You installed a knowledge management system, set up your taxonomies, trained your agents – and are getting good adoption. Your metrics such as article usage rate and FCR are improving. You even get FCR above 90%. You’re in a good place – so you decide it’s time to roll out self-service.
The self-service portal lets your end-users and customers help themselves. Since your knowledge is good and you’ve designated the appropriate articles to be accessible by the self-service portal, self-service usage starts to grow and your customers like it.
But now your agent-based metrics aren’t looking as good. Average call time is rising and your FCR is dropping. What’s the problem?
Actually, it’s not a problem at all. It’s a sign that common, routine issues are being solved through your self-service portal, and your agents are handling only the more complex issues. It’s actually great news because:
- Issues are being deflected to self-service, lowering your support costs
- Customers have a better experience because they can get the answers faster, without taking the time to call the contact center or service desk
- Agents’ work is more interesting and challenging
Our customers have been able to reassign employees to other departments or projects as a result of using self-service. Hear two of our clients talk about how RightAnswers enabled them to reallocate their support staff: