building a world-class call center: performance metrics, operations, structures and trends at...

BEST PRACTICES,

®

LLC

Best Practices, LLC

Strategic Benchmarking Research

Building a World-Class Call Center: Performance Metrics, Operations,

Structures & Trends at Consumer/OTC

Companies

Copyright © Best Practices, LLC

BEST PRACTICES,

®

LLC

Table of Contents

I. Executive Summary

Research Project Overview

Participating Companies

Key Insights & Benchmark Findings

Key Performance Metrics at a Glance

Definitions

II. Call Center Structure & Focus

III. Operations

IV. Complaint Management Process

V. Performance Metrics

VI. Technology Use & Impact

VII.Future Trends & Issues

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Objectives & Methodology

Research Objective:

Provide participants with current metrics for call center performance in the

pharmaceutical, medical device, biotech, diagnostics, consumer health, and

consumer packaged goods industries

Benchmarking Methodology:

Create and deploy custom benchmarking survey

Deploy survey tool online to call center leaders across the industry

Develop key performance metrics and ratios from quantitative survey data

Develop insights through conducting in-depth executive interviews with selected

participants

Research Project Overview

Best Practices, LLC conducted this benchmarking study to identify performance benchmarks

for the size, cost, service delivery efficiency, structure, leadership, processes, technology, and

operations of call center organizations for consumers/ OTC companies within pharmaceutical and

related industries.

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Best Practices, LLC Studied Call Centers at 35 Companies

Participating Companies: Benchmark Class

Nine call center leaders from 9 OTC (Over the Counter), and consumer packaged goods

companies participated in this study. Participation was limited to call centers operating in the

United States or Canada.

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Participating Companies: Alcon, Colgate Palmolive, GSK Consumer, Merck Consumer, Nestle Health Care, Novartis

Consumer, Pfizer Consumer, Procter & Gamble, Reckitt Benckiser

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Call centers support 141 products on average, with

a range from 45 to 213. .

Participating Call Centers: A Brief Profile

Reporting 33% report into Medical Affairs and Marketing Others are widely distributed,

reporting into functions ranging from Sales to Technical Services to Safety.

Leadership Leaders most often work in director-level

positions and report up to senior executives.

100% are located in the United States.

44% operate as internal corporate functions, 22% are run by vendors, and 33%

are mixed internal/vendor models.

66% have regional/country specific structures. Approach

Nearly half the centers support at least two different industry segments.

The percentage of respondents supporting each industry segment is:

78% OTC

44% consumer packaged goods products and devices or diagnostics

33% prescription drug business

Industry

Top focus areas are medical inquiries & medical

or technical complaints and safety.

Focus

Area

Structure

Products

Location

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Key Insights

• AMBIGUITY IN LEADERSHIP COMPOSITION OF OTC CALL CENTERS: While more than 75% of

OTC call centers focus on medical inquiries and drug safety, there seems to be low representation

in the leadership team for both Drug Safety and Medical Affair. Only 22% of those groups have

direct reporting members on the leadership team. This is especially unusual for Medical Affairs since

one-third of all the call centers report to Medical Affairs.

• COMPLAINT RESOLUTION: OTC products are usually a cross between prescription drug and

FMCG products and are present in market from the past several years. The technical information for

these products is readily available and accessible to the first-line agents. Consequently, about two-

thirds of calls are handled by first-line agents. And the first-line agents successfully resolve 89% of

the complaints during the first call, This highlights the efficiency of OTC call center agents in working

with customers.

• PREVENT RECURRING PROBLEMS: Of complaints that are not resolved in the first call, 50% of

the OTC segment manages them in the call center itself . Another 13% of companies send the

callers to a specialized complaint resolution group. In line with this, 14% of calls handled by call

centers fall in Tier 2-3 that get escalated to call center leads or subject matter experts. Use of

regular reporting and trending is considered to be the best approach to identify and prevent

recurring issues by all the benchmark partners in OTC benchmark class.

