What is call center CRM: Benefits and features

Wondering what call center CRM is and why you need it? Wonder no more.

The phone number isn’t dead! Seriously – customers still call in to organizations big and small looking for help. And that’s because sometimes, it’s truly just the fastest way to talk to someone and solve an issue. 

But, similar to your other customer service channels (email, chatbot, social media), it’s incredibly important to:

1. Keep records of all customer touch points and interactions
2. Stay organized so you can personalize a customer’s experience in a moment’s notice

This is exactly what a call center CRM (or a call center customer relationship management software) will do for you. 

What is a call center CRM? 

A call center CRM connects all of your customer support reps (or sales reps) through a single platform, automating the routing (or round robin-ing), ticket labeling, and processing of incoming calls. 

Here’s a breakdown of how it works: 

1. If you collect phone numbers as part of your sales processes, when those numbers call in, a call center CRM will pull up the record for your team so they know exactly who is calling.
2. The software will even route the call to the deal owner, if there is one, so that the customer has a streamlined experience with your brand. 

What call center tools and features should I look for?

As with any software or tool out there, not all call center CRM software is the same.

Here are a few basics any call center CRM you look to use should have:

• It should integrate with your existing CRM system. These are often known as call center CRM open source solutions.
• It should automatically round robin and route calls to either available customer service reps, the salesperson who is next in line, or to the person at the company the customer has already worked with or spoken to (either at a deal level or as an account manager).
• You shouldn’t need more than one phone number for your call center CRM to do this work. In other words, you don’t need a number for each sales person, or each customer service rep. Instead, the call center CRM should pull on rules within your CRM system to determine where to send the call.
• It should allow for phone tree capabilities so customers can select their reasons for calling, and be routed to the correct folks. With this, sales and customer service won’t need separate numbers. 

Here are a few more specific call center CRM tools and featured you may want to consider in any RFP process:

1. Outbound Calls
The short list above details the basics of how a call center CRM should work for inbound calls, but your software should also make it easy for reps to make outbound calls as well –– and have that information and data stored in the customer record. 

Your teams should be able to log in to your CRM system, go to a contact, click on the phone number in that contact, and make an outbound call. 

2. Helpdesk Ticketing
Automated helpdesk ticketing within a CRM system helps to track customer service requests, which are solved, which need to be fulfilled, and more. This helps to keep a customer service team hitting their numbers –– and the automated ticketing does this without a rep having to remember to put it in. 

In other words, more reps on the phone helping folks out, and less reps manually inputting data. 

3. Call Recording
We’ve all been in calls where we’re told that the conversation may be recorded for quality purposes. For larger or busy teams, a call center CRM that records conversations and puts them in the customer record can be extremely helpful. 

This allows new hires to get up and running faster by listening to old calls and scripts (which can serve as training material), but also monitors the performance of the reps to ensure they are being helpful, transparent and upholding the company’s values.  

The call center technology experience most brands ignore

Call centers can get a bad rap, and much of it’s because the type of personalization we use throughout our other sales and customer service channels doesn’t translate in the call world. That doesn’t have to be the case. 

Call center CRM software and solutions can:

• Automate routing

• Provide phone trees

• Pull up customer contact information for both inbound and outbound calls

• Record conversations

• Help track every single interaction a customer has with your brand in a place where your reps can easily reference it in conversations

The phone number hasn’t died – the experience just hasn’t been upleveled – and far too many brands are missing out on a customer experience that can get them ahead of the competitors.