Getting Started with Zendesk Talk

GETTING STARTED WITH ZENDESK TALK 3 Introduction Even in the age of email, social media, and they use to manage all other customer whatever new channel is just around the conversations. Easy to set up and use, corner, customers still prefer to use the Zendesk Talk helps organizations boost phone for communicating with companies. agent productivity, improve cross-channel Whether it’s to resolve complex support reporting, reduce costs, and—most issues or to receive personalized service, importantly—improve the customer many people appreciate companies that experience. make the investment in providing quality support over the phone. This ebook is designed to help you successfully implement Zendesk Talk. Zendesk Talk is cloud-based call It includes high-level guidance, as well center software that helps companies as best practice tips, to ensure you and provide more personal, productive your team can provide—and continue to phone support. It’s built right into the improve—great phone support for your Zendesk multichannel support ticketing customers. solution, allowing teams to deliver phone support from the same platform

4 CHAPTER ONE Goals and Strategy Your Zendesk Talk setup strategy will vary based on your organization’s goals. A team with dozens of phone support agents, for ex- ample, will have different business goals than a small startup introducing phone support for the first time. After talking to lots of Zendesk customers, we’ve found that the majority of their goals fit into three main categories: (1) introducing phone support; (2) boosting customer satisfac- tion; and, (3) improving operational efficiencies. These goals certainly aren’t mutually exclusive, but honing in on your team’s primary goals will help you and your team prioritize decisions about setup, staffing, and key metrics.

GETTING STARTED WITH ZENDESK TALK 5 GOAL 1: INTRODUCING Introduce your phone number PHONE SUPPORT gradually We talk to lots of companies that start Displaying a phone number prominently with email only support, but eventually on your website can increase credibility find that it’s important to provide their with customers and assure them that customers with a way to contact them help is just a phone call away, but it might over the phone. In fact, we spoke with be better to slowly “ease into” phone one fast-growing e-commerce company support by strategically sharing your with resourceful customers so eager phone number. DonorsChoose.org, a to speak with someone for support leading nonprofit, first started out with that they uncovered the CEO’s cell phone support by sharing their support phone number on a financial filing and line only with their high-value donors. You published it online for others to call. can also put a support number on the specific sections of your help center that If your goal is to introduce phone cover subjects you know customers may support in a way that’s minimally need to talk through. disruptive to your current support operations, here are a few tips:

GETTING STARTED WITH ZENDESK TALK 6 Use an IVR to deflect FAQs Create a voicemail inbox GETTING STARTED WITH PHONE SUPPORT: DONORSCHOOSE.ORG Well-designed interactive voice responses If you don’t yet have a large enough (IVR) menus (also known as “phone team to support a full call center, you trees”) not only make your business feel can use Zendesk Talk as a voicemail more established, but can also provide inbox. All voicemails automatically create recordings to deflect common questions. tickets, making it easy to keep track and If you know that many customers call in divvy up among agents for follow-up. DonorsChoose, a leading nonprofit that to ask for opening hours, a pre-recorded With optional voicemail transcription, allows individual donors to contribute greeting at the start of the IVR will allow you can see at a glance why a customer directly to teachers in high-need your customers to “self-serve” on the has called. Plus, you can create triggers communities, initially used Zendesk to support contributors and teachers only via phone, saving them (and your agents) time. based on words in the voicemail email. After noticing that many members transcription, which could, for example, of their community were eager to speak automatically assign any voicemail with directly with a DonorsChoose employee, the word “refund” to the agents in the they introduced Zendesk Talk for phone refunds group. Agents can follow up support, starting with their high-value on voicemails with either an outbound donors. phone call, email, or even text message. Now, they are able to assist high- value donors and nurture projects in new regions, while maintaining their commitment to organizational transparency and efficiency.

GETTING STARTED WITH ZENDESK TALK 7 GOAL 2: BOOSTING CUSTOMER SATISFACTION Research continually shows that the members to meet your customers’ phone phone channel results in higher customer support demands. For those unpredictable satisfaction—it’s not surprising, given spikes in call volume, limit call queues and the immediacy and personal touch of a provide customers the option to exit a call. That said, if your primary goal is to long queue and leave a voicemail. improve customer service, it’s not enough to just provide a phone number to call. Empower agents to make You have to make sure to strategically outbound calls design your phone support operations in a way that minimizes the major sources of If you know that you are more likely customer frustration. to achieve positive satisfaction with a phone call, encourage your agents to Staff enough agents to field respond to frustrated customer emails inbound calls with a phone call. Not only will your customers appreciate the proactive, Customers hate waiting on the phone to personalized approach, your agents may talk to an agent. If customer satisfaction is find that it’s faster and easier than crafting your team’s primary goal, then you need a long email response, especially for to ensure that you have enough staff complicated issues.

Measure satisfaction If boosting customer satisfaction is your To solicit customer satisfaction using main goal, make sure that it’s your primary Zendesk Talk, send follow-up emails after key performance indicator. Your agents each call. Not only will you be able to don’t have to challenge the Zappos eight- understand what’s working well when your hour phone support call record, but if you agents help customers over the phone, measure agent performance based on call but you’ll be able to compare CSAT scores length rather than customer satisfaction, across all your other channels. it’ll be difficult for your team to fully resolve your customers’ issues. If boosting customer satisfaction is your main goal, make sure that it’s your primary key performance indicator.

“Using Talk helps us constantly improve our customer service.” BETTER SUPPORT WITH ZENDESK TALK: BRAYOLA Brayola is an online marketplace that matches Communications and Customer Service, said. up before the team could respond, revealing women with the perfect bra by allowing them “When you hear a voice at the other end of where the team is performing well and where to share the details of their favorite bras with the line that genuinely wants to help you, it it can do better. Automatic call recording each other privately. For their team, phone takes the edge off of the frustration and gives provides further opportunity for analyzing support is strategically important—for both us a chance to explain the process.” which approaches are most effective, and for the satisfaction it provides customers and the coaching both old and new team members on insights it provides the company. With Zendesk Talk, agents can see at a glance the best way to handle different issues. if a caller has any other tickets, and if they are “Nine times out of ten, if there’s a problem it’s open or closed. Plus, dashboards show how “Using Talk helps us constantly improve our better to have a personal interaction with the many calls the team is handling, how many customer service.” Abrams said. customer,” Fiona Adams, Brayola’s Director of people are on hold, and how many have hung

GETTING STARTED WITH ZENDESK TALK 10 GOAL 3: IMPROVING Put information at the OPERATIONAL EFFICIENCIES agent’s fingertips Although we hate to think about The time that agents spend looking for compromising the customer experience information to help their customers adds to minimize costs, sometimes the reality up. Upload your customer phone numbers is that teams are trying to do more with into Zendesk Support (details here) so less. The good news is that by moving that agents know exactly who is calling to Zendesk Talk you’re already taking a and can see any prior communication with big step towards saving your team time that customer. When known customers and money. Zendesk Talk is much less call, the automatic screen pop-up includes expensive than traditional call center vital customer information, so agents don’t solutions and allows agents to be more need to spend time identifying the caller efficient by managing all their channels or asking repetitive questions. Plus, use in one place. Here are a few tips to keep your Zendesk internal knowledge base in mind as your team sets out to reduce or other helpful apps that make it easy for your phone support overhead with your agents to get access to the customer, Zendesk Talk: product, or troubleshooting information without making callers wait.

GETTING STARTED WITH ZENDESK TALK 11 Streamline routing Consider remote agents MANAGING A REMOTE TEAM: GETAROUND Routing callers to the wrong agent takes If your team is looking for ways to up valuable time—receiving agents will decrease costs, you might consider hiring spend time on the phone with a customer, remote agents, which can reduce staffing even though they may not be equipped and infrastructure costs. Because there to help them. A well-designed IVR routing is no specific equipment required to use system, or phone tree, will allow callers to Zendesk Talk, agents can get started Getaround is an on-demand car sharing select who they need to speak to, so they anywhere in the world. Plus, real-time community, creatively tackling the very are connected to the correct agent on the dashboards make it easy for you to keep real problem of car overpopulation. first call. We provide more information for tabs on agent performance, even if they Since 2010, they’ve launched car sharing in five major U.S. cities, and designing effective IVR trees later in the aren’t in the same office. expansion at this speed has required ebook. their Customer Happiness team to scale in step. Given the risk and liability Train and support your team involved in driving, and considering the physical value of a car, phone support is They’ll help you improve first call essential to their success. resolution, decrease handle time, and With Zendesk Talk, the Getaround team increase customer satisfaction. We’ll can quickly onboard new agents to their teach you more about hiring, training, and call center in the Philippines, without coaching agents in the section on “Staffing investing in any additional equipment. and training agents”. Agents only need their laptops to start helping out customers over the phone.

Confident and well- trained agents are the best resource for delivering efficient phone support.

