Home Based Agents The Crown Jewels of Customer Service Sally Hurley VIPdesk_Jack Heacock Telcoa_052710

Confidential — Proprietary VIPdesk Information 11

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Home-Based Agents The Crown Jewels of Customer Service

VIPdesk Webinar Series May 27, 2010

View The Webinar

Presented By:Jack Heacock: SVP, Telcoa: The Telework Coalition

Sally Hurley: President, VIPdesk

http://vipdesk.na4.acrobat.com/p41024623/�


About The Presenters

• 20+ years delivering premium service for Fortune 500 brands

• Passion for service

• Committed to building a culture that supports work-life balance

• Proud to be a green company-supporting thousands of individuals that work from home across North America

• President of Entrepreneurs Organization

Sally HurleyPresident

Jack HeacockSr. Vice President

• Co-founder of the Telework Coalition, Washington, D.C.

• Call Center Magazine “Pioneer Award” winner for Work@Home™ Agent Programs

• Nationwide human resources and payroll corporate systems; telecommunications; and facilities Project Director for Amtrak

• Lt Colonel U.S. Army Signal Corps (Retired)


Agenda

• Virtual contact centers: the basics

• At-home agents: providing intuitive customer service

• Increasing customer satisfaction and revenue via a home-based team

• Profile of an at-home agent: how talent drives success

• Recruiting and managing home-based agents

• Environmental benefits of a home-based workforce

• Real-life examples of successful virtual customer care

Copyright 2010, The Telework Coalition, All Rights Reserved

“Why” a Work@Home™Solution

~The Crown Jewels of

Customer Service

May 27, 2010

VIPdesk Webinar Series


• Better educated, more mature agents• Greater agent and customer satisfaction• Larger pool (geographic area) of agents• Improved agent retention and skills base• Part-time and Split-Shift agent availability• Less use of imported energy• Reduced congestion, pollution, and injuries

Work@Home™ Quality


• Homesourcing (Work@Home™)Benefits

• Avoid lay-offs in tough economic times• Reduced cost per agent• Better ‘corporate’ and ‘customer’ memory• Trending for Bank Cards, Annuities,

Investments, Insurance, Medical advice, scheduling, and triage, 411, 911, etc.

• Recommendations by The Tower Group• March 2008 – Homesourcing Call Centers• March 2010 - Telecommuting: A Targeted

Solution…

Work@Home™ Costs


• ‘Events’ ~ Those ‘Stubborn Things’

• Weather obstacles• Natural occurrences• Geo-Political disruptions• Off-shore inhibitors & degradations• Other obstacles…

Minimized or avoided via Home Agents

Work@Home™ Stability

The Formula…


IT + P³ = E³©

“For Successful Work Today and Tomorrow”


The enabling Information Technology

PLUS the implementing Policies, Processes, and Procedures

EQUALS the Economic, Energy, and Environmental benefits for the Work@Home™ employees, their employers and the customers and communities served

See: The Telework Coalition’s Top Ten Reasons for the Virtual Workforce ©

IT + P³ = E³ ©


• Emerald: Enthusiastic, fresh, and genuine service

• Ruby: Satisfaction and resolution ~ The 1st time and every time

• Safire: Customer needs anticipated and fulfilled with comfort and up-selling opportunities

• Diamond: Improved cultural and understanding focus

• Pearl: Word of mouth customer-to-customer 3rd party referrals

Work@Home™ The ‘Crown Jewels’ of Customer Service

Implementing:Do it yourself or outsourcing?

• While distributed work cannot occur without the enabling technologies, the P³’s are often the greatest ‘challenge’ to coordinate and develop

• To achieve the objects of improved quality, cost containment, and speed of implementation many are partnering with those who have a demonstrated track-record of virtual customer care success

Copyright 2010, The Telework Coalition.


Our Passion

Our clients trust VIPdesk to represent their brand as a seamless extension-- providing exceptional service to their customers, that helps ensure customer retention and drive revenue.

. . . making great brands even better


Brand Leaders Trust VIPdesk

http://www.childrensplace.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/Home?storeId=10001&langId=-1&catalogId=10001�


VIPdesk Core Belief

“Every customer contact is a critical marketing event”

And an opportunity to drive performance and profitability.

Conversely, a single negative customer event, poorly handled, can destroy a brand’s reputation.


Projected Growth of Home Agents


Attract Home-based Applicants

• Flexible scheduling• Reduced expenditures • Elimination of commute• Enhanced schedule flexibility -

work/life balance• Comfort of working from home• Ability to maintain lifestyle in addition

to career• Work on behalf of brands they love

Geographically dispersed agents mitigate risks associated with localized or regional Business Continuity events


Utilize Multiple Recruiting Sources

Candidates come from referrals, local, regional, tradeand national sources.

JOB BOARDS

SOCIAL MEDIA

MEDIA COVERAGE

TRADE PUBS


Comprehensive Recruiting Process

Recruiting Process

Pass Basic Qualifications: 24%

Pass Client Specific Qualifications: 59%

Pass Hardware/Software Requirements: 73%

Pass Resume and Phone Screen: 83%

Pass Credit/Criminal Check: 79%

Complete Agreement and Tech Setup: 85%

Complete/PassCertification: 63%

Go Live: 95% Currently 1 out of 30 go live


Profile

Experienced Specialized Screened and Trained

40 years old 95% college

educated 5% graduate

degrees 63% management

experience 72% hospitality/

customer service experience

15 years of work experience

Relevant subject matter experience

Brand culture and products

“Brand Advocates” representing favorite brand

Located anywhere

Background checks Personality profiling Web-based HR

systems and tools Web and instructor-

based training Brand immersion

training


There are CSRs, Agents and Reps…

Virtual model enable Brand Advocates

Don T.

