Tips to Hire the Best Call Center, Agent by Creaghan Harry

Call centers can really help you in boosting the performance and growth of your business. If you have a one-person business, hiring a call center can leave an impression on your customers that they are trading with a business that is multi-staffed. The most significant advantage of working with a call center is that you can operate at different time zones and country and still work effectively.  They have an on-call staff ready round the clock to represent your company at a reasonable rate. It is cheaper as compared to hiring a single employee. But the question is how you will know which call center will suit your requirement and work towards expanding your business?

Create a profile

Before you decide on hiring a call center agent, make a file that consists of all the top agents you have shortlisted. List questions like “what are their skill sets?”, “what are their core competencies?” or “What personality traits do they have?”. Profile them according to their diversity, traits, educations, qualifications, and economics.  Do they need to have the “must have” skills or knowledge? Ask yourself what kind of an agent are you looking for? Does it have to be an inbound agent, outbound agent or an inside sales agent? Creaghan Harry asks you to answer these questions to get better clarity on what your organizational goals are and if the agent will be able to match it up.

Recruiting strategy

It is essential you create a recruiting strategy that will help you in targeting job seekers that meet your requirements. This plan should consist of personal referrals, posting jobs online, print advertisements, job fairs, virtual communities, colleges, and universities.  A call center typically employs three different types of call center agents- Top performing agents, adequate agents, and marginal agents. They fall under different grades like A, B, and C.

Effective communication skills

According to Creaghan Harry, effective communication is the most important thing you should search in a call center agent. An efficient call center is the one that knows how to speak to its clients on a regular basis. Not only their communication skills but also ethics and etiquettes are essential. The agents should be patient with customers and understand how to meet their needs and expectations.

Good listeners

The most important part of effective communication is to know how to listen carefully to the clients and customers so that the agents can help to resolve their issues. Instead of assuming things, they should be able to understand first, being too presumptuous will not get them to the core problem of the consumers. This will result in more frustration on both sides of the party.

The growth of your business depends on the kind of call center agent you have, make sure they provide you 24/7 support.  They should be customer-oriented, evaluate them by the way they handle customer calls, this will decide whether the customer wants to do business with your organization or not.