13 CHAPTER TWO Environment and System Requirements You’ve established your team’s main goals for phone support and are ready to get started. But before you dive into recording your call greetings and testing out your new Zendesk Talk line, there are a few things you need to check to be sure your team’s environment is properly set up for your new VoIP solution. Zendesk Talk is a VoIP solution, which allows you to make voice calls using a broadband internet connection instead of a regular (or analog) phone line. VoIP solutions are flexible, customizable, and generally more cost-effec- tive than traditional phone lines.

GETTING STARTED WITH ZENDESK TALK 1414 Here are five easy steps that you (or Configure your router with open whoever manages your network and IT) ports and QoS (quality of service) will need to follow before you get started: enabled Check your connection and Make sure your router has the required bandwidth ports open. With your router’s QoS, prioritize these ports or the IP address First things first: you’ll need a strong of the computer(s) making and receiving and stable Internet connection. Wireless calls. Two different ports are required network connections can work, but a to meet two different needs (learn more hardwired connection to your network here): will provide optimal results. A call over Talk requires at least 80 kbps (kilobits per • Transmission control protocol (TCP) second) per session, and we recommend for call initiation 500 kbps to provide leeway for other • User datagram protocol (UDP) for A call over Talk requires at network connectivity needs. Concurrent the audio component of the call least 80 kbps per session, network activity, like streaming media or and we recommend 500 kbps transferring files, can impact call quality, to provide leeway for other so a dedicated network for your calls will network connectivity needs. provide best results.

GETTING STARTED WITH ZENDESK TALK 15 Open the correct ports in your Enable wired headsets in your computer’s firewall browser Mac and Windows operating systems We recommend wired headsets that might have system firewalls enabled that connect to the 3.5mm audio port on your block the same ports required for Zendesk computer, or USB headsets. They’re Talk. Make sure to allow incoming reliable and don’t require batteries. connections for Chrome or Firefox. Here’s Bluetooth headsets can result in broken a quick tutorial. streams of audio, and wireless can cause dropouts. The one downside of wired Use a recently updated Chrome or headsets is it can lead to an agent’s Firefox browser workstation becoming a tangled mess of wires. Plastic zip or velcro ties are cheap Speaking of web browsers, for best and will help maintain some order. Our results, use a recently updated version own support team at Zendesk has specific of Chrome or Firefox. New features built headset recommendations—you can find on the Twilio framework (or Zendesk as them in our Community here. a whole) are dependent on the browser’s feature set, and some features may not be available in earlier versions of a browser. Additionally, older versions of browsers may have bugs that would impact call quality.

16 CHAPTER THREE Phone Numbers It seems obvious enough: to use Zendesk Talk, you’ll need a phone number. You may already have one that your customers call for support, or you might be choosing your very first one. In either case, here are a few things to consider.

GETTING STARTED WITH ZENDESK TALK 17 IF YOUR ORGANIZATION it. Plus, it provides the opportunity to snag DOESN’T YET HAVE A PHONE a vanity phone number that is easy to NUMBER remember and indicative of your brand. Zendesk Talk offers phone numbers for A local number might make more sense 40+ countries, including toll-free, local if customers are calling from one or more and national numbers. Here is a full list of specific locations. In addition to costing number types and countries. less than a toll-free number, a local number is just that: local. It might help There are several factors to consider build a human connection between you when choosing a new number: and your customers. Where are my customers? How many phone numbers do I need? Answering this question will provide clarity around the toll-free vs. local number This will vary business to business. You debate. might find that customers living in specific, high-concentration areas prefer local A global or even national customer numbers, in which case you would provide base might be better served by a toll- a local phone number for each. However free number. Offering toll-free numbers for customers who live outside of those can signal to your customers that you’re areas, it might make sense to also provide committed to providing great phone a toll-free number. service and not expecting them to pay for

