There is one question in particular that lingers on every marketer’s mind: how do you reduce churn? Can contact centers help in this case? Are contact centers really important, or are they just cost centers even now? How can you improve customer service through call centers? Answers to all these questions and more in this week’s Contact Center Perspectives. We are sure you will have a great time going through them!

Congratulations to all the featured influencers, experts, and publications!

Churn be Gone! 5 Ways to Kill off High Churn Rates [icmi.com]

How can you reduce churn? The article lists 5 proven tactics that can easily be applied to do exactly that.

Did you know that 48% of customers say that the critical time to gain their loyalty is upon their first purchase or when they first begin a service? Always remember that building loyalty is an investment for the future. Cancelation of renewal charges is said to give a boost to CSAT scores. These and other such points are the highlights of this article.

Churn be Gone! 5 Ways to Kill off High Churn Rates https://t.co/w2xyRPUpaZ #cctr #custserv

— ICMI (@CallCenterICMI) February 12, 2016

Perception vs Reality [icmi.com]

80% of customers feel that companies are putting more effort into marketing rather than customer service, whereas only of 12% contact centers feel that way. Wow! That’s quite the myth buster.

This and the 7 other such perception vs reality comparisons included in this blog are real eye openers.

Nice set of #custserv and #cctr stats: "Perception vs Reality: 8 Consumer Trends the Contact Center Can't Ignore" https://t.co/wAQEVOLqYY

— Bob Furniss (@bobfurniss) February 16, 2016

In A Digital First World, Contact Centres Are the Custodians of Customer Loyalty [customerthink.com]

Did you know that 70% of customers interacting with call centers feel that they know more than the agents dealing with them?

The summary of the article is that even in the age of multichannel support, customers still want to speak with a human (the contact center). Call centers will be expected to support complex issues and a company’s response will decide customer loyalty.

In A Digital First World, Contact Centres Are The Custodians Of Customer Loyalty https://t.co/BUVl9DmCSq via @CustomerThink #marketing

— Tim Hughes 提姆·休斯 (@Timothy_Hughes) February 17, 2016

Contact Centers Play Stronger Role in Business Value Chains: Survey [deloitte.wsj.com]

Contact centers and customer engagement channels will continue to grow significantly in number and strategic value to organizations’ efforts to capture customers’ loyalty and wallet share over the next two years, according to the 2015 Global Contact Center Survey from Deloitte Consulting LLP.

By 2020, it is expected that leading, customer-centric businesses will have contact center operating models that support the entire customer lifecycle in an integrated fashion, even if the traditional functional silos such as marketing and sales remain.

http://twitter.com/ab_haas/statuses/698455016139550720

How to be the best at customer service, wherever your contact center is based [customerthink.com]
Companies have a huge opportunity to focus on optimizing the aspects of experience that are meaningful to the lives of their customers. However, the location of a contact center should have absolutely no bearing on customer service.

With the availability and accessibility of cloud solutions, there is simply no excuse for bad customer service in 2016 – no matter where your contact center agents are based. Your ultimate goal should be that the customer hangs up with the issue solved and a happy memory of how helpful your agents were.

How to be the best at customer service, wherever your contact centre is based https://t.co/p0Wa4REXSt

— CustomerThink (@customerthink) February 16, 2016

We hope you enjoyed this week’s Contact Center Perspectives. Be sure to respond in the comments, tweet us @VOZIQ or follow us on LinkedIn.