The warning signs are everywhere.
The hushed tones when Call Center Reps gather in the break room...The wide-eyed looks when sales promotions are announced...The cries of, "If I wanted to be in sales, I would have interviewed for a sales job!"...The sighs of resignation during sales training workshops...The new resumes online that somehow seem vaguely familiar...
When Call Center Reps hate to sell, we put our customer service AND sales initiatives at risk. Instead of driving revenue up, we may be driving customers away.
When we ask Call Center Leaders, they simply want their reps to:
- Fix the problem that caused the customer to call
- Confirm that the customer is happy
- Sell them more stuff
Why are Call Center Reps so reluctant to go along with such a simple program?
That question has not one answer, but five. Our work with clients over the last two decades has uncovered five specific things you can do to relieve the issues that cause Call Center Reps to hate to sell.
Read more about the 5 warning signs and what to do about them
About LSA Global
Founded in 1995, LSA Global is a leading performance consulting and training firm that helps high growth technology, services, and life-science companies create a competitive advantage by powerfully aligning their culture and talent with their strategy. Learn more about getting aligned
Cross selling has many benefits.
Top performing cross-selling contact centers increase wallet share, deepen customer relationships, improve customer loyalty, build employee confidence, reduce attrition, and enhance the customer experience.
To build effective cross selling skills ensure that you include these seven elements:
- Metrics: Identify the top 2-3 business metrics that you want to move.
- Gaps: Assess major skill gaps to target investments, set a baseline, and initiate the change process.
- Flexibility: Have the option to train one agent at a time to take advantage of periods of low call volume while minimizing downtime.
- Coaching: Include online and offline coaching to guide reps through competency levels and provide immediate performance feedback.
- Scenarios: Design around critical customer simulations and scenarios for applying skills on-the-job.
- Test: Build a final performance test that confirms mastery of the key skills.
- Impact: Measure skill adoption and business impact.
Read more about building call center cross selling skills
Visit our Customer Service Blog
About LSA Global
Founded in 1995, LSA Global is a leading performance consulting and training firm that helps high growth technology, services, and life-science companies create a competitive advantage by powerfully aligning their culture and talent with their strategy. Learn more about getting aligned