GETTING STARTED WITH ZENDESK TALK 18 In addition to locale, you might want to weeks for the number porting process THE BENEFITS OF LOCAL PHONE consider offering multiple phone numbers in the US, longer in other countries. This NUMBERS: TAQUILLA for different types of customers or service support article on porting numbers into issues. It might make sense to provide Zendesk Talk provides the details you your most important customers with a need. phone number that will escalate them to a special group of agents. The “Measuring Porting your number in five easy steps: Zendesk Talk customer Taquilla, a and Improving” section of this ebook Brazilian online shoes retailer based in provides insight into how to determine if 1. Get up and running on a new Zendesk Belo Horizonte, wants their customers this is even necessary. Talk phone number. nationwide to know that their service team is readily available. They decided to IF YOUR ORGANIZATION DOES 2. When you are ready, forward calls offer local phone numbers for the states HAVE A PHONE NUMBER from your existing number to your new of São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Parana and Zendesk Talk number. Distrito Federal. It is less expensive for You have two options for using your their customers to call local numbers, and gives the impression that the small retailer existing phone number with Zendesk Talk: 3. Submit your port request to Zendesk is accessible nationwide. porting or forwarding. support and your existing provider. The ease of contact—plus the reassuring Porting 4. When notified, configure your existing sense of proximity—helped Taquilla boost revenue by 50%. Zendesk Talk not only number in Talk before it ports. makes it easy for their agents to manage Zendesk supports “porting” (moving a these multiple phone numbers, but the phone number from an existing provider You’re done! Seamless transition. lower price point and increased agent to Zendesk Talk) for a number of countries productivity helped the team reduce (see a full list here). Be sure to budget four telephony costs by 30%.

GETTING STARTED WITH ZENDESK TALK 19 Forwarding calls to Zendesk Talk be a tricky prospect. Here are some tips to make things run a little smoother: You may work with your existing provider to forward any call to an existing phone Communicate, communicate, number to your Zendesk Talk number. This communicate allows organizations with phone numbers in countries where we don’t yet support Use the tools at your disposal to porting to continue using their existing communicate—as early as possible—that phone numbers. If you do decide to you are changing your phone number. forward calls, be sure to check with your Use email blasts, social media posts, and existing provider about passing inbound any other communication channels to caller ID to your Zendesk Talk number. make sure your customers, partners, and employees are aware of the new number PHASING OUT AN EXISTING and when the change is taking place. PHONE NUMBER Update everything So you’ve got a fresh new Zendesk Talk number that you’d like to use instead Update your website to reflect the new of your old one—we don’t blame you! number and be sure to do a local search Sometimes it’s nice to have something of the old number, because it might be new. But replacing a phone number can hiding in places you don’t expect. All of

GETTING STARTED WITH ZENDESK TALK 20 the PDFs of ebooks, case studies, white papers, etc.? They’ll need to be updated too. Crowd source this question: Where else do we share our phone numbers? Business cards, social media profiles, and phone directories all need to be updated. Create some buffer If possible, implement the new number while the old number is still in service. This will prevent customers who use the old number from falling through the cracks, and will also provide the opportunity to give them the new number. Implement the new number while the old number is still in service.

21 CHAPTER FOUR Routing, greetings, and queues Now that you’ve clarified what numbers your customers will call to reach you, you can de- sign the experience they’ll have once they place a call—the greetings they’ll hear, how long they might wait, and where they’ll get routed for help. Zendesk Talk makes it really easy to fully customize your phone support operations, no matter the size or complexity.

GETTING STARTED WITH ZENDESK TALK 22 CREATING AN INTERACTIVE public-facing extension of your brand. VOICE RESPONSE PHONE TREE Keep that in mind when considering everything from the way you organize the An IVR is essential for any large company IVR to how you record messages (see the to scale quality customer service. When greetings section for more information). used correctly, it can provide answers to FAQs without straining support agents, Keep things simple and quick and, when agents are needed, route customers to the correct agent, limiting According to a recent study, 75% of wait times and transfer. consumers “agreed” or “strongly agreed” that IVRs forced them to listen to irrelevant However, the fact remains that customers options. We recommend limiting the are easily frustrated with IVRs, with number of IVR options—no more than 5 is as many as 11% hanging up when best. encountering them. It’s important to be thoughtful when creating an IVR, to put Deflect FAQs and allow for self- the customer first, and to take efforts to service improve over time. Here are some best practices to help get you started: Limit call volumes and save your agents (and customers) time with greetings that Remember who you are provide answers for simple questions, such as how to reset a password or find First and foremost, an IVR, just like an information about a shipped item. Use advertisement or tradeshow booth, is a

GETTING STARTED WITH ZENDESK TALK 23 tags in Zendesk Support to identify the Never stop improving common questions that drive a high volume of calls so you can satisfy a high There’s no such thing as a perfect IVR, so volume of customer inquiries without the it’s important to monitor important metrics help of a live agent. like average wait times and abandoned call rate, and look for ways to improve. Let them talk to a human Support managers should meet regularly, particularly when first launching a new While an IVR can mitigate the strain on IVR to monitor performance. Too many your support agents, it’s by no means abandoned calls? That might indicate meant to replace them. Many customers an overly complex IVR. Wait times too have problems that require speaking to high? You might need to highlight more an agent, and many more simply prefer self-service options, lightening the strain it—in fact, at the beginning of a customer on live agents. The point is, identify the service experience, 90% of consumers problem, make a hypothesis about the want to speak to a live agent. Don’t cause, and experiment with solutions until intentionally hide this option through an you see an improvement. And, of course, 90% overly complex phone tree—we don’t the best way to learn how your IVR works recommend having an IVR menu with is to ask your customers—or, better yet, of consumers want to more than 2 or 3 levels. ask to watch them as they navigate speak to a live agent. through your IVR options. Learn how to set up your IVR menu here.

