XACT

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and position.

I am the VP Customer Service & Sales of 4AllPromos

Describe what your company does in a single sentence.

4AllPromos is a trusted promotional products supplier that helps businesses and organizations create high-quality custom branded merchandise that brings their brand to life.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What specific goals or objectives did you hire XACT to accomplish?

• Rapidly scale our Customer Service team with top tier talent
• Gain flexibility in staffing during slow/busy times
• Elevate our overall customer experience with helpful, knowledgeable and empathetic team members

SOLUTION

How did you find XACT?

Online Search

Why did you select XACT over others?

• Great culture fit
• Good value for cost
• Company values aligned

How many teammates from XACT were assigned to this project?

2-5 Employees

Describe the scope of work in detail. Please include a summary of key deliverables.

XACT provides customer care for 4AllPromos, acting as an extension of our in-house team. Their agents handle inbound customer inquiries, order status updates, and post-sale assistance through phone, email, and chat. Key deliverables included: 

• Rapid hiring of top talent to meet our staffing needs
• Responding to constantly changing business needs due to internal staffing changes, increasing order volume, extension of operating hours, and elevated service level goals
• Creating a comprehensive onboarding process to ensure success of new team members, which included digitizing and improving our existing hiring materials 
• Strong collaboration with our internal team to ensure consistency in experience 

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What were the measurable outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

• Achieved our service level target for the first time ever as an organization!
• Offboarded some internal customer service agents to other opportunities without impacting customer service due to XACTs support and responsiveness
• High number of 5 star Google reviews, specifically naming XACT agents
• Internal teams that interact with XACT agents report high levels of satisfaction and confidence in their work, from delivering excellent customer support to following internal processes

Describe their project management. Did they deliver items on time? How did they respond to your needs?

Yes, they delivered on time and let us know if there was ever any risk in meeting timelines or deliverables.  They have been receptive to change and are incredibly flexible to work with.  They also respond well to feedback and collaborate well with all of us.

What was your primary form of communication with XACT?

Virtual Meeting

What did you find most impressive or unique about this company?

They are true business partners.  They understand what our business goals are and that flexibility and change is the name of the game right now.  They are proactive in suggesting solutions to achieve our goals. There is also a strong culture alignment. They understand how critical consultative customer service is to us, and they've been able to hire and coach team members who deliver that.  They share our enthusiasm for our business and our desire to deliver a "OneTeam" experience to everyone. 

Are there any areas for improvement or something XACT could have done differently?

Can't think of any. Frankly, I expected the first 6-12 months to be a learning experience for both sides and for some things to be a bit rocky.  But they have far exceeded my expectations.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and position.

I am the VP Sales of an environmental systems company.

Describe what your company does in a single sentence.

The company provides high quality waste containerization technology for municipal solid waste and for municipal recycling streams.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What specific goals or objectives did you hire XACT to accomplish?

• Provide Call Center Support to New York City residents ordering trash and recycling bins.
• Provide Call Center Support to New York City residents checking order status of trash and recycling bins.
• Provide Call Center Support to New York City residents with a service complaint.

SOLUTION

How did you find XACT?

• Online Search
• Referral

Why did you select XACT over others?

• High ratings
• Pricing fit our budget
• Good value for cost

How many teammates from XACT were assigned to this project?

1 dedicated account manager and leadership team, 10 - 25 call center agents.

Describe the scope of work in detail. Please include a summary of key deliverables.

XACT provides customized call center solutions for a large contract that support the public placing orders or checking status of orders.  Features include call recording, support in multiple languages, and detailed call reporting.  We have a dedicated and professional account manager that oversees all aspects of our operation, which streamlines communication.  The call center agent team has been effective and successful in supporting our project.  The program has been flexible to accomodate order surges and/or lighter ordering periods, a feature we greatly appreciate.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What were the measurable outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

Total Calls Answered compared to Agent Count 

Call Queue Time - best in class 

Call Abandonment Rate - during hours and after hours

IVR Programming and effectiveness  - facilating call volumes and directing calls appropriately

Describe their project management. Did they deliver items on time? How did they respond to your needs?

Following the launch of our campaign, we scheduled quality assurance monitoring to review agents
as they began processing live volume. XACT shared these QA forms and call center reporting with us, and sought our feedback on agent performance. XACT was committed to ensuring that
our campaign ran smoothly, and worked closely with us to make any necessary adjustments to
improve agent performance and customer satisfaction.

