Call center managers know that excellent customer service keeps customers happy and builds brand loyalty. They also know hiring qualified customer service representatives is challenging because they need both hard and soft skills.
Nearly 80% of American consumers consider speed and product/service knowledge important elements of a positive customer experience. Therefore, call centers need representatives who have the ability to learn and understand the company’s products and services. They need excellent verbal and written skills, good multitasking and time management abilities. They also need to be friendly and understanding, and be able to manage difficult callers without getting frustrated or flustered.
According to a Deloitte study, 36% of US customers prefer to contact customer service via phone. However, 32% of organizations were running contact center technologies in the cloud at the end of 2020, and 75% said they expect to move to the cloud within the next two years. Therefore, customer service representatives must know how to use phone, email, and chat effectively.
Call centers know it is vital to have a top customer service team. Therefore, they implement an industry-leading assessment solution like the eSkill Talent Assessment PlatformTM so they can use call center skills tests and call center computer skills tests to screen applicants.
Why Call Centers Need the eSkill Talent Assessment PlatformTM
If you are a call center recruiter, you know many customer service skills are difficult to measure because they are subjective. These are some ways call center and call center computer skills tests help you and your team identify top customer service candidates.
- Assessment Library: All eSkill clients have access to an extensive library with hundreds of validated assessments. These include job-based skills tests such as the Customer Service and Call Center Operator Skills Test and subject-based skills tests such as the Call Center Computer Skills Test. You can also use cognitive tests to assess other vital attributes, such as verbal reasoning and critical thinking.
- Customize Skills Tests: You can opt to use pre-prepared skills tests or edit them by choosing difficulty levels for questions and adding and deleting questions. Alternatively, you can build assessments that perfectly match your job roles by selecting questions from multiple validated skills tests. You can even create assessments using your own questions.
- Simulations: To be absolutely sure applicants can do a job, you can present them with typical job scenarios and observe how they perform. For instance, if your representatives usually manage several customer inquiries simultaneously, Chat and Multitasking simulations enable you to determine if they can respond to multiple customers promptly and accurately.
- Video Response Questions: You cannot measure some attributes effectively using a written assessment. Verbal communication and foreign language skills are two examples. With the eSkill Talent Assessment PlatformTM, you can include video response questions to measure these abilities accurately.
- Behavioral Assessments: Candidates may have the right skills but be a poor fit for your company culture. By using behavioral assessments in conjunction with call center skills tests and call center computer skills tests, you can evaluate cultural compatibility along with abilities and experience.
Which Call Center Skills Tests Should You Use?
The specific call center skills tests you should use depend on the role you need to fill and your job requirements. Most assessments include 40 questions in multiple-choice, true/false, simple select, and select all that apply formats. Here are some assessments you should consider using.
- Customer Service: Assesses candidates’ communication and listening skills, teamwork and collaboration, adaptability, and problem-solving abilities.
- Call Center Computer Skills Tests: Tests applicants’ knowledge of MS Office® applications such as Word, Excel, and PowerPoint.
- Emotional Intelligence: Evaluates applicants’ social intelligence, empathy, and ability to control emotions and use them productively.
- Email Etiquette: Tests applicants’ ability to format and write email messages using correct grammar and spelling and their understanding of email etiquette.
- Inbound/Outbound Call Center Simulations: Presents candidates with customer situations they will encounter so you can see how they will react and respond.
- Multitasking Simulation: Asks candidates to work on multiple tasks so you can evaluate their ability to organize and complete them efficiently.
- Chat Simulation: Requires candidates to respond to typical customer inquiries so you can confirm they know how to reply to and send chat messages.
- MS Office Simulations: Asks applicants to complete tasks they would be required to perform on the job using popular computer applications.
Get Started with Skills Tests
Assessments like call center and call center computer skills tests help you minimize hiring mistakes by hiring candidates who will be successful at your company. This enables you to improve the quality of customer service you provide, improve customer retention, and reduce turnover.
Do you want to learn how call center skills tests and call center computer skills tests can help you hire top candidates for your call center? Contact us to request a demo.