GETTING STARTED WITH ZENDESK TALK 24 Defining and refining agent groups opportunity to communicate your for your IVR company’s personality. Keep in mind your company’s overall “voice” as you write and Your customers call for different reasons. record your IVR greetings, including: Some need technical support. Others customer service. Still others need sales. Main greeting With your IVR, customers can choose the agent group they’d like to reach. Create This is the first thing a customer hears agent groups based on different functions when they call you, so it’s essential to or skills, like specific departments (billing get this correct. Record a greeting that is or shipping) or language (English speaking welcoming, on-brand, and signifies to the and Spanish speaking). customer that you’re going to help them. Keep it short and to the point, clearly Tag phone tickets by type of issue listing the various options of your IVR (technical support, sales, customer (remember, try to keep it around 5). success, etc.) to learn if you need more granular distinctions to improve call Available agents greetings routing and limit transfers. This greeting informs callers that an MANAGING GREETINGS agent will be with them soon. We know customers don’t like to wait, so now is not Your support line greetings are an the time to be overly bubbly or verbose. extension of your brand and an Record a message that apologizes for

GETTING STARTED WITH ZENDESK TALK 25 the delay, offers appreciation for the unfortunate act of waiting for an agent and customer’s patience, and assures that downgrade it to an unbearable nightmare. an agent will be available as soon as Empathy is a good tool when choosing possible. hold music. Listen to the music yourself for a few minutes and note how it makes you Voicemail greeting feel. Have some other people do the same and ask them to imagine they’re listening When prompting customers to leave to this music while they wait for a support a voicemail, ask them to provide the agent. If you’re looking for inspiration, information your agents will need to best Zendesk held a contest to find the best help them, such as account number, best hold music. The results are in and the time to call back, type of issues, etc. You winning music is free to download and use! should also provide the customer with information such as normal business Learn more about managing outgoing hours and other support options (like messages here. self-service) so they can make informed decisions about how to proceed. Splice information into your wait (like self-service) so they can make music informed decisions about how to proceed. Add in helpful tips, announcements or Hold and wait music self-service options to your wait music using a free program like Audacity so your Hold music can be very polarizing. The customers hear more than just music while right music can put a customer at ease, they wait for an available agent. while the wrong music can take the

GETTING STARTED WITH ZENDESK TALK 26 SETTING YOUR QUEUES Consider your callers With Zendesk Talk, you can easily What is the phone support experience that determine how many and how long callers you’d like to provide your callers? Would will wait in the queue to talk to an agent. you prefer that they wait longer to reach Industry “averages” are 80% of calls a live agent, or wait a short time before answered in 20 seconds, but what works leaving a voicemail? Refer to customer best for your team may be different. Here satisfaction ratings or even reach out to are some things to consider to you set customers to get their take. your queue configuration: Continue optimizing Ask your agents Keep an eye on call queues and metrics Have they received feedback from any (find more details in the section on customers that they were waiting too “Measuring and Improving”). If you see, long? Or have they themselves noticed say, high levels of caller abandonment, anything that would be improved? Your you may need to shorten your queues. frontline agents could be your best resource.

The right music can put a customer at ease, while the wrong music can take the unfortunate act of waiting for an agent and downgrade it to an unbearable nightmare.

28 CHAPTER FIVE Staffing and Training Agents Now that you’ve taken the proper steps to set up Zendesk Talk, it’s time to focus on the people who will use: your agents.

GETTING STARTED WITH ZENDESK TALK 29 CHOOSING THE RIGHT AGENTS Articulateness As with everything else in work (and life), Phone support is more immediate than for the best possible results you want the email or even chat, where agents have a right people for the job. In a broad sense, bit more time to think through responses. there are general skills that you’ll want in Phone agents must posses the ability to any support agent: patience, intelligence quickly provide clear, concise information. and empathy to name a few. But phone support requires some specific attributes. Stamina Here are a few to look for when choosing agents: Phone support is a marathon, not a sprint. Agents must give consistently Buoyancy good service, call after call. Unlike other channels, they will have to maintain and Working in customer service can be project a positive demeanour, via their frustrating for even the most seasoned voices, throughout the day. veteran. You don’t want your agents to take the stress of the previous call into the next one. Look for agents who can deal ANSWERING CALLS ON-THE-GO with a stressful call and quickly bounce back for the next call. And the next. And Your agents can answer calls on their the next. computers or, if they are away from their desks, forward calls to a mobile device or landline.

