Training and Coaching
Call center training software guide
By Seismic On 18 March 2024
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Training and Coaching
By Seismic On 18 March 2024
Training call center agents is key to delivering excellent customer service. But with demanding workloads and high turnover rates, call centers need a scalable way to deliver training to every agent — that’s where call center training software comes in.
Effective agent training is a crucial investment for every call center. After all, your agents are the face of your company and likely one of the first people a customer interacts with if they have a question or need a problem solved. Call center training ensures that agents have the knowledge and skills needed to provide customers with the experience they expect. Unfortunately, many organizations don’t dedicate enough time or energy to training agents. This may be caused by significant turnover, or perhaps they are so busy they can’t afford to pull agents off of the floor to deliver training. The good news is that call center training software helps support teams overcome these training barriers and challenges.
Call center training software helps companies create, manage, and deliver training to agents and other customer-facing employees so they are prepared to provide exceptional customer care. This software enables trainers to create call center training courses that agents can access right from their desks. These online lessons focus on:
Customer service has quickly become a competitive advantage and proven driver of long-term growth for organizations. However, the rapid pace of business, paired with evolving customer preferences, means that companies need to enable agents to deliver outstanding service time and time again. Let’s take a look at how the call center industry is evolving and how it impacts agent training.
More customers are turning to self-service channels for simple, transactional interactions like checking an account balance or the status of an order. When it’s time for a customer to reach out to an agent, it’s likely because they can’t find the answer or solution through self-service. Therefore, these interactions tend to be more complex, unique, and unpredictable.
To adapt to new service channels and customer needs, call centers need to provide agents with training opportunities that prepare them to handle and solve detailed interactions. Additionally, agents need to be equipped with a wide range of customer service skills to handle interactions across multiple support channels like chat, email, and phone.
More call centers have also embraced a remote or hybrid work model in the post-pandemic world. In fact, a 2021 study showed that more than 87% of agents work from home compared to only 19% in 2019. Studies also predict that anywhere from 60-80% of agents will continue working from home long-term.
The days of relying on in-person, instructor-led training sessions are a thing of the past. Now, leaders need to find a scalable and efficient way to provide training programs for call center employees who are located in different cities, states, and countries
On average, call centers experienced an average attrition rate of 42% in 2021. In addition to this retention challenge, 31% of agents said they are disengaged with their role and actively looking for new jobs. Of those surveyed, the lack of employee training and development opportunities were the top reasons why call center agents are disengaged and looking for new roles.
If call centers want to improve agent retention and engagement, they need to give agents access to the ongoing training they want. This will not only provide crucial upskilling, but also provide agents with a clear career growth path.
While industry change is unavoidable, the good news is that call center agent training software can help companies overcome these challenges and ensure customer satisfaction. Unlike other training methods, call center training software is a great way to automate the training process, provide ongoing learning opportunities, and track training progress. Take a look at this quick comparison between traditional training and call center training software:
Now that we’ve covered the benefits of call center training software, it’s important to note that not all call center training software is created equally. While some companies may be tempted to turn to an old-school learning management system, the best call center training software is purpose-built for frontline agents and includes the following features.
Call centers that leverage online training software have a great opportunity to create an engaging, scalable, and effective training program for their agents. Here are some best practices to keep in mind when it comes to creating and delivering your organization’s call center training program.
Analyze training needs
Develop clear goals and objectives
Embrace onboarding and continuous learning
Focus on essential call center skills training
Track training progress
World-class call center teams deliver exceptional customer care time and time again. And with our call center training software, teams can onboard new agents quickly, deliver ongoing learning and coaching, and track training progress against business goals. Read how one customer earns an average CSAT score of 90% by delivering call center training online with Seismic. Or, get a demo and we’ll show you how to take your call center training program to the next level.
