasks could save them 360 hours per year.
Conversions increased for 77 % of marketers that used marketing automation solutions.
According to the HIMSS Future of Healthcare Report, almost 80% of healthcare providers want to considerably boost their expenditures in digital healthcare solutions over the next five years.
What Kind of Businesses Can Benefit from Contact Center Automation
It is not uncommon to think that call automation software is only beneficial to contact centers. In reality, automated contact centers are beneficial for all kinds of organizations
Automation in Our Daily Lives
If you are new to automation in call centers, it may be difficult to understand how this technology works. Believe it or not, call center automation is already a huge part of daily life. Each time you route a call through your VoIP systems, transcribe a call, make an order through Amazon, use 2FA to access your banking/ financial account, or use auto suggestion to write a text message, you are making use of automation and AI.
Varieties of Call Center Automation
Let's explore popular varieties of call center automation.
Auto Dialers
Auto dialer technology is a powerful tool that sales agents can use to streamline their outbound calling process. With an auto dialer, you simply provide a list of phone numbers, and the system takes care of dialing them for you. It can even detect whether the call reaches a human, a busy signal, or a voicemail.
When a call reaches a real person, the auto dialer seamlessly transfers the call to one of your agents. If it reaches a busy signal or a voicemail, the system can either hang up or leave a pre-recorded message.
There are several types of auto dialers available. Progressive and predictive dialers are advanced models that can predict the likelihood of reaching a human and the availability of agents to speak with them. On the other hand, power dialers initiate the next call as soon as an agent becomes available.
By using an auto dialer, you can save your agents valuable time by avoiding the need to listen to ring tones, busy signals, and leaving voicemail messages manually. This allows them to focus on what they do best - building relationships with customers.
Using an auto dialer can boost agent productivity and efficiency by as much as 300 to 350% (that is 3x more calls every hour per agent).
Automated Forecasting & Scheduling
Call center forecasting predicts the number of incoming calls a company will receive, and schedules agent shifts accordingly. CCaaS platforms use omnichannel forecasting engines to monitor call center data and predict contact volume by hour, day, month, and season. Machine learning tools consider agent availability and generate optimized shift schedules.
Agents receive their personalized schedules through the scheduling system. In addition, many CCaaS platforms allow agents to request schedule changes, bid for available shifts, and trade shifts with their coworkers directly from the agent interface.
Using contact center automation to automate tasks such as data analysis, volume forecasting, scheduling, and adjustments, forecasting saves agents, supervisors, and administrators valuable time each day.
Live-Agent Guidance
Modern CCaaS platforms leverage AI & contact center automation to allow your organization to provide unmatched support. Live-agent AI provides real-time assistance during customer interactions, right on the app interface.
Through machine learning and natural language understanding, the platform analyzes call audio and generates automated live transcripts. But it doesn't stop there. Modern platforms also offer a range of insights and tools to boost agent performance.
Some of these insights include:
Customer sentiment scores
Canned responses
Customer journey information
Pacing feedback
Action item to-do lists
Relevant knowledge base articles
Post-call summaries and highlights
These auto-generated AI insights not only benefit call center agents but also supervisors. As a supervisor, you can review:
Live transcripts
Customer sentiment scores
Receive notifications if metrics breach certain thresholds or SLAs.
and more!
Proactive Outbound Messaging
With proactive outbound messaging, you can send messages in response to specific notification events–such as when a customer subscribes to your service, submits a survey response, or misses a payment.
Once a preset notification event is triggered, your CCaaS system determines the customer’s preferred communication channel–voice, email, SMS, or social media–and delivers the customer a proactive custom message. Set templates for each trigger event, automatically filling the text with customer information for a personal tone.
Send automated reminders, updates, and important announcements for appointments, passwords, virtual shopping carts, billing, deliveries, and orders. Efficiently communicate without overwhelming your call center agents.
Virtual Agents and Self-Service Menus
One of the most well-known contact center automation tools is the self-service menu, which often includes interactive voice response (IVR) systems, chatbots, and interactive virtual agents (IVA).
IVR systems are automated phone menus that allow customers to access self-service options. Customers can interact with these menus through speech-to-text or dial-tone selections. IVR menus are available 24/7 and can perform various functions like routing customers to agents and queues, providing customer account information, and making announcements.