GETTING STARTED WITH ZENDESK TALK 30 TRAINING AND COACHING Teach phone etiquette YOUR AGENTS Customers want to feel like they are Hiring the right agents is important, but talking to humans, not robots—in fact, you also need to train them properly and research shows that agents with a give them proper feedback and coaching more casual tone can result in higher so they know how to improve. Here are satisfaction ratings than more formal, some tips for training and coaching your or robotic, tones. Give your agents the agents: support and coaching they need to feel confident helping customers in a way Give agents relevant knowledge that feels natural. Call recordings can be a helpful way to provide feedback When a new agent joins your team, they to your agents. You can identify specific will lack the relevant product or service examples of things they’ve done well and knowledge. To get them onboarded, make opportunities where they could improve. sure you have a well-organized internal knowledge base (KB) they can use to Train agents on Talk learn about your product or service. Once they have read through the KB, role play We’ve designed Zendesk Talk to be easy with them to help them get comfortable to set up and use. In fact, it’s so simple helping customers on the phone. it only takes a couple of minutes to

GETTING STARTED WITH ZENDESK TALK 31 • Create macros and triggers for install and start helping customers over the phone. But, Talk also comes with a quick follow-up and triage. We variety of tools that can help your agents already mentioned that you can serve your customers more effectively. build triggers to automatically Encourage your agents to read the short assign voicemails for quick triage “Using Zendesk Talk” article in the Help and resolution. We’ve also found Center and practice how to answer phone it helpful for teams to create calls, make warm transfers to other agents macros to send customers an and put customers on hold. email after a call, inviting them to reference the call recording in the Give them helpful tools to optimize customer portal and asking for their their workflows feedback. The time that agents spend looking for Staffing your agents information to help their customers adds up. Here are a few ways to simplify your agents’ workflows: In addition to understanding who you want to assign to phone support, you’ll • Use your Zendesk Support also need to develop a logistics strategy, internal knowledge base or including everything from phone support other helpful apps that make hours to the number of agents to staff. it easy for your agents to get access to customer, product, or troubleshooting information without making callers wait.

GETTING STARTED WITH ZENDESK TALK MIRRORING TIPS FOR MORE EMPATHETIC Listen to the customer and react accordingly. Someone in a hurry doesn’t want PHONE SUPPORT cheerful chatter, and someone who wants to chat doesn’t want to be rushed. VALIDATING Sometimes your answer isn’t what the customer wants to hear, even if it’s the correct answer. Let them react, listen to what they have to say, address their concerns, then repeat the correct answer. ACKNOWLEDGING Tell the customer you understand the problem and the reason for their call. Make sure they feel heard. LISTENING The call will often go quicker and smoother if you just let the customer vent. Interrupting them to get the conversation back on track too often and aggressively can make the call drag on even longer. Hear what they have to say and help them. SUMMARIZING Repeat back what a customer has told you in a supportive way. This demonstrates that you understand the problem. COMMUNICATING Ask permission to put customers on hold and let them know how long it will take. If it looks like it will take longer, check back in and communicate this to them. The pain of waiting can be diminished if you set an expectation of how long it will take.

GETTING STARTED WITH ZENDESK TALK 33 STAFFING YOUR AGENTS Dedicated Model In addition to understanding who you There are pros and cons to either method, want to assign to phone support, you’ll but in general if your organization has also need to develop a logistical strategy, more than 10 agents it is recommended including everything from phone support to use the dedicated model, at least for hours to the number of agents to staff. some channels. In this format, agents focus their attention on customers from one WHAT STAFFING MODEL channel. For example, phone agents would Dedicated model SHOULD I USE? only service phone customers for the duration of their shift. This model allows Consider what staffing model to use as agents to develop a solid understanding you put together your agent assignment of one channel and find the most effective plan. Offering multi-channel customer methods of helping customers. Further, a service is the core of any organization’s dedicated model allows the support team support strategy. But, in some cases it’s to scale more effectively. The downside of not possible for agents to manage multiple this model is that agents often don’t get channels and it’s critical that there is a deeper understanding of a customer’s a plan in place for assigning agents to problems as they end up escalating channels. There are two methodologies complex queries. This results in them for channel assignment: a shared agent (potentially) developing a shallower skillset. model and a dedicated one. In a shared Shared model model, agents handle some or all channels simultaneously. In a dedicated model, agents are focused on a single channel.

