Building Rapport with Callers

By Nancy Friedman

Name? Account number? Zip code? Mother’s maiden name? Sounds like a scene from a prison movie, doesn't it?

Well, it’s not. It’s the start of an average call in many a call centre. Why? In most cases, the call centre agent hasn't been shown another way to answer a call.

This next story illustrates why it’s important for agents to gather information from callers without sounding like Wanda the Witch or Warren the Warden!

My wallet was stolen a few months ago. Fortunately, I remembered the names of the credit cards I was carrying. Unfortunately, my wallet with all the credit cards also had my cheque book.

My first response was to list the cards that I knew were in my wallet. I then began the daunting task of calling each of the major credit card companies to report the loss. Perhaps, because of the type of work I do every day and because of the horror stories I've heard, I have become "Mrs. Perfect Customer." I don't yell, I don't belittle, and I don't get angry. I smile and try to help the call along. I'm really a good customer.

With this in mind, I picked up the phone and made my first call to one of the credit card companies. "Hi, my name is Nancy Friedman," I said. "I’m in Orlando, Florida, and my wallet with all my credit cards has just been stolen and I wanted to report it right away."

"NAME?" said the agent with the voice of a warden.

I always give my name up front, as I had this time. Obviously, the agent who answered the phone didn’t hear it, didn’t write it down, or didn’t remember it. So I repeated my name and spelled it for her.

"ACCOUNT NUMBER?" the agent continued.

I thought one of us had better have a sense of humor, and I could tell it wasn’t coming from the other end, so I said, "Well, I have my phone number, address, and birthday memorized. I never got around to memorizing all my credit card numbers, and if you recall, my wallet with that information was stolen." Dead silence.

Then I heard, "PHONE NUMBER?" Well, it went downward from there. I won’t burden you with the rest of the conversation. Suffice to say, I was disappointed. There wasn’t one word of empathy from this agent. She sure didn’t have what I refer to as the “care gene.” She had a job to do and by gosh, she was going to do it – and in record time, too.

I had six credit cards in my wallet. When I called to report the loss of each one of them, none of the credit card companies acknowledged my problem. It was hard for me to believe, too. Probably the worst experience I had was when I called the bank concerning my cheques. When I told my saga to the bank, the woman I spoke with asked the questions as though I had been the one who stole the wallet.

What does the behavior of the agents at the bank and the credit card companies say to me, the customer? It says that maybe I should take my business somewhere else.

To keep customers satisfied and loyal to your company, it is crucial that an agent build rapport with every customer at the beginning of each call, whether the customer is calling to discuss a problem, a concern, or an inconvenience.

The agent who answers the call should acknowledge what the customer is saying and use the same words that the customer says, as in the following example:

Caller: "I just lost my wallet." Agent: "Your wallet? I’m so sorry. Let me get your name and we’ll see how we can help."

Learning how to build rapport is an art, not a science. You may recall Yul Brynner, the great actor, who appeared in the musical "The King and I" in more than 2,000 performances. He said the same words, night after night. Yet each performance was award winning. Why? Because each performance he gave was to a different audience. I imagine he got tired of the script sometimes. Yet because he knew the audience was new each night, he made his lines sound fresh every time.

For call centre agents, the telephone is your stage and the connect button is the curtain. One of the best ways agents can be sure to convey empathy is to practice the lines they say the most so that the delivery sounds different each time.

I sympathize with agents who work in centres that receive enormous numbers of calls. But I also hear all sorts of excuses. One of the most common is: "Gee, Nancy, we have to say the same thing over and over. It gets so boring." Or "Nancy, we’re limited for time for each call." Or "Our policy is to get on and off the phone as quickly as possible."

These are excuses. Not reasons. Although an agent may say the same thing over and over again, it’s probably the caller’s first time asking the question. And it isn’t enough for agents to know the answers. They also have to reassure customers that they’re ready to help them. When customers reach call centre agents, they don’t care how much they know – until they know how much they care.

Nancy Friedman is president of Telephone Doctor®, an international customer service training company headquartered in St. Louis, Missouri, specializing in customer service and telephone skills. She is a KEYNOTE speaker at association conferences and corporate gatherings and is the author of four best selling books. Call 314-291-1012 for more information or visit the website at www.telephonedoctor.com.

Published in Networking Today, October 2005.