Customer Contact Center Trends for 2014

Companies should already be reducing the number of phone calls and customer service requests they receive this year by assessing their customer-service presence on websites and across social media. Pages should be easier to find and use; a customer visiting a company’s Facebook page should see links to FAQs or Customer Service to decrease public complaints on the company’s news feed. Self-serve pages should include instructional videos and downloadable customer service apps for smartphones and tablets. Additional customer service trends for 2014 include the following by Datamark's white pages report: Companies turn to mobile apps to keep drama off of social media channels Steering consumers toward mobile customer-service apps, rather than keeping them waiting for a response on Facebook or Twitter, will decrease complaints and negative feedback on social media and get customers the help they need. FAQs, downloads of instructional manuals, how-to videos and “schedule-a-callback” features save customers from having to wait on the phone to speak to a real person. Video chat Live video support using services such as Google Helpouts will include engineers and executives who provide explanations and support in lieu of self-help options. Some video chats will become events that generate positive publicity by surprising customers with expert and celebrity interactions. Additional revenue streams via multichannel customer contact Because video chat is expensive (bandwidth and training for expert customer service agents), companies will test whether consumers are willing to pay extra for premium customer service. Google Helpouts’ business model, for example, allows experts to charge for their time and services. Outsourced customer contact centers onshore and nearshore The sophistication and complexity of delivered services grows alongside stronger relationships between clients and outsourcers. Companies in need of Spanish speaking customer service reps will turn to service providers in the U.S. Southwest, northern Mexico and other Latin American countries that have young, educated and bilingual workforces. A focus on quality of care over cost savings means companies are willing to pay a little more for customer contact centers onshore or at nearshore locations close to the U.S. border. Hispanic market will drive customer service outsourcing U.S. Hispanic purchasing power was $1.2 trillion in 2012 and is expected to grow to $1.5 trillion by 2015, according to the Selig Center for Economic Growth. Hispanics are one of the most active demographics on social media, and Facebook recently announced it is opening an office in Miami, Fla. Companies in need of Spanish speaking customer service reps will turn to contact center service providers in the U.S. Southwest, northern Mexico, and other Latin American countries that have large bilingual workforces. Additionally, customer service agents will become part of a company's upper level team, handling calls, responding to emails and social media messages, and conducting video chats -- often in more than one language. For more, download the complimentary white paper, “Customer Contact Center Trends for 2014,” and watch this video from Datamark: More about Datamark: DATAMARK, Inc. is a leading business process outsourcing company specializing in high-volume digital mailroom management, document processing, document management, bilingual customer contact centers and business process consulting for Fortune 500 firms and other large organizations. Headquartered in El Paso, Texas, DATAMARK employs nearly 2,200 people in its U.S., Mexico and India facilities. For more information, visit http://www.datamark.net. *featured image by www.clubtix.com *cartoon by Ted Goff

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Customer Contact Center Trends for 2014

Datamark's white paper tracks trends shaping call center and multichannel customer service in 2014.

Christie Barakat

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Christie Barakat