GETTING STARTED WITH ZENDESK TALK 34 Shared Model HOW MANY AGENTS DO I NEED? In a shared model, agents are expected to work on the channels that require most Determining how many agents you attention and then switch over to other need to staff is a little bit of an art and channels as they become busier. For a science. The Erlang C formula helps example, a shared agent might start their estimate the number of agents required day working on email support, but then based on the estimated number of calls, switch over to answering phone calls as average handling time (total time per more start coming in. The advantage of call), maximum wait time and service level this model is that agents maximize their (the industry “average” is 80% of calls time and are always solving customer answered in 20 seconds). You can find a queries. However, an agent would have to link to a handy Erlang C calculator here. be highly trained to be able to effectively switch between multiple channels with little notice.

HERE’S A QUICK EXAMPLE: 100 240 Calls per hour Average handling time (seconds) 80 20 10 Maximum wait time Service level (% answered Recommended (seconds) within max wait time) agents

GETTING STARTED WITH ZENDESK TALK 36 WHEN SHOULD I STAFF schedule lunch an hour before or after AGENTS? midday rush. The same goes for breaks; ask agents to take them during known This is a slightly easier question to answer. quiet times. In addition to knowing what hours to staff agents, you need a sense of when they Time zones can take lunch, breaks, and vacation. The answer will require you to track some data If you’re a larger enterprise with customers and tweak things until you get it right: in multiple time zones, you might want to stagger phone support to meet the real- Days of the week world demands of your customers. Not everyone can provide 24/7 support, but Mondays and Tuesdays are typically the that doesn’t mean you have to limit work busiest days for support, but you can keep hours to local 9-5 hours. an eye on your team’s unique call volumes with the call volume dashboards. Seasonality Times of day It’s important to understand busy times of year as well. If you’re a retailer, and Lunchtime might seem like the best see a spike in calls during the holidays, time to take lunch, but the fact is many you’ll need to plan to staff up for those customers use their lunch break to contact busy times. customer service. You might need to

GETTING STARTED WITH ZENDESK TALK 37 HOW LONG SHOULD AGENT Having said that, spending too much WRAP-UP BE? time on wrap-up can lead to longer hold times for customers. So if you find Agent wrap-up gives agents the that too many tickets consistently lack opportunity to put the finishing touches relevant information, you might want to on a ticket after the call has ended but extend wrap-up. If hold times are too long, before they take the next call. It might be consider reducing. tempting to make this as short as possible, but doing so might lead to mistakes, such as important notes not being logged. Luckily, automatic ticket creation and call recordings capture a lot of important call information, so agents don’t need to spend too much time recording details after a call. However, the agent still needs time to log notes, particularly if the issue hasn’t been resolved. If it’s being escalated, the more information the agent can provide, the better.

38 CHAPTER SIX Measuring and Improving You’ve set up and configured Zendesk Talk and staffed phone support with talented, well- trained staff. Your work is done, right? Well, not quite. If you want to provide the best service to your customers, the kind that makes them choose you over your competitors and tell their friends and colleagues that they should all do the same, you must actively monitor phone support and take action to improve it.

GETTING STARTED WITH ZENDESK TALK 39 There is no one-size-fits-all approach to Real-time queue activity this. Your company’s profile and goals are unique, and things change. New products The Zendesk Talk real-time dashboards and services are launched, companies make it easy to monitor your queue and grow, local businesses become global agent activity and make in-the-moment businesses, and revenue goals are up- decisions to relieve bottlenecks, reduce dated. It’s up to you to decide what to wait times, and ensure your customers are measure and actions that can be taken to getting the help they need. improve, but Zendesk is always here to help with powerful tools for measuring and Customers waiting too long or agents improving your call center in the moment overburdened with long queues could with real-time dashboards and over time indicate several problems: with call data in Insights. • Too few phone agents Remember: No metric lives in a vacuum. • Non-optimal IVR design (not Tweaking one will impact others. For properly deflecting or routing calls) example, spending more time with customers to walk them through issues • An unexpected spike in volume can improve first call resolution and/ caused by an outage, promotion or or customer satisfaction, but—without other unscheduled event additional staffing—may lead to longer average wait time or abandonment.

