Authored by: Juanita Coley
Guest Interview: Irina Mateeva
ABN, the abbreviation for Abandon or Abandonment, holds significant implications for businesses, particularly in Workforce Management (WFM).
In the world of WFM, Abandonment occurs when a customer disconnects from a call.
For a call to be considered abandoned, the caller must disconnect BEFORE the call is answered AFTER a certain threshold was reached, which is generally determined
by the business. This threshold is what separates and/or classifies abandoned calls from accidental calls that may have made it to the call center or calls that made it
to an agent and the caller simply hangs up for whatever reason.
How does Abandon calls, OR other customer interactions, impact your CX and business profitability?
Before we delve into how ABN impacts your CX and business profitability, let’s clarify what we mean by “other customer interactions” first.
While ABN is commonly associated with calls in WFM, it extends far beyond, and there are SOOO many other customer interactions that can be abandoned and could be
unaccounted for. Failing to recognize where customers abandon these processes can have far-reaching consequences beyond customer service,
affecting the business’ overall profitability.
Examples of these other interactions are:
- Live Chats
- Shopping Carts
- Loan applications
- Web forms
And this is just naming a few. Again, when talking about WFM we are generally talking about the call center. Therefore, often times ABN is narrowed down to interactions
where customers engage through phone calls, emails, or chat perspectives. But doing so would be a HUGE MISTAKE.
Why???
Well, not understanding where your customers are ABANDONING your business processes can have much deeper impacts than just affecting customer service.
In the context of call centers and WFM, abandonment impacts your CX (customer experience) because customers aren’t receiving the support they need, which in turn
could cause them to seek support or service from your competitors, ultimately impacting your business profitability.
How Can I Reduce our Abandonment by Customers?
Again, because there are so many factors that could be causing your customers to abandon interaction, you first want to ensure you are doing a deep data dive into WHY
your customers are abandoning.
Understanding and reducing abandonment rates hinges on the effective use of data. Businesses must leverage insights gained from customer behaviors to tailor strategies
that not only enhance the customer experience but also positively impact the business’ overall profitability.
Once you have data to suggest the WHYs, you can now start to implement some of the following tips:
- Ensure appropriate staffing – This is an appropriate response to callers that are holding extended periods of time before abandoning. The data would suggest that
they may be waiting because you don’t have enough staff to support the current call (or other interactions) workload.
- Ensure appropriate IVR (Interactive voice response) options are available – This would be an appropriate response to a high transfer rate once calls are answered.
- Offer call back options – This is an appropriate response to high abandons, but short times spent in the IVR. The data would suggest that callers abandon early into
the call but may call back later in the day.
Again, these are just a few tips on how you can reduce your abandonment rate, improve your customer experience, and impact your business profitability.
However, DATA is key with this little three-letter acronym.
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