Hi All,
Anyone with experience in the effects of reducinmg opening hours in an inbound sales call center?
Am testing a hypothesis that if opening hours are reduced, e.g. by one hour, then customers will instead seek other channels, i.e. online and our retail stores, and that the effects on (total) sales will be zero/limited?

Any comments?

Many thanks!

Kristian,

As per my understanding this will be primarily dependent on the sales campaign that you have and kind of customers that contact at that centre.

Kind of Sales Campaign:- The product on sale can be a urgent requirement, or it can wait for a while. Brand Equity of the campaign.

Customers:- Whether New customers call this number or the existing customers also call on this number to reorder/more order.

Reducing the operational window, will sure make a -ve impact. But the degree of impact can be established only after the clear view of the campaign and target customers.

Hi,

In addition to what Manu has stated, it also depends on the dependabilty and loyality of your existing customers to wait for another hour or route to other channels, criticality of these product and its usage and exisiting competetion for the product.

Personally I wouldnt want to re-route my request through another channel if iam ordering a Pizza, I may as well call another food joint.

Would you want to cut your operation hours 'coz you want too sabve on cost of the manhours employed?

Also, the decrease in Operational Window by an hour might also impact your efficiencies... primarily the Occupancy of the agents... you might want to look at that too...