What was your primary form of communication with XACT?

• Virtual Meeting
• Email or Messaging App

What did you find most impressive or unique about this company?

XACT prioritizes ongoing communication to address any potential issues and to continuously refine processes, procedures, and campaign structure for maximum efficiency and quality. Our regular meetings and calibration calls ensure that they can quickly address any concerns and keep our campaign on track for success.

Are there any areas for improvement or something XACT could have done differently?

I can't think of anything in particular, because as issues arose during the project we brought them to XACT's attention and they were always promptly reviewed, discussed, and addressed.  We always strived to have the very best call center experience possible for our customers.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and position.

I am the Senior Manager, Service of 2-10 Home Buyers Warranty

Describe what your company does in a single sentence.

Home Warranty Provider

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What specific goals or objectives did you hire XACT to accomplish?

• Create Warm Leads for Contractor Enrollments
• Improve Enrollment Rates
• Reduce internal management needs for this function

SOLUTION

How did you find XACT?

Online Search

Why did you select XACT over others?

• Pricing fit our budget
• Good value for cost

How many teammates from XACT were assigned to this project?

2-5 Employees

Describe the scope of work in detail. Please include a summary of key deliverables.

Xact:

• Receives cold leads
• calls up to 3 times
• vets the leads to gain and judge interest
• submits warm leads back to our company to enroll.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What were the measurable outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

• % of lead conversion
• Lead quality (how the leads were): 
• Did the companies know about us and what we do?
• Did they know what we were calling about?
• How interested were the companies we received as warm leads?

Describe their project management. Did they deliver items on time? How did they respond to your needs?

This has improved dramatically over the past year. In the past, we have struggled to receive advanced notice when leads are needed. This has improved, as has communication and working with us to solve problems and deliver desired outcomes. We meed bi-weekly, and they have actively engaged in the problem solving process to improve the lead quality and conversion rates. 

In the past we also had difficulty getting a hold of the leader over our team. This improved dramatically with Angela and Angie taking over our account. 

What was your primary form of communication with XACT?

• Virtual Meeting
• Email or Messaging App

What did you find most impressive or unique about this company?

For the past 1-2 years, they have really embraced partnering with us to improve our working relationships and the results we're seeing. 

Are there any areas for improvement or something XACT could have done differently?

Better call visibility. 2-party notification is only required in a few states, and yet we're told we don't record calls. This makes it extremely difficult to perform quality checks and to drive improvement. 

Reporting customization and e-mail customization. It takes manual intervention to receive information on which call set we're on (257 calls left on the 2nd round of calls, for example).

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and position.

I am the Director of Sales and Customer Success of an automotive company

Describe what your company does in a single sentence.

E-Commerce company that sells replicated and insurance quality reconditioned wheels.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What specific goals or objectives did you hire XACT to accomplish?

• Alleviate Customer Service Issues

SOLUTION

How did you find XACT?

Referral

Why did you select XACT over others?

• High ratings
• Pricing fit our budget
• Company values aligned

How many teammates from XACT were assigned to this project?

2-5 Employees

Describe the scope of work in detail. Please include a summary of key deliverables.

We ask the Xact team to aid our small business with customer service tickets via our Zendesk ticketing system as well as assist customers on the phone with various tasks such as order status updates, providing customers with product knowledge so they can confidently make orders and assisting customers with various service-related issues like returns and cancellations.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What were the measurable outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

Project is still ongoing but the entire xact team has been a pleasure to work with thus far.

Describe their project management. Did they deliver items on time? How did they respond to your needs?

Again the project is ongoing but given the complexity of our business and some of the challenges we face our Xact team has responded to any need or task assigned when asked to do so.

What was your primary form of communication with XACT?

• Virtual Meeting
• Email or Messaging App

What did you find most impressive or unique about this company?

I'm impressed most by the structure and adaptability of the company. Our project is unique as we are in a very unique business and they have picked up most of the challenges we face daily.

Are there any areas for improvement or something XACT could have done differently?

No real glaring area of improvement is needed. The reps assigned to project need to focus on the fact they represent Auto Rim Shop in the Customer Service cases that arise and sometimes they may be tasked with giving an uncomfortable answer to a customer that the customer may not want to hear.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the director of operations for a catalog company called Donna Salyers Fabulous-Furs.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with XACT?

We didn’t have an internal call center to take calls from our catalog search or customer service for our website orders. We hired XACT to take over these responsibilities for us. 

