2022 Guide for Call Center Managers to Track Call Results in Salesforce
7 min
According to a report by Fortune business insights, the global Contact Center as a Service (CCaaS) business is growing fast and is expected to reach 15.07 billion in 2029. In today's world of competition, companies need to innovate their call center operations and capitalize on CCaaS market share. The market will likely increase as big companies develop AI-enabled contact center platform solutions for more personalized and enhanced customer journeys.
As a call center manager, you will continuously measure call results to improve customer service, drive sales or increase revenues.
Call results are nothing more than key performance indicators or outcomes (KPI) in a call center operation. Improving customer satisfaction and cementing brand loyalty is the main objective of any call center operation. As a call center team, you will achieve this by making sure customer service calls are painless with a pleasant experience. The most effective way to offer an exceptional customer experience is to capture and capitalize on insightful data.
A call center manager must track insightful data on customer service calls in real-time to help organizations improve service delivery. These include adjusting internal processes, standard operating procedures, and technology to delight and engage customers consistently.
Main SLAs for Call Center Managers
To create a better customer experience, call center teams will be responsible for leveraging call results data. Thanks to the call center managers, with the help of Salesforce admins, to enable call results tracking and get values out of them. That is possible with tools like Salesforce service or sales cloud integrated with call center technology. To run call center operations efficiently with quality assurance requires choosing the right call results and presents in Salesforce dashboards for easier reporting and seamless visibility.
This article will discuss why tracking call results in Salesforce is essential and their significance to call center managers and businesses.
What Call Results to Track in Salesforce
KPIs in call centers are mainly tracked, measured, and reported through call results. Each agent has predefined directions or outcomes associated with their calls. These results also contain properties that, if not configured correctly, return inaccurate data that does not reflect an accurate picture of the call center performance. Therefore, call centers must produce well-defined and configured call outcomes to maximize benefits for managers, agents, and callers.
- Call results are expected to have the following details:
- Number of calls received during a specific period
- How many of those calls resolved customer issues
- Which customers spoke to the call center agent.
- Which call was successful?
- The call result list needs to include well-defined result definitions to allow the agent to access the calls that need attention.
Top Call Center KPIs to Track in Salesforce
Here are the top KPIs for call center managers to track in Salesforce to improve overall call center performance and achieve customer satisfaction;
- Customer Satisfaction Score (CSAT)
- Average Handling Time
- First Call Resolution (FCR)
- Average Speed of Answer
- Call Abandonment Rate
- Service Level / Response Time
- Adherence to Schedule
- Call Quality Assurance
Customer Satisfaction Score (CSAT)
A vital metric to measure as a call center manager is customer satisfaction to understand customer relationships' well-being. In Salesforce, you can assess critical indicators of customer satisfaction using surveys and tools like the Customer Satisfaction Score (CSAT), Customer Engagement Score (CES), and the Net Promoter Score (NPS). The call results you are measuring are overall satisfaction, loyalty, attribute happiness, and intent to repurchase products or services.
Why is customer satisfaction feedback essential to track? Because an organization can target its most satisfied customers with loyal products or services while using negative feedback to make an impactful service change/improvement.
First Call Resolution (FCR)
The ambition of any call center manager is to have a team that can resolve customer issues 100% on a first call without any follow-ups. Achieving this objective amounts to the first call resolution or FCR. Every percentage improvement in FCR has the same percentage impact on customer satisfaction.
FCR in Salesforce is tracked via a Service console and calculated by;
(Number of issues resolved in a single call/The total number of calls received) x100%
The overall call center industry FCR performance ranges between 44% and 92%, while 71% is the benchmark average. An FCR score of 71% means that 29% of customers have to call back seeking resolutions of their first calls.
Average Handling Time
According to Gartner, average handling time or AHT is a vital call result to track in a call center, especially when aiming to maintain high service levels. AHT includes the time it takes to serve the customer from when a call is placed to the time it stays in the queue, actual call up until resolution.
66% of customers prefer calling support over the phone if they have inquiries or issues.
In Salesforce, you can track average call handling time under the support manager dashboard. On average, customers served within an average call handling time of 5 minutes less leaves them satisfied. Some agents may quickly jump into a call with customers and rush things out to reduce AHT, which may not necessarily mean better support. The ATH result is critical for call center managers because they use it for accurate forecasting, resource planning, budgeting, scheduling, and coaching or training needs in call centers.
Average Speed to Answer
The average speed to answer is the average time it takes for a call to be answered, including the time the customer spends waiting in a queue.
Like an FCR, the average speed to answer a call impacts customer satisfaction. The faster call center agents pick up customer calls, the better their overall experience. Call center managers track the average answer speed to optimize agents' working shifts, especially during busy hours.
Call Abandonment Rate
This KPI measures the number of callers that hang up before talking to an agent during the call or while waiting in a queue. A high call abandonment rate is terrible news to call center managers: Customers are getting frustrated and giving up before you have a chance to fix their problem in a call. High call abandonment correlates with low customer satisfaction.
Call Abandonment Rate = (Total abandoned calls divided by Total calls received) x100%
Call center managers must keep an eye on this metric and ensure it is within the recommended industry standard of 5-8%. A high call abandonment rate means you have a complicated and lengthy interactive voice response (IVR) tree or reduce your average holding time.
Service Level / Response Time
Service level/response time is the most critical metric to the effective management of the call center and the customer service experience. The service level/response time metric is the percentage of calls answered within a specific time, usually in seconds.
- Service level/response time measures;
- How your call center is serving your customers,
- The number of agents required to provide efficient service to your customers,
- The competitive advantage of your call center in the industry.
For example, a call center manager might set an inbound call KPI of 90% service level within 20 seconds.
Service level = Number of calls answered within the 20s threshold / Total inbound calls x 100
Adherence to Guidelines and Schedule
This metric tracks how well your agents follow a script and observe other calling handling protocols per schedule or shift configuration. For instance, if you want your agents to greet callers a certain way, that would be included in this metric.
Adherence to schedule = (Total available agent time / Total time in an agent's work schedule) x 100
Call Quality Assurance
Call quality assurance is one of the most common and critical of all the call center metrics, regardless of the call center's size, industry, and function. Call quality assurance measures how well your agents meet your customers' needs through monitoring of live conversations.
Usually, after the call is completed, the agent sits with their team leader or manager to review the agent's actions that transpired during the call. The quality assurance team monitors all calls and sets evaluation criteria—the higher the call quality, the better performance of the agent.
More Call Results to Track
Other relevant call results include Peak Hour Rate to determine how call centers perform during times of high demand, Cost per Call as an essential budget element, Call Volume per Agent, and Call Conversion Rate to track campaign performance.
Conclusion
Tracking call outcomes is the core responsibility of any contact center manager, although it depends on their ability to generate new call results based on unique conversations or customer requests. However, they ensure the right balance between the accuracy of call results and call center efficiency.
While customer service and satisfaction seem to be the ultimate goals and objectives for a thriving call center, operations and overall business needs also need to be considered.
