Customer service training is important for new hires and veteran agents. Effective training and coaching ensure that every agent is prepared to interact with customers and quickly resolve their support requests.
In a recent survey conducted by Seismic, we found that organizations that provide access to ongoing training and coaching opportunities have better employee outcomes. In fact, 76% of respondents said that having quick access to coaching and training content keeps them from second-guessing themselves. On the other hand, in organizations where training and coaching aren’t readily available, 93% of respondents said that more training, coaching, or upskilling would help them meet their goals.
To visualize how this plays out at different organizations, let’s take a look at Sam and Jordan. They both recently started customer service jobs at large, fast-paced companies.
A tale of two onboarding experiences
Sam’s company starts the onboarding process before his first day on the job He receives onboarding paperwork and company policies ahead of time, so he’s prepared for job-specific training on his first day. Sam’s employee training plan includes a mix of online and in-person training to deliver key information about products and processes. He also practices interacting with customers in real-life scenarios to put his new skills to the test. After his first few weeks of onboarding, Sam is tasked with five daily support tickets. Thanks to solid onboarding, he closes his five tickets with ease, receives high satisfaction scores, and meets his key performance indicators (KPIs). His manager, pleased with Sam’s performance, raises his daily quota to 15 tickets. Sam continues to exceed expectations and, within 30 days, is fully ramped with a quota of 30 tickets a day.
Jordan starts her job with a week-long, in-person training class that features a large binder full of paperwork, procedures, and tests. After her new-hire orientation concludes, she’s tasked with a quota of 5 daily support tickets. At the two-week mark, Jordan isn’t meeting her KPIs, so her manager reduces her quota to three tickets. By the end of her first 30 days, Jordan is still struggling to find her footing and receiving sub-par satisfaction scores. Frustrated, discouraged, and without a way to hone her skills, she decides to leave the company while her best friend continues down the path to productivity.
Sam and Jordan’s onboarding experiences couldn’t be any different. But in organizations around the world, these same onboarding stories play out every week. As we mentioned before, access to training and coaching makes agents’ jobs easier. And when agents lack access to the training they need, they start to look for jobs elsewhere. In this post, we’ll explain how organizations can implement training and coaching programs, as well as measure their impact on business objectives.
Measure important customer service KPIs
Forward-thinking companies and managers like Sam’s use the power of data to inform customer service training initiatives and improve agent performance. According to a study by Dimension Data, 72% of customer service leaders say analytics enable better performance; yet, 20% of contact centers don’t measure the benefits of training.
While there are plenty of valuable KPIs, here are a few that provide actionable insights that customer service training programs should monitor:
Customer Satisfaction (CSAT) is an index score, rated on a 0-100% scale, and is calculated by surveying how the customer values the quality of the interaction. CSAT is helpful as it measures the customer’s satisfaction regardless of channel—whether it was a phone call, online chat, email, or anything else.
Net Promoter Scores (NPS) measures customer experience on a 0-10 scale. Customer service reps ask customers how likely they are to recommend the company to a friend or colleague. A 9 or 10 rating means customers are promoting the company and is a fantastic indicator of customer service team improvement.
Churn, also known as attrition or agent turnover, measures the percentage of employees that leave their company. Call centers have a reputation for high turnover, both from voluntary and involuntary termination. When customer service teams have high churn rates, it may be time to review customer service skills training modules to ensure that agents are developing the skills they need to be successful.
Improve your KPIs with these customer service training ideas
Seismic works with several customer service teams that use our learning and coaching software and have increased their CSAT and NPS scores. These same companies have also achieved higher retention rates when their agents complete customer service training courses. In fact, one Seismic customer, Symplicity, saw noteworthy improvements across several KPIs, including:
- By completing learning and coaching, their agents experienced a 5% jump in satisfaction for an average CSAT score of 99%
- Reduced new agent onboarding from six to three months
- Lower time-to-close with a 15% increase in one-touch tickets
Our customers also shared valuable insights into what works for them. We asked them what best practices they rely on to improve agent performance – these are three that stood out.
Go above and beyond for the customer
The first priority for agents is to always provide the best possible customer experience. When agents deliver on that promise, it’s important to share those stories to foster a culture where an entire team is willing to go the extra mile for their customers. By celebrating customer victories, your broader customer service team is encouraged to contribute to customer satisfaction.
Navigate difficult conversations with unhappy customers
Upset customers are an unfortunate part of customer service. But the way your agents respond to unsatisfied customers can have a real impact on your business. By treating experiences with angry customers as an opportunity to restore the relationship, agents can improve customer satisfaction and retain their business. Regularly training customer service teams can help ensure that these types of interactions don’t go from bad to worse.
Ask customers to take your survey
NPS lives and dies on the willingness of customers to take the survey. Train agents to guide customers through the surveys to ensure that NPS is correctly calculated.
These are just a few training examples to help customer service teams meet or exceed their KPIs. Regardless of what metrics your team uses, remember that the best customer service leaders focus on measuring the progress that agents make against each KPI. The data will provide valuable insights into training efforts and how it impacts rep performance.
Improve your customer service KPIs with Lessonly by Seismic
Lessonly by Seismic’s team learning software connects the dots between customer service training and team performance. Agents perform better when they develop the critical knowledge and skills needed to do great work. If your team is ready to simplify learning and coaching at scale, get a demo today.