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

We went through an onboarding process with training materials and taught them about our systems, processes, and basic customer service protocols and service guidelines. XACT acts as our third-party call center. 

They primarily handle incoming calls from customers who are placing orders, and they facilitate and enter those orders into the system for us. They also follow up with customers if they have questions regarding return service labels, sizing information, or tracking information on their products. They work directly in our software system. 

They’ve also integrated a chat script on our website, and they’ve done phone Interactive Voice Recording (IVR) work after hours. For any individuals who have struggled with our service guidelines, XACT has provided extra training for them. 

What is the team composition?

We work primarily with five members of their core management staff. This includes their IT representative, CEO, and three account managers. 

How did you come to work with XACT?

They were a referral from someone else in our industry. 

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve invested over $100,000 with XACT. 

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with them in October 2021, but we really started using their services in August 2022. The work is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement? 

We are working through higher average call times, but they’ve been presented with some challenges, and they’re stepping up to try and solve those issues. 

How did XACT perform from a project management standpoint?

They have an excellent management team. We usually have a task list, and we send it to them and then review it over the phone or on Microsoft Teams. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

We’re very satisfied with the work that they’re providing and have been highly impressed with how they’ve been trying to understand our needs. We’re working with a new software system, and they’ve been great about providing us with feedback. They’re very interactive and act like a partner for us. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

Their base model is a little difficult for some new agents within XACT to adapt to, so they don’t always have the highest level of proficiency right away. 

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Be concise about what you're looking for. You might need a little patience, but they're worth it in the long run.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I am the Sr. Director of Business Process Operations for the Business Head Quarters of TK Elevator Company; which services and installs elevators for customers

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire XACT, and what were your goals??

We have a large amount of customers that pay via credit card, which equates to our company paying millions of dollars in credit card fees. We used Xact's call center to contact customers paying via credit card in an effort to get them to switch to ACH or check. The goal was recover 1.3 million in fees. Additionally, we changed bank accounts 2 years ago and we still had customers paying 20 million a month to the old bank account, which we are trying to close. We used Xact calling center to contact customers making payment to the old bank account in an effort to inform them and help them switch to making payments to the new account.

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor and what were the deciding factors?

We worked with a consultant on this project and Xact was one of the BPOs they recommended.

Describe the project in detail and walk through their service package, including any calling tools used.

We provided Xact a list of approximately 15K customers paying via credit card and/or customers still making payment to our old bank account. We set them up with an email account and gave them access to our customer payment portals. Xact and TKE collaborated on a script for both campaigns. Xact trained their agents to make the calls and provided a weekly update of # of calls and the disposition of each call.

Who did you work with and what was the feedback process like?

We initially worked with the VP to get the project started. We were then given a project manager and an Administrator to support the PM. The initial PM didn't work out, so exact found another PM to put on the project. We had weekly session with the Xact team to review metrics, provide feedback, and recommend process changes.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Can you share any measurable outcomes of the project or general feedback about the service?

Service work great, in addition to some other process changes, we were able to save 1.8M vs a goal of 1.3M. Additionally, we reduced the monthly payment to the old account from 20M to 5-7M per month.

Describe their project management style, including communication tools and timeliness.

Weekly updates via TEAMs meeting and weekly metric package submitted to keep me informed. On occasion, I had to prompt submission of the metrics package, but this did not happen often.

What did you find most impressive or unique about this company?

I was impressed by how quickly they ramped up and once they changed PMs, how quickly the calls were getting completed. I also like that they provided me with # of hours used and # of hours remaining on a weekly basis, which allowed better planning and determining if a change order was going to be needed. They also gave some concessions, which was very help in establishing a great working relationship. I thought their escalation process was good and it uncovered lingering issues we needed to fix with our customers.

Are there any areas for improvement or something they could have done differently?

Some of the agents documented/dispositioned calls differently. Some agents didn't sound really enthusiastic and this led to customer complaints and thinking the campaign was fraud. However, for the number of customer contacted, this didn't happen much at all.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the operations manager of a startup software development company based in North Carolina.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with XACT?

