Are you paying attention to your agents’ product or service knowledge? How well-trained are they to respond to customers questions?
Product or service knowledge plays an important role in call centers, even more, if we are talking about support agents for customer service, helpdesk, and sales.
It’s essential for them to know the product or service you offer to give answers to your customers. But not only that, product or service knowledge makes agents feel more confident when they are on the call. It helps to resolve problems in just one call, it gives the agents more tools to sell more, and they feel more motivated when they talk about something they know very well. These are just some of the reasons why you should be thinking about improving your contact center agents’ product or service knowledge. Here are 5 ways you can do it.
Make Sure They Read The Material Available
The marketing, sales, and production teams put all their effort into creating informational materials to let clients and possible clients understand the product or service you are selling. Brochures, catalogs, manuals, articles, case studies, and other materials have valuable information about the product or service. Reading these materials not only helps agents know the product, but to send the same message. Having some of these materials handy can be very helpful during their calls. Include these materials as part of their training so all agents have access to them and make sure they read them.
Produce Digital Materials
Sometimes we lose track of paper-based materials and it can take us more time to find information. For this reason, we recommend that you produce digital materials that agents can have on their computers, consult them when needed, and be easy for them to find the information they need. Make sure the materials are clear, well-organized, and accessible, with a consistent style and format, with important information highlighted. You can also take advantage of technology and create didactic materials to have on the agent’s computers for them to learn.
Read: How To Improve Coaching & Development Of Customer Experience Employees
Let Them Develop a Personal Experience
It’s always easier to learn when we experience something first hand. If you have a product or service that your agents can use or experience, do it. Agents will develop a more intimate understanding of the product and will help customers with their actual experiences. If you do not have a product or service that lets you do this, you can organize an on-site training. Let the agents know how the product is made, what the store looks like, how the service is provided. These can cost you time and money, and sometimes it can be difficult to implement, but try to transmit the experience to your agents’ trough videos, photos, samples, stories, smells, etc.
Schedule Cross-Training Sessions
To get to know the product or service in a deeper way, it is important to know the parts that involve the whole process. Cross-training can help the agents understand what the product or service really offers to customers. For example, they can assist to a QA training to know the level of quality the company offers, or attend an operations training to know the processes, standards, materials, and timeline the product or service needs, just to mention some of the things your agents can learn with cross-training.
Read: 6 Ways To Promote Your Call Center Culture And Improve Your Customer Service
Measure And Reward
It’s important to know the level of product or service knowledge of your agents. This helps you to create customized, more effective training for each agent and make sure they know what they need to know to offer a better service. You are investing in training, make sure it’s working. You can have pop quizzes or even roleplay sessions and games. But, don’t forget to reward them too. Motivate your agents to keep learning, updating, and improving their product or service knowledge. Keep in mind that motivation plays an important role in training.
Give your agents the tools and training they need to do the best they can with their customer interactions.