On the other hand, virtual agents, also known as chatbots, provide self-service digitally through apps, websites, or SMS texting. Unlike IVR menus, virtual agents do not rely on voice interactions. They can perform tasks such as routing users, changing passwords, and sending knowledge base articles.
Many CCaaS and VoIP providers offer drag-and-drop flow designers that allow you to create customized virtual agents, interactive bots, and IVR menus. These designers let you personalize submenus, routing paths, conversational AI responses, actions, and capabilities. With advancements in natural language processing technology, virtual agents are becoming more and more lifelike.
By implementing contact center automation, businesses can streamline customer interactions, provide self-service options, and improve overall customer satisfaction.
Workflow Automation
Do you find yourself spending hours every day on mundane tasks that can easily be automated? With workflow automation, you can say goodbye to time-consuming manual routines.
Imagine being able to automatically assign agents to queues or channels when service level are exceeded. On top of that, you can streamline customer outreach and follow-up calls. And that's just the beginning!
Setting up this automation is as easy as a few clicks in your CCaaS app's Automation tab.
Here are some popular workflow automation that can revolutionize the way you work:
Stay on top of important updates with instant alerts and notifications.
Keep your data in sync across different apps for effortless collaboration.
Be proactive with your outreach and reach out to customers before they even realize they need help.
Ensure that you are always meeting your SLAs and delivering outstanding service.
The Benefits of Contact Center Automation
Automated call centers not only improve your team's productivity. Adopting automation & AI within your organization comes with multiple benefits.
A Call Automation Software That Fits Your Existing System
BTI’s call automation software seamlessly integrates with your current setup, whether it's on-site or on the cloud. With our service, you can maximize the capabilities of your existing contact center system without the hassle of replacements or hefty investments.
Increased Customer Satisfaction
Contact center automation can enhance customer experience by providing quick and accurate responses, reducing wait times, and ensuring consistency.
Eliminate Human Error
Automation minimizes the risk of human errors in data entry, information retrieval, and other routine tasks. In addition, automation has the power to spot and address faulty data, making sure it gets fixed or eliminated from the system.
This not only helps enhance the quality of data but also mitigates the risks linked to faulty data, such as inaccurate or incomplete analyses, delayed decision-making, and a decline in revenue.
Increased Employee Engagement
By automating routine and time-consuming tasks, employees are less likely to experience burnout. Call center automation helps manage workload efficiently, preventing employees from becoming overwhelmed and stressed, which positively impacts their engagement levels.
Integration
With call center automation, representatives no longer need to wait for screens to refresh or navigate through multiple systems to gather information. Automation systems provide instant access to relevant customer data, enabling agents to respond promptly to customer queries without delays.
Leveraging its integration capabilities will allow your agents to switch between multiple channels with just a click. With automated call systems, your representatives can efficiently manage multiple interactions simultaneously, enhancing productivity and responsiveness.
A 360 Degree View of Your Customers Journey
By bringing together data from different touchpoints, businesses can gain a 360-degree view of their customers. This holistic perspective helps them better understand how customers interact with their brand while allowing managers to create a comprehensive brand narrative across all channels and the customer journey.
Better Decision-Making
Automation systems collect and analyze large volumes of data generated during customer interactions. This data-driven approach provides valuable insights into customer behaviors, preferences, and trends. Decision-makers can leverage these insights to make informed and strategic choices and reallocate resources more efficiently.
Industry Compliance
At BTI, we are aware that every organization must adhere to a specific set of requirements depending on your specific industry compliance regulations. Contact center automation enables you to keep a detailed record of all the necessary documentation to ensure compliance. In addition, call automation platforms often include robust security measures such as encryption protocols and secure storage mechanisms.
These features help in safeguarding sensitive customer data and ensuring compliance with data protection regulations like GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation) or HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act).
Looking For Business Communication Service & Installation?
BTI has 35+ years of experience providing business communication services for small businesses and enterprise level organizations. If you are looking for a provider that can take care of all your business communication needs including installation and unmatched support you are in the right place.
Do you want to know more about contact center automation and how it can benefit your organization? Take a look at our latest webinar "Cutting-Edge Ways to Streamline and Automate Customer Interaction Using Hyper-automation and AI" to get expert insight on call center automation or contact us. We are here to help!