Peggy Carlaw

Peggy Carlaw

Impact Learning Systems
Peggy Carlaw is the founder of Impact Learning Systems. Impact helps companies develop and implement customer service strategies to improve the customer experience. Their consulting services and training programs help organizations create a customer-focused culture while producing measurable business results. Peggy is also the author of three books published by McGraw-Hill including Managing and Motivating Contact Center Employees.
  • Call Center Best Practices
    0 comments 258 reads
    Posted on 2012-05-12

    Call cen­ters that han­dle ser­vice and sup­port calls are, unfor­tu­nately, often viewed as cost cen­ters. Although these cen­ters usu­ally don’t bring in rev­enue directly, they do con­tribute to the company’s goals in many valu­able ways, most notably in rein­forc­ing the company’s brand and in increas­ing cus­tomer loyalty.

    To raise the vis­i­bil­ity of your call cen­ter as a valu­able con­trib­u­tor to your company’s growth and bot­tom line prof­its, fol­low these six best practices.

    1. Know Where You’re Going

    What are you try­ing to achieve? What are the goals of your com­pany? How can your...

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  • Call Center Coaching: 5 More Tips to Ensure Your Success
    2 comments 706 reads
    Posted on 2012-04-20

    Our pre­vi­ous post on call cen­ter coach­ing titled, “Call Cen­ter Coach­ing: 5 Tips to Ensure Your Suc­cess,” gave tips to help you improve your man­age­ment style in a sup­port or call cen­ter environment.

    We’re pleased to present the next 5 essen­tial skills that will help improve your coach­ing ability.

    1. Spend some time each day prais­ing your agents. Tak­ing time to give feed­back is an essen­tial skill of man­ag­ing. Offer­...
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  • Call Center Coaching: 5 Tips to Ensure Your Success
    0 comments 534 reads
    Posted on 2012-04-13

    Man­ag­ing staff—in any form–is hard work and requires a well-stocked reper­toire of peo­ple skills, busi­ness acu­men, and the abil­ity to jug­gle mul­ti­ple projects and deal with pressure.

    For those of you who man­age call cen­ters and sup­port cen­ters, you are tasked with watch­ing oper­a­tional costs in addi­tion to deal­ing with a team of agents. Your man­age­r­ial skills can mean the dif­fer­ence between an effec­tive call cen­ter or one that’s fail­ing. Good man­age­ment requires a heavy-dose of both intu­ition and tech­nique, and each cir­cum­stance requires a per­son­al­ized blend of skills. When prac­tic­ing call cen­ter coach­ing, there are a mix of meth­ods that we’ve...

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  • When to Use Customer Service Games in Training
    0 comments 1,026 reads
    Posted on 2012-02-04

    Customer service games can add spice to a training program. I ought to know, I wrote the book! Unfortunately, I’ve seen too many games used just because–well, I’m not sure why. The game was fun, but didn’t increase learning or help participants perform better on the job.

    Customer service games are fun, motivational activities. The key is to use them in conjunction with skill learning and skill use. When relevant to participants and their jobs, the games build confidence, lift morale, spark enthusiasm, stimulate creativity, and ultimately achieve results.

    Games can be quick, fun energizers that raise participants’ awareness of customer service issues. Games can also be full-scale activities that teach a skill and offer participants the opportunity to practice the skill in an informal,...

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  • Tracking Customer-Focused Metrics
    1 comments 1,390 reads
    Posted on 2012-01-18

    For years, contact center managers have been measuring operational metrics like average handle time, average hold time, turnover, sales per representative, average time to respond, and so on. But are these the most important metrics to measure?

    What’s important to measure depends on who you are

    Customer service and support managers want to measure the operational metrics listed above along with others like transfer rates and queue length to help them run an efficient organization.

    Executives, on the other hand, want to measure customer satisfaction, customer loyalty, market share, and profitability by product or service line so they can see how effective the company is at maximizing the shareholder’s return on investment. The two do not always jive.

