What Customers Want from Support Contact Centers

Understanding your customer’s expectations for service is the first step in providing an amazing customer experience. It is essential that customer support contact centers develop a comprehensive understanding of what customers expect from them, whether or not their needs are being met and how they can improve their service to meet their expectations. Doing so could mean the difference between thriving and dying.

Do customer support contact centers always provide excellent service?

The majority of customers surveyed are dissatisfied with the service they receive from contact centers. This might not be surprising, but the number of customers who are dissatisfied with the service they receive is: 54%. This number is staggering and also suggests that contact centers must immediately change the service they provide their customers, or they risk losing them.

What do customers want from support contact centers?

In order to meet customer expectations, it is important to know what their expectations are. Customers reported that when they call a support contact center, their priorities are to talk with a skilled agent and to have their problems solved quickly. This information can be helpful for managers to assess their own customer service practices, KPIs and policy standards and make changes accordingly.

What communication channel do customers prefer to use, and what do they use now?

Results from this survey indicate that the phone is still the most used and the preferred method to interact with customer service representatives. Thus, customer service contact centers should dedicate the majority of their resources to their call center, but also accommodate other channels of communication for support.

If phone support is not available, what form of communication do customers prefer to use?

Results from this survey indicate that if phone support is not available, email is the most preferred method of communication. Thus, customer support contact centers should ensure that their agents incorporate email into their communication methods. It can be extremely effective in interacting with customers.

What technology would customers like for contact centers to have?

When asked about what type of technology they would like for contact centers to have:

75% of customers stated they would like the option to be called back, rather than wait in a queue.
48% of customers stated they would like to download video files to help solve their customer support issue.
36% of customers stated they would like to use real-time video chat with a contact center agent.
24% of customers stated they would like to interact with a speech recognition system.

Thus, in order to better meet their needs, contact centers should allow their customers the option to:

Be called back, rather than wait in a queue
Download video files to help with support issues
Engage in video chat with an agent
Be helped by a speech recognition system
The majority of customers are dissatisfied with the service they receive from support contact centers. In order to meet customer’s expectations, companies should have an accurate understanding of their needs.

Results from this survey indicate that customers would like (in order):

Their problem solved quickly
To have personal interaction with an agent
To speak with a skillful agent
Currently, phone is the most used and preferred method of communication with contact center agents, followed by email. In the future, customers would like contact centers to integrate features like: call back from queue, real-time video, video downloads and speech recognition systems in order to enhance their call center experience.

This infographic sheds light on customer’s expectations for contact center service. It can be used to inform customer support practices and begs the question: Is your contact center meeting your customers’ expectations?

Facts and Stats

Only 19% of customers are satisfied with the service they receive from support contact centers.
The phone is the most used (48%) and the preferred method (80%) to interact with support agents.
If phone support is not available, customers prefer to use email to communicate with support agents.
75% of customers would like the option to be called back rather than wait in a queue.