Scaling your Customer Support Organization in a Small Business
A methological approach to follow when your current capacity does not seem enough
Many startups begin offering Customer Support service using a few in-house resources, not putting a lot of effort and focus in the process. When the times comes for scaling up operations, some reengineering of processes, organization and IT systems is a MUST. At this point, you know that the decisions you make will not be easy to reverse.
Here is a methodological approach on how to deal with this subject in an effective manner. It has been based on our experience in e-table.gr, and it will hopefully provide some useful insights to managers facing a similar situation.
The need to Change
E-table is an online restaurant booking service operating in Greece and Cyprus. I was one of the two co-founders, and have been a co-CEO there since then.
During our first years, we were in great pressure to increase our customers, and we were willing to go far in order to achieve this. People were reluctant, at first, to use our online service, thus we decided to also give them the ability to book by phone. That meant that we had to setup our own call center.
As reservations increased, we found ourselves in a situation where we were “bombarded” with customer requests via email, social media, phone, and live chat. The volume of customer requests had increased, and we had to scale. Multiplying our resources devoted to the related processes was not an option. Therefore, we followed the following steps in order to address this challenge:
Step 1: Understand your current situation
You must be sure that you know the key characteristics of your AS-IS situation very well. That means that you need to have the answer to at least the following questions:
What is the Customer Demand Profile?
- What are the reasons of communication (=types of requests) initiated by your customers per communication channel? Make a classification of reasons as well and estimate the related frequencies (eg requests per hour)
- What communication channels do your customers prefer per type of request? At what frequency?
- How are the customer requests distributed throughout each day of the week?
- Under which conditions does the customer make a request, eg is (s)he in a hurry? Is (s)he comfortably seated on his/ her sofa? You must distinguish the conditions that affect your choice for the best method to satisfy each request type.
- Do some types of requests oblige you to also perform subsequent outbound communications? How? Why?
Be after your customers’ true needs. Don’t just note down their apparent behavior that is affected by the way you are currently running your support organization!
How well do you perform now?
Research online, discuss with professionals, brainstorm a bit, and define the Key Performance Indicators for your support channels in general and per key request type. KPI’s should be few and “to the point”. You may group your KPI’s into two categories:
- Service Quality metrics: They relate to the customer experience. Examples include:
- Percentage of successfully ‘closed’ cases
- Average Time to close cases (per type of request and channel)
2. Productivity metrics: They have to do with how efficiently your Support Organization operates. There is no point in having the best Service Level you can and being — in parallel — driven out of business! Here are some examples:
- Productivity per hour
- Utilization of your agents
- Occupancy of your agents
Calculate how well you perform in your selected KPI’s. You should not only understand where you stand right now, but you should also identify the trends in your metrics. The trends may reveal issues you do not currently think you have!
Estimate the cost of serving
You should already know the total cost of your Customer Support Organization. This typically includes the costs of human resources, tools and services used, and other indirect costs (e.g. premises). You should try to break down the cost and allocate it to specific types of requests and channels. Moreover, try to distinguish the direct costs (can directly be linked with a specific customer request) from the indirect costs (they are usually fixed costs that are allocated to requests based on certain criteria).
Step 2: Define where you wish to be
Set minimum acceptable standards of service quality
Based on the analysis of Step 1, you are able to set some standards for your service that would keep your customers happy.
Reengineer your Processes and Organization on paper
Research best practices and brainstorm by taking into account the work you performed in previous steps. Do not let the current way of operating things affect your judgement. You must make at least the following decisions:
- How many levels of support do you actually need? Usually, organizations employ 3 levels: 1st level receives the request and handles all simple issues. 2nd level is a kind of Backoffice that handles more complex issues. 3rd level consists of ‘experts’ on certain matters, and is only used in edge cases.
- Which requests are to be served by each communication channel? The work you performed in Step 1 will help you decide.
- What are the main characteristics of your future processes?
- Is there any way to automate any part of these processes?
- How will you capture the knowledge produced by your organization and reuse it effectively? Will you need a ticketing system, a knowledge portal or a new CRM?
- Will you need people working on-site or off-site?
- Is outsourcing an option?
- Will you need an overflow partner?
Build alternative scenaria (of your TO-BE situation) with your team, and try to estimate the expected KPI’s and costs. Scenaria that lead to worse service quality than the lowest acceptable should immediately be rejected. Choose the scenario that best suits your needs (in Service Quality and cost effectiveness/ productivity).
Choose Technology Enablers
You have to perform some ‘sourcing’. This is not an easy task. You have to be very careful about which specific tools/ services you will use. Every product has its ‘idiosyncrasies’! One place to start is Capterra.
You may find the enablers we have employed at e-table in the figure below.
Note that the abilities that one enabler may provide might drive you back to the drawing board! For example, Yuboto gave us the ability to have most of our 1st level support agents working from home by use of a custom built VBPX server. This has had tremendous benefits for our case.
Step 3: Formulate and execute an Action Plan
No need to explain this step. Do not forget to obtain acceptance and commitment from all key employees who will be involved in the execution of this Action Plan.
Step 4: Keep monitoring and Optimize
Formalize your Procedures and Policies
Begin gradually building documentation of your processes, policies, and role descriptions. This will help your personnel learn, avoid mistakes, and improve the status quo.
Maintain an Internal Knowledge Portal
Have the relevant information ready to anyone who may need it in a format that makes it easily to absorb under the typical working conditions. The portal:
- May have the form of a microsite, a desktop software or whatever is more convenient for your organization
- Must contain not only official documentation, but circumstantial information that may be used by your agents for a brief amount of time
- Must provide the information in a very intelligible way, and keep all potential distractions away. Usability engineering pays off.
- Must be properly maintained with formal processes.
Maintain a Measurement System
- Make use of the reporting capabilities of your technology enablers. If you miss a critical piece of information, try to cooperate with your suppliers in order to find a solution. Yes, you must insist; it will pay off.
- Setup formal processes about who is monitoring what, and some formal Reports for each management level.
- Setup KPI’s for the performance of your agents, and assess the possibility of providing a performance bonus that may motivate your team.
- Benchmark yourself against industry standards or — in lack of them — against goals that you deem realistic.
Have your ears OPEN
You must always listen to:
- Your Customers: Setup ways to obtain their feedback, and then actively use that knowledge.
- Your Support Team: Small details can make a huge difference. They know better these details than you.
- New trends in Technology and Best Practices: Nothing stays the same. Try to keep your knowledge up-to-date.
Closing words
This subject is huge. This article just provides a simple framework to help you organize your thoughts for the first time. I may dive into specific aspects of Customer Support in the future (KPI’s, outsourcing, CTI, outbound communications, tips learnt the hard way, and other interesting stuff). Feel free to comment below or share your own experiences!
