Regardless of where what side of the fence you fall on this topic, to discern the best approach, it’s essential to analyze a range of factors including customer preferences, the intricate nature of transactions, and historical reliance on voice communication:

1. Does your customer base want a voice channel? Dig into the demographics of your customer base and unravel their channel preferences. Looking into who is into live voice interactions and who leans towards other channels like back office, can reveal some fascinating insights into keeping as many customers happy as possible.
2. What has been your historical strategy? Consider how long you have had a voice channel, its usage and customer familiarity. Evaluate this history and customer interaction levels to determine if and how you want to transition. Assess if a gradual or sudden transition aligns with customer expectations and readiness for a change.
3. Consider the complexity of your transactions. Not all businesses should ditch voice interactions. Assessing contact complexity can help determine if axing voice would drive away customers. Ensuring a smooth transition for each line’s unique needs is crucial to avoid unhappy customers or slow transactions.

After considering all of this – here are some tips on how to decide if you should reduce your phone support to save cost, while still keeping your customer satisfaction high. Implementing these strategies can potentially help you strike the right balance between resource allocation and exceptional customer service.

1. Let customer choices drive your mix of voice to back office support ratio: don’t have a concrete goal in mind for the ratio, instead let the goal be to improve your back office channels and the satisfaction and ease of use for your customers, so that they learn the new channel, and start to prefer it you can show the clients that the other channels and solutions are easier/more effective after learning it. You cannot use other sources as a definitive for what ratio to use without a proper conversion and learning
2. If you are trying to save costs, and you have no choice but to increase the amount of back-office: Set up a means for customers to call you at different failure points in your back-office process (stopgaps/tollgate checks). For example – if a customer has reached out to you 3x on the same issue on the same email string, on the fourth email, from the agent – have the email automatically add the customer service hotline to the agent’s email signature so they can instead reach out and talk to a live person.
3. Another possibility of saving costs is seeing if there are alternative voice solutions available: If you already outsource your business operations, it’s crucial to find the right provider. Look for one that offers flexible options like changing delivery locations, hybrid setups, or full work-at-home arrangements. These options can help you reduce costs while maintaining your brand identity. Choose the right outsourcing partner to optimize operations and achieve your business goals efficiently.

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