GETTING STARTED WITH ZENDESK TALK 40 METRIC DEFINITION Quick tip Calls waiting in queue Number of callers waiting for an If your team is experiencing an available agent unexpected spike in call volume due to a technical outage or other event, quickly Average wait time Average time a customer has been change your main greeting to let callers waiting for an agent in the queue know that you are aware of the issue and working to resolve it. That will get Agents online Number of agents online and your customers the answer they need available for Talk calls quickly and reduce the amount of callers Longest wait time Longest time any customer has in the queue. currently been waiting for an agent in the queue

GETTING STARTED WITH ZENDESK TALK 41 Overview Overview metrics take a much deeper look into the health and efficiency of your phone support.

GETTING STARTED WITH ZENDESK TALK METRIC DEFINITION Total calls Total number of inbound and The following are great metrics for outbound calls scrutinizing during regular meetings and Total inbound calls Total number of inbound calls long-term planning sessions. They let you know where you’re strong and which areas need improvement. Total outbound calls Total number of outbound calls Max calls waiting Maximum number of calls waiting at any point in the specified window Abandoned in queue Total number of calls where customer hung up while waiting in the queue Exceeded queue wait time Total number of calls sent to voicemail after exceeding the max wait time in the queue Voicemail Total number of calls that went to voicemail for any reason Outside business hours Total number of calls received out- side business hours

GETTING STARTED WITH ZENDESK TALK METRIC DEFINITION Customer requested voicemail Number of calls where customer requested to be put through to voicemail by dialing 1 Average wait time Average time a customer has been waiting for an agent in the queue. Excludes Available agents greeting. Average time to answer Average length of call, including wait time, hold time and time with transferred agents Average duration Average length of call Average hold time Average time spent on hold per call (based only on calls where hold is used at least once) Average wrap-up time Average wrap-up time across all calls

GETTING STARTED WITH ZENDESK TALK 44 METRIC DEFINITION Agent Activity Total online time Total time the agent was on a These metrics focus on agents, both call, in wrap-up mode, or online individuals and as a whole, and are (browser must be open if using essential for understanding agent browser, can be closed if using performance. phone forwarding) Time available Total time agent was available to answer calls and set to online. Does not include time on calls or in wrap-up mode. Average talk time Average talk time across all calls (excludes hold time and consultation) Total talk time Total talk time (excludes hold time and consultation) Average hold time Average time spent on hold per call (based only on calls where hold is used at least once)

GETTING STARTED WITH ZENDESK TALK METRIC DEFINITION Total hold time Total time with calls on hold Calls accepted Total number of calls the agent answered Number of calls transferred Total number of calls the agent transferred to someone else Transfers accepted Total numbers of transfers the agent accepted Calls missed Total number of calls that rang for 30 seconds with no response and were placed back in the queue Calls declined Total number of incoming calls where agent clicked Decline in the given time period Calls put on hold Total number of calls placed on hold Average wrap up time Average wrap-up time across all calls Total wrap up time Total time spent in wrap-up across all calls

GETTING STARTED WITH ZENDESK TALK 46 These metrics can surface some HISTORICAL ANALYSIS WITH important issues. Are some agents not CALL DATA IN INSIGHTS pulling their weight while others are doing too much? How many customers In addition to the real-time dashboards, are calling but unable to talk to an Zendesk Talk comes with the analytical actual person, or unwilling to wait for power of Insights, which allow you to an extended period to do so? Are calls drill down into the historical performance taking too long? of your call center. The out-of-the-box dashboards give you and your team the Monitoring these metrics will provide tools you need to understand what’s insight into which agents need better working and how to improve. These training as well as opportunities to include amount of inbound, outbound, improve workflow. and voicemail calls; inbound vs. outbound day-to-day call volume; call wait times; talk time; time spent in IVR; agent times; and number of abandoned calls. Zendesk Talk comes with the analytical power of Insights.

GETTING STARTED WITH ZENDESK TALK 47 Just a taste of the metrics available with the out-of-the-box Insights reports. In addition to the out-of-the-box dashboards, you can create your own custom reports. You can find more information in our Help Center.

48 CHAPTER SEVEN Conclusion We hope this guide has given you everything you need to kick off and optimize a thriving phone support effort, one that runs efficiently and meets your customers’ needs. We’ll leave you with one key takeaway: improving phone support is an ongoing endeavour. The longer you offer it to your customers, the more experience and data you’ll have at your disposal to improve. Zendesk is here to help you every step of the way. Learn more at: www.zendesk.com/talk