We were in search of a customer service partner to manage some affinity branding programs we were running. That included a few fan clubs we were managing on behalf of a few different organizations. When we first launched those clubs, I was handling all phone and email support on the customer service side. We needed a partner that could help us scale that support to allow us to grow.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

To start the partnership, we had to educate their agents and teammates that were staffed to the programs on the types of benefits we were offering to paid members. Once they were up to speed on our programs, they were responsible for assuming the role of a customer service employee for those programs. Each of the three programs was focused on a different industry and had unique benefits and access granted to involved fans. We asked XACT to handle incoming calls and emails from customers and direct them appropriately, as requested by the member. 

Their main deliverables were helping us understand the nature of the calls and emails through reporting. That reporting also included metrics around call or email handle time, which was used to determine what we would be billed on a month-to-month basis.

The email and phone service provided was pretty much 24/7. Across the world, they’d address calls and emails at all hours. 

What is the team composition?

I worked with a couple of personnel managers as well as 30 individuals on our account. 

How did you come to work with XACT?

Someone likely referred either our CEO or COO to them.

How much have you invested with them?

Our pricing was based on hourly support, including any applicable overages. We spent approximately $2,700 each month with them. 

What is the status of this engagement?

We worked with them from March 2019–January 2021.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement?

They were efficient, and very few complaints from customers were ever escalated to me. I was impressed that we didn’t encounter any critical issues from a customer service standpoint, based on the volume of calls they were taking. They did a great job serving those accounts, which was shown in the success of those programs as well as the feedback we received. 

The programs they supported were designed to support the most passionate fans of those entities, and they wouldn’t have stuck with us had our customer service been subpar. Their team’s handling of this part of the business allowed me to focus on other parts of the business. Some technology changes that affected their work were rolled out during our time together, and they did great with that transition as well.   

How did XACT perform from a project management standpoint?

We had a shared Slack channel that included their entire team. They were very engaged and curious about the programs. When someone on their end had a question, they did a good job of addressing it among themselves. They were always open to my suggestions and feedback based on the information I presented to them. As our programs changed over time, they were able to use their own community to find answers to questions without always escalating to a manager.

During our reporting meetings with the managers, they were open to addressing any changes that were occurring within the programs and making sure initiatives were thoroughly communicated across the team. It was a seamless process.    

What did you find most impressive about them?

They were a large team that was expected to come together and be passionate about and interested in the business they were supporting, and they succeeded in that. I was impressed by their level of commitment and enthusiasm for the role. Their genuine interest in the members they were servicing stood out as well.

Are there any areas they could improve?

If anything, it may help to revisit some aspects of training as our programs evolved. As there was turnover within their organization, they were very thorough with training and documentation. Revisiting those at certain periods may have been beneficial to both parties. 

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Build a strong relationship with their management team. We had a collaborative, open relationship from the start, and it remained that way throughout our dealings. Be willing, accessible, and engaging to help them help you.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

Until about two weeks ago, I was with a company called Udacity, which is one of the leaders in the online learning education space.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with XACT?

We handled what we called assisted sales, or B2C sales. We primarily used chat, and we wanted to explore the option of leveraging phone as a very top-of-the-funnel experience.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

XACT took inbound calls from customers that were just entering the Udacity funnel. People often called with questions about the company or our courses. Many of the courses are more technical in nature, so people want to confirm that they’d picked the right course or have the appropriate proficiency level. Some qualification was done as well.

Another example of how they handled calls was activation in the sense that when people called to cancel their membership, the XACT team would try to keep them engaged. For instance, if somebody called saying they couldn’t complete the course, XACT tried to convince the caller to continue with the program and highlight career opportunities for them if they succeeded and got their certification. 

Udacity used Salesforce internally, including Sales Cloud. We also used Intercom for chat and Blueshift for email. We put XACT on our Salesforce instance, so they had permissions and access to enter information. We used RingCentral, but they used inContact. When a call came in on our IVR (interactive voice response) system, it was forwarded to their infrastructure. They handled the call and used our Salesforce instance.

What is the team composition?

It fluctuated over time. We worked with an average of 10 people at a time. Of course, you’re not really hiring 10 people; you’re hiring more than that because people are backfilling for each other, etc. There was a trainer, as well as two people who helped with infrastructure issues. One infrastructure would be ensuring that the script that we wrote was updated and fit into their infrastructure. 

The other person handled training. There was training before the program, and then they updated the call reps on new programs we were launching. We added the retention program, which required updated training as we went along. 

How did you come to work with XACT?

