Higher calling: here are five steps that a bank can take to develop a call center strategy to improve customer outreach and enhance sales.

• Author: Gerstner, Diane
• Position: Feature

Despite their rising popularity in recent years, call centers today remain underutilized and under-appreciated. Some banks continue to resist adding the service. The arguments that these institutions make are familiar: They view call centers as an "intervening layer" between them and their customers. They fear that call centers will detract from personalized service. And, they are concerned that centers will "distance' the institution from its customers. These banks imagine their customers saying, "I used to call my bank and be able to talk to a human being, and now all I get is a recording."

Actually, the opposite is true. Well-configured call centers with appropriate technology and skilled personnel add to the quality and quantity of customer touch-points. Such centers enhance personalized service and help bring the institution and its customers closer together.

Consider these customer benefits:

* Rather than being handed from employee to employee (some of whom turn out to be the wrong contact), customers calling into a call center can be routed directly to the call center agent or branch officer who is most capable of helping them.

* Instead of being limited to the bank's office hours, customers can make inquiries, obtain account information and do transactions at their own convenience.

* As opposed to being put on hold because a customer service representative is busy serving someone in the lobby, a customer's call is routed to a call center professional who is ready and waiting.

* Rather than getting a busy signal or an answering machine-or being told the loan officer is out to lunch-a customer receives immediate service or information from a professional.

* In contrast to talking to a random branch employee, a customer reaches call center professionals who have specific customer account information in front of them on a computer screen, as well as highly developed sales and referral skills to understand and act on customers' financial service needs.

Again, call centers can live up to this potential only if the bank makes the right technology and staffing choices. Does it cost too much? No, not necessarily, particularly if you factor in the increased business that a call center typically generates. Below are five steps that a bank can take to make maximum use of the customer-service benefits of call center technology.

1. Select a Strategy

   The ultimate success of a bank call center depends on a careful initial delineation of your...