Customer service business process outsourcers (BPOs or “outsourcers”) have similar goals and challenges to in-house operations—and some additional ones of their own. They’ve got to keep several plates spinning at all times such as: Do they have a secret sauce that helps them to achieve that?

According to Gartner, when customers are able to find resolutions at the end of high-effort experiences, 96% are more likely to be disloyal to brands, and 81% are likely to share negative word-of-mouth. This is why it’s crucial for you to have a ticket escalation process. Read this guide to understand.

First Call Resolution is a vital contact center metric that monitors accurate and prompt support, tracking the number of customer issues resolved within the first support call. Fast-paced consumers want brands to value their time and expect their needs to be met on time—no matter how they get in touch with the brand— which makes FCR a leading indicator of customer happiness and a direct measure of a call center’s operational efficiency.

Measuring your Net Promoter Score (NPS) is the most effective way to gauge customer satisfaction. NPS dates back to 2003, when Fred Reichheld, a partner at Bain & Company, introduced a novel way of measuring how pleased your customers are with the products and services you deliver. If you’re unfamiliar with NPS, this guide will help you understand what NPS means and how you can use NPS for your business growth and to improve customer satisfaction.

If you’re in customer service, you’re likely to run into angry/frustrated customers who are facing a difficult time with your product or service. In these situations, you should know how to apologize to a customer properly. From the tone of your apology to how you write an apology statement, it shows the customer that you genuinely understand their position and are actively working towards fixing their issue.

There’s a ton of data that is created with every support request serviced in your help desk. Every ticket comes with its set of vital time-based metrics, ticket tags, and customer ratings. When you multiply that by the average number of tickets your business receives on a daily basis, what you have is a treasure trove of insights hidden within your help desk system.

The holiday season can be stressful for customers and businesses. We at Freshdesk understand the impact of this holiday rush, especially on your customer support team. That’s why we have put together some of the best holiday customer service strategies to prepare you for the holiday shopping window that lasts until the new year.