The telecommunications industry gets a bad rap when it comes to customer support.
In fact, according to the American Consumer Satisfaction Index, telco firms came in dead last for customer satisfaction. To hang onto existing customers—and win new ones—you may want to explore a new customer service method, like live video support.
Providing customer support is a unique challenge for telco companies. Customers need support with everything from upgrading or modifying their service to scheduling repairs or reporting network issues. Given modern society’s reliance on telecommunications technology, any hiccup in your service or customer support can cause extreme frustration for your customers. Is there a way to keep customers happy without breaking the bank regarding customer support?
We’ll show you how you can solve customer issues faster with remote support.
This post will examine 5 of the benefits live video support can offer telco companies and how to best leverage your remote tool to maximize those benefits.
Video conferencing and chat tools have existed in the market for decades now. Since the mid-2000s, users have turned to tools like Skype, Zoom, and more to communicate with long-distance friends and relatives or communicate with work colleagues in different locations.
Many people credit the events of 2020 and the COVID-19 pandemic with starting the shift toward remote video support. While these environmental changes made remote meetings and live video chat necessary for a large population at once, live video support was increasing in popularity before COVID-19. According to a survey conducted in 2019, 90% of respondents enjoyed using live video to get their point across.
Related Read: The Best Remote Tech Support Software for Call Centers
Blitzz has helped dozens of telco companies get up and running with live video support. We’ve seen the ways this type of support solution benefits our customers. Let’s dive into the top 5 benefits we’ve seen our customers enjoy when they implement live video support.
If you’ve ever tried to walk someone through a solution to a technical issue over the phone, you understand how frustrating it can be to solve this type of problem without a shared visual. Live video support removes this stumbling block for your remote tech support team. Enabling your support agents to get their eyes on the problem lets them solve customer issues more quickly and efficiently than they can with audio-only customer support.
Live video support for telco companies doesn’t start and end with video conferencing apps, either. You can use a more advanced tool like Blitzz to make the experience even more seamless. Blitzz allows your customers to use their mobile device camera for the call. This functionality lets your agents get their eyes on hardware issues through the customer’s camera viewfinder.
How vital is a positive customer experience on the first call? Extremely vital. 32% of customers will leave a brand after one bad support experience. Giving your support agents the tools they need to help your customers right off the bat will increase your first-call resolution rate, saving your organization time and keeping your customers happy.
Customers hate waiting on hold. 66% of customers report that waiting for a long time on hold is their number one complaint regarding customer service. In other words, you could improve the customer experience of ⅔ of your customers simply by removing the need to call your support line and wait on hold.
With live video support, customers can schedule an appointment online and speak with a support agent at a scheduled time instead of wasting time sitting in the queue. This time savings is one of the main reasons customers are demanding remote video support.
Live video support also offers more convenience than on-site visits. When a customer schedules an on-site visit, they are usually given a window of time in which the technician may arrive. Compare this inconvenient waiting game with the ability to hop onto a live video call with a support agent who can resolve their issue remotely, and it’s no contest.
Telco support calls tend to have high urgency and high levels of customer emotion. Some telco companies have even offered training to staff on how to deal with abusive callers. Telco issues can hamstring your customers’ work and personal efforts, which results in a lot of frustration. Still, another reason these support calls can become so challenging is the lack of visual empathy.
Visual empathy refers to the increase in your ability to understand another person’s feelings when you see the other person face-to-face. In other words, it’s much easier to yell at a faceless voice on the phone than it is to yell at another human being when you’re looking them in the eye.
Related Read: The Blitzz Video Etiquette Guide for Remote Support
The increased visual empathy of live video support for telco companies doesn’t just make the support experience more pleasant for the support agent and customer—it makes the experience more effective.
Adding a sense of visual empathy to your support experience helps the customer feel heard and assists your support agent in getting their message across. These elements come together to increase first call resolution with visual empathy.
Truck rolls are expensive. When you factor in the cost of fuel, truck maintenance, technician hours spent on the road, and more, it’s estimated that a fully-burdened truck roll costs your organization over $1000.
Live video support won’t eliminate the need for truck rolls altogether, but you will be able to reduce them drastically. Offering live video support allows your technicians to solve most issues remotely without ever setting foot on the customer site.
One of our customers in the telco space was even able to reduce truck rolls for their initial installation processes. They developed a self-installation kit and paired this kit with Blitzz’s live video support. The results? Happier customers, fewer truck rolls, and a healthy bottom line.
Reduced truck rolls aren’t the only way virtual customer service improves your bottom line. You can also save money on infrastructure costs and more by using live video support to transition your support team out of the office and into a remote work environment.
One concern some telco company leaders express when considering live video support is the loss of their benefits from other support channels. We can put this concern to rest with one word: Flexibility.
Utilizing live video support for your telco company doesn’t mean you need to cut out all your other support methods. Live video support complements other solutions like phone, live chat, and in-person support.
Adding a live video support tool to your tech stack allows you to better tailor your support options to the needs of each individual customer. This increased flexibility will help you show your customers you understand their needs.
If you’re ready to challenge telco’s reputation for poor customer service once and for all, live video support might just be the way to do it. Your customers will enjoy accessible and convenient support with flexible hours and clearer solutions when you implement live video support. Your support agents will benefit from an increased sense of visual empathy that goes both ways. And, last but not least, your bottom line will enjoy the boost it gets from reducing truck rolls.
Blitzz offers one of the most comprehensive remote video support tools on the market. In addition to live video, you’ll benefit from features like augmented reality, OCR-powered text extract, advanced reporting, and more. Try Blitzz out for free today to see how our tool can level up your customer service efforts.