We did a pretty extensive search. I talked to about 10 different places. It had been several years since I’d done call center activities, so I really started from ground zero. I did a lot of web searches and talked to other companies and narrowed it down to 10. I spoke to all of those companies on the phone, sent a loosely defined RFP to six of them, and then narrowed it down to three. Those three companies met our CEO and marketing person.

How much have you invested with them?

There were setup costs, such as integrating inContact and our Salesforce instance, and QA costs in some cases. There was also an hourly rate per rep. 

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in January 2020, and XACT is still working with Udacity. It’s my understanding that they’ll continue to grow with Udacity. Because of the success of the program, they’re looking at rolling it out further.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement?

In terms of retention numbers, they were performing greater than our chat functionality. When we started out, retention was a few percentage points, but we got into double digits pretty quickly. We reached mid-double digits after that. There was a lot of growth. They did a great job introducing us to the telephony world and quickly building up our acquisition and retention programs.

In terms of their work, they were great, and I evaluated that through SLAs (service-level agreements) and real-time updated reporting. We asked for a lot from them, and they definitely kept up. Their flexibility was also noteworthy, as the program evolved from acquisition to retention.

How did XACT perform from a project management standpoint?

They had very strong project managers, which was something we were really reliant on; I was stretched too thin to do day-to-day management. They brought in someone who handled not only training but also project management. We were constantly doing new programs that needed to be tested, so somebody really needed to manage that integration, update scripts, understand the program, and then communicate the program to their frontline.

We had biweekly calls with the trainers at that level. We also put them in our Slack channel. We treated them as an extension of the team; while chat was handled by our employees, XACT handled the phone. Both teams met quite frequently. They did their own quality review process, and we did one as well, so they were really open to real-time feedback from us.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Their ability to respond quickly and scale set them apart. We had 10 reps, but we moved beyond that eventually. They were really good thought partners who brought new ideas to the table.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, I don’t think there’s anything specific. The telephony space is changing pretty rapidly, so things they could think about are a more dispersed workforce and integration with different CRM systems. They also have chat offerings, and I think it’s important that they can leverage a client’s existing chat infrastructure.

Any advice for potential customers?

Be upfront about expectations in terms of what you want and how you’re going to measure success. Constant check-ins during the first month are really key. I think they do a really good job providing daily reporting, but depending on how big your organization, it’s important to figure out how to automate that reporting. We depended on Google Sheets, which was good, but seeing how it fits into the bigger picture and infrastructure is important.

Whenever you do these programs, remember that patience is a virtue. Know that it takes a month to ramp up. You can do all the best training you want upfront, but they were also open to real-time training. I know they have offshore call center offerings; we didn’t test that out, but more and more customers are interested in that.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

Provide online delivery services Director Customer Success

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire XACT?

Call Center Representatives to handle calls.

What were your goals for this project?

Handle inbound and outbound calls quickly and provide excellent quality.

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor?

Wasn't part of that process, company relationship is 9 years old.

Describe the project in detail.

Inbound and outbound calls to/from customer and merchants for fast pace company, providing 7 days a week support. Took on additional tasks as requested. QA and call recording provided as well.

What was the team composition?

Reps were pleasant, team members would provide coaching as requested.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Can you share any outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

Freed up the team as they handled calls thus allowing the company to put resources on other tasks

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

We conducted regular calls as needed, would jump on requests quickly as needed which was appreciated.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

The management team was attentive and great to work with. Their tech support was great to work with when tech issue arose between both companies.

Are there any areas for improvement?

Continue training reps as needed for continued improvement.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I am the customer service manager for Cherry Hill Programs. We supply shopping malls with Santa Claus and Easter bunny photo experiences.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with XACT?

We hired XACT to assist us with our seasonal influx of calls, which only happens during the times we are operating at malls.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

We needed a company like XACT who could staff up for us in the short period of time that we needed them.

We have all sorts of different scenarios in which customers were either unable to claim their photos after they went to the set. We have an online digital photo option.

There is a bit of technicality involved with checking to see if the customer's photos were actually uploaded and if so, why they were unable to retrieve them. A big portion of what they did for us was looking through receipts to verify codes, times, malls, as well as figuring out whether this was sent correctly and uploaded.

In addition, we have complaints about the Santa set which can range from wait times, to photo quality and other things. There are a whole lot of things that can happen; sometimes mall-related and sometimes staff-related. They also field complaint calls and forward that information to me so that I can accelerate it to the correct departments and get it taken care of.

