Opinion: Tis’ the Season for Scaling: Navigating the Hurdles of Boosting Your Customer Service Team for the Xmas Rush

The twinkling lights, the searing heat, and Mariah Carey’s “All I Want for Christmas Is You” on repeat – it’s (nearly) that time of year again. Yes, the holiday season is upon us, and whilst you’re probably thinking – what is this guy on about, footy finals haven’t even finished yet! – for many businesses, it means gearing up for the busiest time of the year. Retail businesses, for example, could be doing anywhere from 30% to 70% of annual sales over the Xmas period alone! 

While visions of holidays and family time by the pool swim around customer’s heads, they also expect prompt and stellar customer service. So, how do you scale up your customer service team quickly and cost-effectively to support with the surge in demand? Let’s unwrap the challenges and discover some festive solutions! 

1. Sourcing talent

At the risk of stating the obvious, the challenges start with sourcing talent – both in quality and in numbers. It’s the same problem every year – Contact Centre Managers know they need to scale up by 5, 10, 20, even 50 or more staff at this time or year every year. Where does the experienced talent pool come from? And when will you ever get the time to sift through the hundreds, if not thousands, of applications and interviews just to get to offer stage, let alone training and onboarding? 

Instead of trying to go it alone whilst trying to execute on your objectives, consider leveraging a partner to do the heavy-lifting for you. With the right partner, they can take away all the pain, time and effort involved with the sourcing process and, because this isn’t their first Xmas, they should have pre-qualified talent pools ready to go, so you can move faster than Santa’s Sleigh on Xmas eve! 

2. Reliability of staff 

One of the biggest challenges to scaling your Customer Service team for the Xmas period is the reliability of the Agents you’re bringing on. Unfortunately, after all the hard-work of sourcing, vetting, and interviewing, many Agents don’t even make it to induction day. Even for the ones that do, there are then many more who don’t make it to day one on the phones or behind the Live Chat window. The battle for talent in Australia and New Zealand has never been fiercer, and a better offer for good Contact Centre Agents at this time of year is only just around the corner.  

Consider adjusting your recruitment strategy to curb the expected fall-off as candidates onboard into your business i.e. if you think you need 10 new Agents for three months, consider hiring 15 – there is a good chance you’ll end up with 10 on day one anyway. Again, leveraging the right partner, they can also be looking deeply at reliability as a key behavioural attribute of the target candidate profile – anyone who ranks low on this probably shouldn’t be considered for interview. Finally, certainty of work is important to every Agent. If you know you will be busy from November to early January with customer enquiry, resource for the right number of Agents that will provide them with some certainty of work over that period. This will largely negate their need to think about moving on elsewhere. 

3. Managing cost

All this talk of scaling up sounds expensive, right? Sales are going up at Xmas, so costs should naturally follow too, right? It doesn’t have to be this way. Yes – it is going to cost you more to service the surge in customer enquiry over the Xmas period, but there are ways to keep the cost low to maximise profitability. 

Firstly, work with a partner that allows you to scale up and then back down again as and when you need it. This means you are only carrying the additional cost for as long as you need to and the Agents you have are always running at full utilisation.  

Secondly, consider a blended workforce strategy. Leveraging a trusted partner to help you scale up with a team of Agents based offshore is a wonderful lever to keep costs low without compromising on quality. In addition, you may be able to scale-up with both onshore and offshore team members – offshore for level 1 customer support, and onshore for level 2 customer support, for example. 

4. Timing is everything 

The time to be thinking about scaling your Customer Service team for the Xmas period is now. Leave your run too late and you will be rushing to a) locate and vet the Agents and b) get the Agents up to competency. The result could be calls and enquiries going unanswered or – even worse – customers receiving sub-par service.  

Scaling up your customer service team for the Christmas rush may feel like managing a whirlwind of tinsel and candy canes, but with the right strategies and a dash of holiday cheer, you can sleigh these challenges and ensure that your customers have a holly, jolly experience. After all, it’s the season of giving, and exceptional customer service is one gift that keeps on giving, long after the Xmas tree is packed away.  

Ready to start thinking about your scaling your Customer Service team? 

Gain access to our free remote info pack here.