Call centers serve as the main hub for companies to solve customer problems and provide information. In our connected world, call centers don’t just react to calls, they also proactively reach out to customers and nurture leads. This makes them a highly valuable asset to any sales team.

Four reasons to have a call center

If you choose to implement a call center, it can become a keystone element of the customer experience you deliver. Let’s learn why this hub is so important for your business and how you can use it to make your customer service stronger.

Good service retains customers—period

A business needs both new and returning customers to grow. If your customers have poor experience with your brand, they’re less likely to return or share good reviews. In turn, such reviews can help drive new customers. Luckily, a great experience, even after a bad one, can still keep customers around.

A 2020 survey found that 78 percent of customers say they will forgive a company for its mistake if they receive excellent customer service to rectify it. This is significant! Yet, if you don’t have a large enough customer service staff, you may struggle to keep up and rectify those issues. A call center can provide this support, ensuring that good customer service is always delivered. Whether it’s a first-time issue or to rectify something that already happened, it helps.

A quality call center contributes to sales growth

Not only does your call center work to put out fires, but it can also proactively drive sales. What’s more, it can even upsell or cross-sell to existing customers. Because customers reach out to the care team for answers to a variety of questions. Whether they want to clarify product features or better understand what your pricing and shipping include, there’s often an opportunity for an upsell. This is especially true if the customer service is great.

The same survey found that 71 percent of customers say they have made purchase decisions based on the quality of customer service they have received. This means your call center can make or break your sales numbers. A positive customer interaction can close a sale while a negative one can drive a customer away to another company.

Your call center collects customer insights

Who knows more about frustrated customers than your call center team? These professionals likely solve the same problems day in and day out. They hear the same concerns and receive the same feedback. As a company, you can ignore this valuable source of feedback or you can tap into it to improve your business.

Feedback collection and analysis takes work, but the knowledge gained is worth it. Build feedback and data collection into the call process when a customer calls in. With a standard set of questions or a post-call survey, you can begin to understand customer challenges and adjust as needed.

Good service attracts customers

While your customer service team is a key part of mid-funnel and bottom-funnel marketing (driving on-the-fence customers to complete their purchases) it can also provide top-funnel branding to attract potential new buyers. Many companies base their marketing strategy around providing positive customer care, which attracts people who think they will receive the help they need.

For example, one survey by TCN found that 69 percent of Americans prefer to speak to a live agent when they call for help. If you provide great customer care over the phone, you can turn more potential customers into paying customers.

Use this as part of your marketing efforts. Include testimonials about the customer service experience on your website and refer to it in your marketing copy. Highlight this aspect of the experience to attract more potential customers.

Value your call centers

Customer service is a thankless job on many fronts. Customers call in and complain to representatives, while management often overlooks their role in growing the organization.

However, if you focus on its potential, you will realize that your call center can become the hub of your company’s customer service. Thus, by streamlining its processes and providing more support for your teams, you will both improve the customer experience and win more customers.