The Advantages of Having a Call Center Software for Financial Services

For a bank, the customer call center plays a key role in the success of their business. For customers, fast, efficient service is not a comfort – it is a need. 

As more and more customers shift to digital banking solutions, the interaction between bank officials and customers is thinning, while customer service agents are increasing rapidly. Worried customers put out all sorts of questions on loans, deferred payments, investments, mortgages, etc to their customer service agents. It is a high volume, high transaction marketplace with stringent regulatory and compliance requirements. While they present an untapped opportunity for the financial services sector to build trust with their customers, modern-day perils of cyber security and financial frauds cannot be overemphasized. 

Similar behavior is observed in financial services providers like stock broking houses, insurance providers, and commodity trading institutions among others. So you know a customer contact center is indispensable and also an efficient solution to manage customer interactions. In a recent PwC survey, consulting major found that contact centers can cut costs by 15% to 30% with simple technological interventions and give agents extra time to focus on the most important customers. 

Starting from scratch, let’s look at the biggest differentiator in a customer contact center software by function– inbound and outbound– that distinguishes the product. 

Inbound Vs outbound customer contact center: a glance

An inbound customer contact center is the receiver of calls. This means, that the contact center caters to customers who call the banks or financial institutions, for information and action such as account balance, blocking credit or debit cards, getting information on letters of credit and seeking bank guarantees among others. This requires a quick request reaction from inbound customer service agents as the customer is on the other end. 

Whereas, the outbound customer contact center is used for outgoing communication including, information on new bank credit card launches, loan payment reminders, and marketing, and sales surveys. Normally, agents carry sales quotas and can prep for calls that are made to target customers.

Making investment decisions on customer call center software buy

For the long-term horizon, you should invest in an automated call center solution. For the uninitiated, automatic call center dialers are an application or system that automates the entire process of outbound and inbound calls. The system is designed such that it automatically dials the phone numbers as per the list of contacts on behalf of the call center agents. The moment the call is answered, calls are transferred to the available agent or routed through IVR. This process brings efficiency by reducing downtime, increasing productivity, and managing customer expectations.

Let’s look at the 4 most important call center dialers that you should know before making a purchase decision.  

1.   Predictive Dialer 

Touted as the smartest of the lot, predictive uses sophisticated algorithms to monitor agent performance and keep tab on his time and availability. It works like a self-service platform akin to assembly line calling with agents getting no rest between calls. It carefully detects the call to ascertain it is a human or answering machine and then connects to an agent who is available to respond. This is apt for the financial services sector with high call volume to keep up with customer service demand. This leads to more live conversations, so the call center agents can focus on important tasks at hand. 

• Better time management by automated dialing
• Improved productivity by reducing call connection time
• Efficient management of leads with inbuilt lead management software 
• Callbacks can be easily scheduled and managed based on the call patterns and the availability of the agents
• Music/Message on-Hold as this dialling software supports music and pre-recorded greeting messages 
• Real time call monitoring the call center agents get the appropriate data about the caller that helps them to make better conversations.
• Standardized report generation is an extremely beneficial tool for the financial services sector that generates detailed data on calls and agents.

2.    Preview dialer 

Financial services companies often use Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software. This is where a preview dialer is most useful as it can be integrated right into the CRM desktop. When an agent is ready to place a call, the CRM will display the respective record alongside the contact number. This helps the agent to view crucial financial records before getting into the call. It features marketing campaigns that were targeted at different customers.

Read Also: Top Call Center Metrics and KPIs to Every Business Should Track

3.    Intelligent Robo Dialers

Intelligent Robo dialers are a hot favorite of banks with high call volumes. It works this way- you record a voice message that goes into the IVR (Interactive Voice Response). The robo dialer and IVR work together to dial numbers and if the dialer detects an answering machine it sends out a voicemail message. Whilst, if it is a human at the other end, it gives the option of calling back or connecting with a customer service agent. If the customer requests a call back then the lead is passed to the CRM. In case, the customer opts in then the call is routed to the customer service agent.

Financial service organizations and banks find this useful to perform all types of activities including cold calling, lead follow-up, customer interactions, and surveys. Agents are able to intelligently filter out qualified leads that generate higher chances of conversions. Moreover, banks can map is based on the agent’s skill and direct complex product calls like mortgages, securities, bonds, and debentures among others to subject matter specialists. 

4. Power dialer 

The power dialer, also popularly known as a rapid dialer, also automates the calling process. First, it pulls up the pre-stored list from the system and by calling each number one by one. Once the call is answered or it lands on the voicemail/ automated answering machine, it proceeds to the next.  This saves time for the customer service agents at financial service organizations, who are always pressed for time. The agents are not required to manually dial each number and wait on it until they are able to speak to the caller. 

Benefits of modern customer call center software

Element	Example	NPS	Cost Reduction	Revenue Benefit
Aligning business priorities, product complexity, and service	·       Prioritize contact center capabilities to growth objectives by customer segments (e.g., mass affluent, high net worth) and product value (e.g., margin contribution, market share).
Enhancing the customer journey and IVR experience	·       Implement NLP-based software for caller intent and routing priorities. Identify proper service delivery channels for demand management and to confirm IVR containment. ·       . Potential enhancement from on-premise to cloud services.
Improving productivity	·       Adopt workforce analytics to schedule agents according to availability and skillset, and leverage dynamic scheduling to reallocate outbound specialized sales calls.  ·       Introduce concepts such as gamification to motivate agents and increase retention.
Accelerating digitization	·       Integrate business and contact center systems to present a single view to the agent.  ·       Leverage automation and AI to simplify pre-call and reduce after-call work.  ·       Deploy “on-demand” automated capabilities to reduce AHT and training.
Streamlining the operating model	·       Redefine generalist and specialist roles: generalists to focus on simple servicing needs across product lines; specialists to focus on advice delivery such as wealth, loan needs, disputes or fraud.  ·       Deploy COEs that apply best practices for remote work, training across regions, and in/outsourced centers in a consistent way.

Five core elements to upgrade your contact center

 

The PwC report further sheds light on an interesting fact– what should financial services providers look out for when upgrading a customer contact center software for the finance sector. Here’s the snapshot for you:

Dial-in to reap rewards

Ready to take the plunge? Get on the right side of customers by being more responsive and having meaningful conversations. It is just not about cutting down operational costs but also coming out of the shadows after Covid-19 wanes off. HoduSoft’s HoduCC Contact Center’s advanced dialers have been designed to match your needs at every step of the way, with customized features. Dial-in to reach our sales representative at +1 707-708-4638 or write to us at [email protected]