-lives in San Francisco-loves running & hiking-is a Tier 1 Performer

Home Agent Profile


Example Brand Advocates

KITTY Kavid kayaker

JOYCE G snowmobiling enthusiast

JULIE Gactive climberCORRINE P

on a zip line

DON Savid runner


• Carla loves fishing; 3 mile walk to raise money for Ryan Cameron Foundation

• Deborah loves cycling and going to the beach

• Dia Enjoys hiking and biking; favorite spot- Diamond Head in Waikiki, HI

• Dollie Runs Peachtree Road Race Marathon each year; Loves hiking and camping at Stone Mountain in GA

• Don Completed 4 marathons and countless 1/2, 10 & 5ks

• Elizabeth loves hiking Tucson trails and instructing Zumba

Passionate Brand Advocates


Virtual Training Best Practices

• Training methodology- Share, Show, Do

• Instructor Training Program

• Smaller class size – no more than 1:15 ratio

• Blended learning for optimum retention; 85% instructor–led / 15% self-paced study

• Module based learning

• Orientation Process – time with all departments

• Post-training program/Nesting


Tools to Support Operations

• Listen to/search calls• 100% call recordingCall Recording

• Integrated with recordings• Grade and report scores Quality Grading

• Internal chat application Communications

• Reports call, email and chat dataReporting

• Online recruiting portalRecruiting


Performance-based Scheduling

Key metrics

Individual metrics are scored and ranked

Scores are available daily

Highest scores receive preferred schedules


Recognition

• Call recording, grading

• Performance Dashboards

• Contests

• Bonuses for top performers

• Individual, team and company recognition

• Virtual awards

• Performance-based scheduling


Staffing flexibility

Jan Wk 1

Jan Wk 2

Jan Wk 3

Jan wk 4

Feb Wk 1

Feb Wk 2

Feb Wk 3

Feb Wk 4

Mar Wk 1

March Wk 2

March Wk 3

March Wk 4

Mar Wk 5

April Wk 1

April Wk 2

FY 2010 Sales SL 84% 89% 87% 90% 97% 90% 94% 96% 77% 82% 95% 95% 77% 41% 46%FY 2010 % handled to forecast 31% 72%143%43% 51% 25% 23% 22% -7% 6% 33% -3% 20% 10% 6%

-20%

0%

20%

40%

60%

80%

100%

120%

140%

160%

2010 Weekly Stats

FY 2010 Sales SL

FY 2010 % handled to forecast


Example- Home-Based Program Achievement

• Exceeded AOS goals by 19.8%

• Beat Credit goals - 11% for the year

• Beat AHT goals by 2.5% for the year

• Increased Customer Sat Quality from 93 to 95%


Case Study 1

Call Type: Sales and Customer Service

Objective: Improve customer experience while addressing seasonal volume

Challenge: Temporary help needed to answer heavy spike in seasonal volume; inconsistent service delivered across multiple team was impactingcompany brand and quality was suffering

Solution: Deployed dedicated, home-based team with retail sales experience who love the brand

Impact: Service levels up by 60%; email completion rate improvement of 41%; reduced program AHT for the client by an average of 22 seconds within 2 months

International Multi-Merchant Retailer


Case Study 2

Call Type: Credit card customer support and rewards and benefits management

Objective: Provide dedicated team to handle multiplebenefits and rewards call types

Challenge: Fragmented experience- too many vendors, inconsistent customer experience

Solution: Consolidate vendors, leverage dedicated home-based team with travel expertise, provided a singlevoice structure

Impact: Dedicated team allowed client to consolidate vendors, improved first-call resolution by 40% and improve the Card Member satisfaction by 15%

Global Credit Card Provider


Case Study 3

Call Type: Incoming orders, order tracking, customer service

Objective: Improve customer experience; drive sales results, and maintain cost per contact

Challenge: Premium customer segment, phone, email and chat handled by 3 teams/vendors, poor customer experience

Solution: Provide single highly-skilled home-based team with both customer service expertise and apassion for fashion

Impact: Increased total service sales by 23% and cost-per-contact by 18% year-over year

Luxury Online Fashion Retailer


Q & A

“On the average most organizations report a loss of approximately 50% of their customer base every 5 years.”

Jim Novo The Drilling Down Project

“Considering a million dollars in business over a 10 year period with a 10% inflation rate, an organization can improve revenues by 49% with a 10% increase in customer retention.”

American Management Association

“A 5% increase in customer retention can potentially boost profits by 25-125%... Acquiring a new customer can cost 6 to 7 times more than retaining an existing customer.”

Fredrick ReichheldThe Loyalty Effect

“46% of respondents reported they quit doing business with a company in at least one industry category in the past year as a result of poor service.”

Accenture consumer survey


Contact Us!

Jack HeacockSr. President

[email protected](202) 266-0046 x. 103

Sally HurleyPresident

[email protected](703) 837-3518

VIPdesk Webinar Series How to Integrate Social Media Into Your Contact CenterJune 8, 2010


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