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66% of Centers Have Regional/Country Specific Structures

The majority of benchmarked companies use a regional or country specific structure for call center

operations.

Q. What type of structure does your call center reflect? (choose one)

Call Center Structure

(n = 8) % of Responses

A globalized center covering

multiple regions/ countries, 34%

Regional/ country- specific call centers, 66%

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Call Centers Most Often Report to Medical Affairs or Marketing

Q. To what function does the leader of your call center report?

% of Responses (n = 9)

Function to which Call Center Reports

One-third of participating call centers report either into Medical Affairs or Marketing, the remainder are

widely distributed throughout the organizations, reporting into functions ranging from Sales to

Technical Services to Safety.

22%

11%

33%

33%

Other

Sales

Marketing

Medical Affairs

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No, 38%

Yes, back-up provided

internally, 25%

Yes, back-up provided by a vendor, 38%

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Majority Have Back-Up Centers in Place for High Call Volume

(n = 33)

Back-Up Center

% of Responses

Q. Do you have a back-up call center—separate from your primary center—in place to handle unexpected situations (such

as a recall) that cause large fluctuations in call volume? (choose one)

63%

Back-up call centers, separate from the primary centers, are in place at 62% of participating

companies to handle large fluctuations in call volume. In all, 38% of companies use vendors to

provide back-up services, while 25% provide back-up internally.

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0%

0%

0%

0%

13%

38%

50%

Other

Assign specific agents to own individual complaints untilresolved

Customers and their complaints are segmented by customervalue or complaint severity and exported to complaint

resolution groups

Account representatives handle complaint resolution for theiraccounts

Complaints are exported to a specialized complaint resolutiongroup

Customer service handles simple complaints and sends moredifficult complaints to resolution

Call center owns and manages complaints

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Complaints Often Owned and Managed by Call Centers

(n = 8)

Complaint Resolution Approaches

% of Responses

Q. For complaints that are not resolved during the first call, what approach best describes your company's system for

tracking and resolving complaints? (choose one)

Half of participating call centers own and manage complaints that are not resolved during the first

call, while 38% route difficult complaints to specialized resolution groups or assign specialist

agents to manage them.

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$29

$16 $14

$12

$9

$6

Max 75th Percentile Mean Median 25th Percentile Min

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Cost per Call Averages $14 for Total Benchmark Class

Participating call centers spend an average of $14 per call they handle, based on the ratio of annual

budget to total calls.

RA

TIO

(n = 6)

Cost ($ Budget) per Call

Segment

Analysis

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24,750 24,025

5,625

728 483 163

75th Percentile Mean 25th Percentile

Average # inbound calls Average # outbound calls

Call Centers Take Median Average of 24,025 Calls per Month

Q. What is your average number of inbound and outbound calls per month?

The average number of monthly inbound calls ranges from a low of 298 to a high of 100,000 across

the benchmark class. Outbound calls are generally a small fraction of the total. High call volume is

directly linked to low budget per call.

Higher average monthly call

volume correlates with lower

budget per call. For example,

companies with more than 5,000

calls per month had an ‘cost per

call’ of $21.68—less than one-

third of $72.44 cost at centers

with less than 5,000 calls

Volume/Cost Correlation

Average#

Calls/Month

Average

Budget/Calln=

< 5K 72.44$ 10

>5K 21.68$ 10

SE

RV

ICE

LE

VE

L

# C

all

s

(n = 8)

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Average Number of Calls per Month

=Top quartile *

*

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®

LLC

Best Practices, LLC is a research and consulting firm that conducts work

based on the simple yet profound principle that organizations can chart a

course to superior economic performance by studying the best business

practices, operating tactics, and winning strategies of world-class companies.

Best Practices, LLC 6350 Quadrangle Drive, Suite 200

Chapel Hill, NC 27517

www.best-in-class.com

About Best Practices, LLC

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http://www.best-in-class.com/





building a world-class call center: performance metrics, operations, structures and trends at...

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