Customer service plays a significant role in how successful a company is in the current consumer market. For companies partnering with a call center, the quality of service they deliver is highly dependent on how well their agents perform.
Contrary to popular belief, call center agents do more than just take calls and respond to tickets. Agents are trained to triage and respond to customer needs, pay attention to issues to update the CRM, provide the relevant information and solutions for each customer, and properly document the details of each call—all while keeping the call professional, personalized, and pleasant for the customer.
What sets professional call center agents apart from the rest is their skills and qualities that help them accomplish their jobs. Essential call center skills include multitasking, active listening, good memory, attention to detail, critical thinking, and effective communication.
In every call, a pro agent puts their attention to detail and active listening to the test to better understand a customer’s concerns and develop a context for the issue at hand. From there, their critical thinking and good memory allow them to come up with a fact-based solution that best fits the case.
Moreover, with effective communication skills, they can convince the customer and reassure them by the end of the call. In a busy workday, multitasking helps pro agents stay on top of their workload and handle calls efficiently.
Apart from these skills, call center agents need qualities like working well under pressure, friendliness, empathy, patience, adaptability, and a sense of urgency to succeed at their jobs.
At the end of the day, customers are at the heart of an agent’s job. Unfortunately, calls don’t always go according to plan, making it vital to be calm, pleasant, and solution-oriented while remaining patient with customers and being empathetic to their frustrations.
The infographic below, courtesy of SelectVoice.com, shares a more in-depth perspective on what it takes to be an ideal call center with top-notch agents.