Summer vacation is coming to an end and your business is getting back into full swing.

Labor Day is the perfect time to refocus your call center.

With the new season comes another opportunity to increase efficiency, improve organization and keep your call center on the cutting edge. The demands of the customer and the competition to deliver top quality customer service are greater than ever before. Finding new ways to improve your call center’s efficiency and satisfaction rates is essential for your business to stay competitive in today’s market.

Here are four tactics to refocus your call center this Labor Day.

Implement a Knowledge Delivery System

Now that summer is over and Labor Day is here, it is time to get your information organized. A knowledge management system will allow you to organize all of the information that your customer service reps need to perform their jobs effectively. This will reduce customer wait times and increasing efficiency. A study by Mobius found that 84% of customers are frustrated when representatives do not have immediate access to information. A knowledge management system will do more than just streamline operations. It will also help to deliver a smoother and more comfortable experience for the customer, resulting in greater satisfaction.

Protect Your Information with Backup & Recovery 

It is always important to be prepared for an emergency. Call centers are not immune to power outages or other disasters, but having an effective data backup and recovery system can help you get back to full functionality as soon as possible. Having a backup of your important data is critically important, especially where customers are concerned. It is also important to consider how protected your backup data is and how quickly you can implement recovery if an incident does occur. On-site backup may be handy for its proximity, but it will help if a natural disaster strikes your call center. The best strategy is to combine on-site and cloud CRM data backup. This not only gives you extras layers of protection, it also provides a range of options for finding the quickest way to get your call center back running again.

Implement a Call-back Option

Long wait times are one of the most notable downsides of delivering customer service through a call center. In fact, 69% of customers said that they were on hold for too long when seeking assistance from a business. (One way around these long wait times is a call-back option, which allows your representatives to contact customers at the earliest availability without forcing the customer to wait on hold. Some customers may prefer the more traditional hold option to make sure they don’t miss their chance, which is why call-back should be offered as an option and not forced on customers. However, a study by Forrester found that 75% of customers consider a call-back option highly appealing.

Integrate Your Call Center with Social Media

Many customers are now turning to social media platforms to voice their complaints before even thinking about contacting a representative over the phone. Leaving complaints like this unanswered will leave the customer dissatisfied and wreak havoc on your business’s reputation. Responding to these complaints via social media is one option, but sometimes the higher level of support that a representative can only provide over the phone may be necessary. Your business needs a way to connect unhappy customers who seek assistance via social media with call center representatives. It is important to find a way to initiate phone contact while also familiarizing the representative with the customer’s issue beforehand to accelerate the process.

Gartner Analysts are fans of this idea: “A Facebook-like social networking environment within an organization can be used as a general-purpose communication channel where information and events that originate in external systems — such as email, office applications and business applications — can be injected into conversations, and vice versa.”

The world of customer service is changing, but call centers remain one of the most effective ways of successfully resolving customer issues. According to Forrester, live assistance from a representative still has the highest satisfaction rate of any customer service channel. While the importance of call centers has not diminished, it is important for call centers to adapt to changing trends and implement new technology to increase effectiveness. Make refocusing your call center a priority this Labor Day to stay ahead of the competition.