A call center has the immense capacity to handle huge amounts of calls at all times. It consists of people that are specifically trained in handling inbound and outbound customer calls thus catering to customer service needs. All calls are monitored and logged and used for future reference.
CRM being the customer centred strategy in providing customer satisfaction is playing a very prominent role in the call center sector. Call Center CRM software collects the vital customer data and stores it. This data is entirely essential to the call center and is utilized in its day to day activities. It helps them in understanding a clearer view of the customer being handled and enables them to give the right answers to customer queries, problems etc. Knowing the customer, his preferences, his purchase and complaint history etc all contribute significantly to the better handling of the customer.
CRM provides the call center professional with valuable customer data providing him the information about the customers history before he even makes a call. He is thus in a position to know and understand the customer preferences. It enables customer databases to be kept up to date at all times.
CRM is used for follow up actions as well. After the initial call all subsequent follow up actions are carried out. CRM enables a call center professional to look at previous call details when there is a query. Lead management is also possible as leads can be identified and assigned to specified employees. This results in a considerable reduction in time loss.
CRM enables call center employees perform their duties easily and with less strain on account of its user friendly attributes. CRM also enables call center professionals and managers to prepare their reports speedily and with clarity.
With the integration of IVR(Interactive Voice Response) and CRM, Call Center companies are able to increase customer satisfaction by improving the customer self service capabilities and there by increasing completion of the customers interaction with the company. This also reduces the total cost of ownership of technologies. IVR and CRM can be used together to better handle incoming and outgoing calls.
IVR with CRM will allow companies to use customer data to offer consumers new sales opportunities through the telephony platform. In many cases, such systems can also be used to track consumer buying behavior to target advertisements further.