How The Quality Conversation helps keep cable customers from cutting the cord

By Bob Davis

Cable companies are faced with competition today like never before. Not only do they have to deal with traditional competitors, they also have competition from content owners, game consoles and cloud-based competitors. All of this has led to the practice called cord cutting.

Whether or not you believe cord cutting is just beginning and will gain momentum, it is impossible to argue with the numbers. The cable industry has lost more subscribers in the last quarter than any other quarter in history.

The number-one driver of this loss is that customers are pursuing lower-priced alternatives. The second most common reason is that cable customers are leaving for bundled products and services elsewhere.

Requests for help versus true cancellation intent

So how do you save a customer who calls in to quit? Well, 50 percent of these calls begin with requests for help related to affordability. Customers start off by saying something like, “I have to do something about my bill! It is just too high and we need to cut back everywhere.” In these cases it is very easy for the agent to jump on the fix and eliminate the premium channels. In fact, this is the number-one solution presented. But is it always the best solution?

And what is the best way to handle calls from customers who have a clear cancellation intent?

My company, Robert C. Davis and Associates (RCDA), works extensively with customer contact centers for cable providers and many other types of companies, and we have found that the best approach for saving canceling customers is to enter into what we call The Quality Conversation with them. To do so requires certain attitudes on the part of the cable CSR.

The importance of showing genuine interest

The most important attitude CSRs need to engage in The Quality Conversation is one of genuine interest in customers and their wants, interests and needs. Much like you can hear a smile over the telephone, genuine interest comes right through to customers and sets the stage for the save. Unfortunately, not having an attitude of genuine interest comes across the phone line, too.

Discovering the true cancellation reason

Perhaps not surprisingly to anyone who has worked in a customer contact center, most callers don’t at first volunteer the real reason they are canceling. Our studies show that on 53 percent of all cancellation calls, the first reason a customer gives the CSR for cancellation is not the real one. Beyond showing genuine interest, The Quality Conversation is centered on a process that includes using discovery questions to find the true cancellation reason. This is extremely important. After all, if CSRs don’t know the true cancellation reason, they’ll focus on fixing problems that don’t resolve the real issues.

The real magic bullet is to use a complete process—full discovery—to help customers realize the value that they see in the service. For most customers, watching TV drives many positive emotions. The Quality Conversation and the full discovery that is part of the process get customers talking about these emotions and their underlying value.

Here’s an example of how it all works. Imagine that a customer is calling in to cancel HBO because he needs to save money. Through initial discovery, you determine that this is the true cancellation reason. Moving through full discovery, the next question you might ask is, “What show are you going to miss the most once you cancel?” More often than not, the customer will answer by saying something like, “Well, I was looking forward to the new season of “Boardwalk” (or whatever program is the customer’s favorite). Once customers start talking about what they’ll miss, it is very likely that they will reconsider their cancellation request. “You know what? I am going to find another way to save money,” the customer will say. “Let’s keep my HBO.”

Helping customers find the value they see in the service is so important, yet CSRs cannot lead them to it without engaging in The Quality Conversation.

Learn more about The Quality Conversation online at http://robertcdavis.net/process/ or call 678-548-1775.

Bob Davis is the president of Robert C. Davis and Associates (www.robertcdavis.net), a consulting firm in Alpharetta, Georgia, specializing in improving sales, customer service and retention results in customer contact centers across North America. Bob is also co-founder of Surpass (www.surpasscalls.com), a highly specialized outsource customer contact center serving the needs of business clients across the country.

The Quality Conversation is the key to turning service into sales

By Bob Davis

We were three weeks into a service-to-sales project in a large customer contact center when I overheard the following comment from an agent passing the training room on her way to the break room.

“I wasn’t hire to sell. I don’t care what they say,” the agent said. “I am not going to do it!”

This is not an uncommon reaction to change. My company, Robert C. Davis and Associates (RCDA), has been helping organizations turn service into sales for many years. We have found that this is a journey to win the hearts and minds of the agents—a journey that is well worth taking.

For example, we helped the billing department of one company move from zero sales to 90,000 sales in just six months. We helped the tech support organization of another company move from .02 sales per 100 calls to 1.8 sales per 100 calls—a 900-percent improvement!

How exactly do you obtain gains like these?

The main way to get there is to engage in what we call The Quality Conversation. If you don’t build a strong emotional connection with customers while solving their technical problem or billing issue quickly and efficiently, your chances of turning the service call into a sale are very small. On the other hand, if you use the following elements of The Quality Conversation on the call, your chances of converting the call to a sale increase greatly:

• Show genuine interest in the customer.
• Handle the call with sincere enthusiasm.
• Engage in full discovery of not only the issue at hand but also the customer’s wants, interests and needs.

The Quality Conversation seems quite simple. The big question is, what prevents agents from carrying it out?

First, you have to address the natural reaction to change. Any time you ask people to change how they do something, they react in stages:

1. Denial (“I can’t believe they’re making us do this.”)
2. Anger (“This really makes me mad. I’m not doing it.”)
3. Bargaining (“Can’t we just keep doing things the way we’ve always done for while?”)
4. Depression (“Why even try? I’ll never be able to do this.”)
5. Acceptance (“Well, it’s mandatory. I might as well learn how to do it.”)

If you understand and expect these stages of reaction to change, you’re better able to help team members move quickly to acceptance of a Quality Conversation initiative.

The other key to changing a team from a service orientation to a sales orientation is to understand comfort zones. People tend to keep doing what they are comfortable doing, regardless of whether or not it produces results. The role of the supervisor or coach is critical. The job is to help agents stay outside their comfort zone using The Quality Conversation approach until they are comfortable with it.

Here are some effective techniques for moving from service to sales:

1. Make a strong transition statement. Once agents have taken care of the issue at hand, they need to make a smooth transition statement. This means saying something like, “Now that we have fixed your billing issue, let me ask you a couple of questions to determine if we can add even more value on this call.” If agents make this statement confidently, the customer will usually react positively. This will help agents move to acceptance of the change, because they’ll see that it works.
2. Move to full discovery. Instead of just making a product pitch, agents must ask questions that will allow them to truly understand how they can add value for the customer. RCDA has been working on service-to-sales transitions with cable providers using this approach. Agents become amazed when they see how full discovery focuses on customer wants, interests and needs and consequently creates a positive experience for the customer. The agents see for themselves how willing customers are to answer discovery questions from the agent who drives that positive experience. The customers talk about their wants, interests and needs as related to their phone and Internet service—and how additional products and services can add value. In the end, the process helps customers sell themselves.
3. Coach for sustainability. Coaching from supervisors is critical during the roll-out of a Quality Conversation service-to-sales transition. They need to reinforce all of the new behaviors on a daily basis or the agents will revert back to their comfort zone—doing their job the old, familiar (albeit less effective) way. Side-by-side coaching, skill transfer, small group practice sessions, commitment sessions, and following up on those commitments are all key to succeeding with a service-to-sales transition and sustaining it.

More information on The Quality Conversation and how to make your service-to-sales transition work, visit RCDA’s website at www.robertcdavis.net.

Bob Davis is the president of Robert C. Davis and Associates (www.robertcdavis.net), a consulting firm in Alpharetta, Georgia, specializing in improving sales, customer service and retention results in customer contact centers across North America. Bob is also co-founder of Surpass (www.surpasscalls.com), a highly specialized outsource customer contact center serving the needs of business clients across the country.