Additionally, we have a reservation system where customers are able to book slots to see Santa. Sometimes, they want to change that reservation, need a refund, or have questions about the reservation process. Those were another huge portion of what the calls they were taking in were related to.

They are actually utilizing several different databases for me and depending on the type of call, they had to define where they were headed with it, whether a customer was looking for a receipt, a fast pass or a refund. They were really awesome at learning all kinds of technical things.

I wrote a whole lot of canned responses initially and gave Marianne (Senior Knowledge Manager, XACT), as much information as I could about how our systems ran. I also gave her a dashboard that connected her to all the pieces that she might need to satisfy customers. From that, she created their own Wiki where people could click, search, and find answers.

She was very instrumental there in taking a lot of canned information and conversations from me and creating a database that she kept up with. Sometimes procedures would change and things were added or subtracted from what we had to do and she kept it ongoing so that it was current to what was happening at that point. 

What is the team composition?

Marianne was our primary point of contact. Angela (Senior Manager of Client Services, XACT) also helped quite a bit with staffing. William (Vice President of Operations, XACT) did a lot of technical stuff behind the scenes, and Richard (Executive Vice President, XACT) did a lot of the scripting and IVR. We had about 25 dedicated team members and about 25 that would take rollover calls who were also trained but weren’t dedicated to the account.

How did you come to work with XACT?

I spent a couple of months going through everything I could find about the main leading companies that were out there. XACT came to the surface in several searches for me as a good company and one that might have the ability to handle a project of our magnitude. Other answering services that I spoke to were not ready for the kind of influx we could have taken. XACT had the staffing and even had the possibility of using international if we needed to.  

I reached out to about 10 different call service providers and there were several other companies that we actually flew out and visited, and my conversation with Kathy (Director of Sales & Business Development, XACT) was the most important part of my decision. When I told her what I was trying to do, she had a lot of ideas on how to do it.

Rather than me instructing some company about what I wanted, she told me what I needed. That was something I was looking for, having never outsourced before and really not knowing how to present myself. She was undaunted and given the information I gave them, Kathy came back to me with a whole lot of suggestions for ways that we could handle this. Both my boss and I were really impressed with that and decided to go with them. 

How much have you invested in them?

We have spent about $250,000 so far.

What is the status of this engagement?

We began working with them in April 2019, and the work is still ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement?

After what they have learned from our first season, with all of this experience under their wings, we can't imagine going without their services at all. We are headed into Easter now with them and we feel very comfortable because of all the things they have learned. I would never want to start over at this point. We feel like we have really gained another part of our own team.

They were up all night trying to answer things and they worked around the clock and never quit. Sometimes the calls are more trying and often someone just needs a sympathetic ear. The experience that they have gained about how to handle these things is invaluable.

Of all of our tickets that came in, we found we had five huge categories that calls fell into over and over. Now that they've experienced most of the different calls we receive, they have the ability to actually categorize these things and take off in the right direction was there. We are speculating that they will be on the phone less time this Easter given that they have this way of attacking it and have learned how to do it more effectively.

How did XACT perform from a project management standpoint?

Communication with their team is great. We email all day long, call each other directly, and also employed Slack, so I never felt that there was a gap in communication at all.

We had a meeting on Wednesdays just to catch up and see where we were at. During those meetings, they would often give us suggestions that we felt were very valuable, and we followed a lot of their leads on those Wednesday meetings to stay ahead. It was an all-out effort on both our parts.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They are incredibly fluid and able to act on the fly. There was no stop and go and there was never a time where we had to figure out what we were doing. For any company that is trying to outsource, it is a very scary thing to hand all of your customers to a stranger.

I felt almost right away that they were working alongside me. My nervousness about letting someone else take over my job was eliminated by their ability to hit the ground running.

Are there any areas they could improve?

There were days that we had to quickly staff because our volume suddenly spiked, but sometimes that was because of a technical problem on my end and had nothing to do with them. 

Perhaps as a team, we might start stronger at Easter with more people staffed in preparation of the idea that we might have these giant flows and swings in the number of calls.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Allow them the time to give you their input. Give XACT as much information about your business as you can, and they will begin to ask you very structured questions given what you describe. It was okay to ramble on and on, and they jumped on that. I was able to speak calmly about it and give them a lot of information, which helped me in the long run.

Any company looking to use XACT should get their input and not be surprised at how much they can offer you, even if you think you know what structure will work best. Give them enough information to let them help you with that design, and it will work out better than most people could plan.