    The disconnect between efficient and effective

    A company could go out of business if their only concern is having...

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  • Upselling and Cross-selling by Customer Service and Support Teams
    0 comments 666 reads
    Posted on 2012-01-17

    As the economy recovers, many companies are looking for opportunities to claw their way back to pre-recession sales levels. And companies that fared well want to be sure to keep their customers as competition in the playing field grows.

    Who’s upselling and cross-selling now?

    While sales teams have long had goals for upselling and cross-selling, more companies than ever are asking their customer service reps to do the same. And they’re asking their support engineers to  recommend product upgrades and contact customers to renew warranty agreements. This growing trend is particularly true in the financial services, telecommunications, high technology, and services industries.

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  • Tailoring Customer Service and Support to Different Personalities
    0 comments 705 reads
    Posted on 2012-01-16

    Fess up, now! There some customers you just love to talk to and others that you can’t wait to get off the line, right? Of course there are some customers who are just downright cranky and rude, but barring those grouches, there’s a reason why you relate better to some people than to others. To sum it up, it’s easy for us to do business with people who are like us. For example, if I want to get to get a quick answer and a customer service rep has one for me, I’m happy. However, if I get a CSR who want to chit-chat about unrelated topics, I quickly become quite annoyed.

    Carl Jung, one of the fathers of modern psychology, developed a theory of psychological types. The idea is that if we can identify others’ preferences and then modify our behavior, we’ll all get along better, prevent misunderstandings, and accomplish more. In the example above, if the sales or support agent can identify my personality type, then the agent can temper his or her need to build a relationship and...

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  • Proactive Customer Service and Support
    0 comments 919 reads
    Posted on 2012-01-09

    You’ve heard of First Contact Resolution, right? Hopefully, you’re taking concrete steps to resolve as many issues on the first contact as possible. Following right on the tail of first contact resolution is proactive service. Also called proactive support or next issue avoidance, it’s a trend worth focusing on.

    What is proactive service?

    When customer service and support reps offer proactive service, they anticipate and preempt additional contact. Here’s an example:

    Mrs. Pedowitz calls her insurance company to get a copy of the contract that explains her health insurance benefits. Knowing that members often call back for help understanding the complex contract, the CSR, Jesse, offers to answer questions about services Mrs. Pedowitz frequently uses. At the end of the call, Jesse offers to e-mail her a link to a summary booklet that is written in easy-to-...

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  • Crowdsourcing Customer Service and Support
    0 comments 1,092 reads
    Posted on 2012-01-08

    If you’re not already crowdsourcing your customer service and support, it’s time to consider doing so. Why? Smart businesses are always looking for ways to help their customers. And when you can help your customers and minimize expenses, why not?

     What is Crowdsourcing?

    Crowdsourcing is using your “crowd” of users as the “source” to help other users. It allows the number of customer issues you can handle to grow without your needing to incur additional labor costs. By letting users participate in the customer service and support process, it puts them center stage, engages them with your company, and increases loyalty. And by monitoring the crowd, you get new ideas.

     Who’s Crowdsourcing Customer Service and Support Today?

    Pretty much any company with a user forum. Here are just a few:

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  • Monitor Your Customers, Not Just Your Agents
    0 comments 653 reads
    Posted on 2012-01-07

    Companies are reframing customer service as a strategic method for gathering important information to inform marketing direction and product development. While you can obtain valuable insights by monitoring your social media channels, adding insights from your call center will provide a greater breadth and depth of information.

    According to Bruce Temkin of the Temkin Group, “The contact center has always housed a large percentage of important interactions with customers, but companies learn very little from these key touchpoints. That’s changing. Newer technologies allow companies to extract deep insights from unstructured content like recorded calls, emails, and chat sessions. Leading companies will learn what drives satisfaction and loyalty, and use the information to change the products they sell, how they market their offerings, and how they service customers.”

    Read More »
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