Scripting provides agents with a written guide to consistently manage the flow of the customer conversation
In addition to the script itself, it could include the addition of predefined steps or required fields to enforce process compliance, objection handling suggestions, input validation to ensure that data is captured correctly, and provide a central
place for agents to access customer or business data from external sources.
Scripts are used in sales, support, debt collection and general data collection environments and can dramatically increase productivity, reduce contact handling time and improve the quality and consistency of interactions. It can also play a central role in process automation by triggering various business processes and tasks within or outside of the contact centre.
Scripting provides agents with a written guide to consistently manage the flow of the customer conversation
In addition to the script itself, it could include the addition of predefined steps or required fields to enforce process compliance, objection handling suggestions, input validation to ensure that data is captured correctly, and provide a central place for agents to access customer or business data from external sources.
Scripts are used in sales, support, debt collection and general data collection environments and can dramatically increase productivity, reduce contact handling time and improve the quality and consistency of interactions. It can also play a central role in process automation by triggering various business processes and tasks within or outside of the contact centre.
Benefits
Reduce risk & enhance compliance
- Enforce compliance by incorporating required fields into scripts or forcing the agent to follow a predefined process.
- Use data validation to significantly reduce human error and the risk associated risk with capturing invalid or incomplete client information.
Improve business agility
- Adapt and respond quickly to changing business requirements – instantly make changes to contact centre scripts on the fly to reflect pricing updates, adjusted calculations and more.
Increase revenue
- Complete more sales and boost conversion rates by ensuring that all the correct details are captured and validated, and the correct process is followed.
- Provide the information needed to help agents handle objections, concerns and queries more effectively to increase the likelihood of generating a sale.
Save costs
- Agents can view, update, and input information from multiple sources from a single scripting front-end rather than wasting time searching and opening multiple applications during a call. This reduces handling time and ultimately the cost of service, cost of collection and the cost of sale of all interactions.
- Scripts can automatically trigger other features or workflows to save time (e.g. displaying customer information based on the call context, running specific external applications, inserting outbound records into loads etc.)
- Reduce training costs by training agents on using one application efficiently rather than navigating multiple business applications. Objection handling and product Q&A’s can also be embedded into the script, providing immediate assistance to agents rather than adding another training requirement.
Improve the customer experience
- Provide agents with easy access to the right information to help service customers more efficiently.
- Embed objection handling, or new product information Q&A’s into the script to assist agents in addressing customer queries or concerns during a conversation.
- Keep agents focused on their tasks and attentive to the customer by eliminating the need to switch between business applications to input information, perform calculations, or search for information.
- Up to date, version-controlled scripts ensure that agents respond in a similar way to all customers, resulting in a more consistently controlled customer experience.
- According to Forester research, scripting is such a powerful tool that it can increase first call resolution (FCR) by as much as 17%, and up agent productivity across the board by 36%.
Challenges
Capturing info across multiple business apps
Agents often need to capture the same information in multiple business applications (such as a CRM, ticketing systems and financial systems), resulting in a poor customer experience (long wait times) and high interaction costs.
Keeping track of script versions
It is difficult to keep track of the most recent script versions, and instantly roll out updates when required.
Agents may make mistakes
Agents may make mistakes when capturing details, wreaking havoc on processes that rely on the accuracy of this data.
Determining drop-off points
It’s challenging to determine drop-off points and detractors in sales or other conversations with customers.
Agent training is time-consuming
Agent training on products and objection handling techniques is time-consuming and expensive
Agents sometimes deviate from the script
Agents do not always follow instructed processes when communicating with customers and may neglect to capture required information.