How to measure and improve CSAT call centre scores

Call centre representatives often ask customers to participate in a customer satisfaction survey after an interaction. Feedback surveys measure customer satisfaction score (CSAT).

CSAT is a metric used to gauge customer satisfaction with a company’s interactions. It is typically captured through a rating scale, with higher scores reflecting successful support and customer satisfaction.

Regularly measuring CSAT allows CX professionals to improve customer experiences, increase customer loyalty and reduce customer churn.

In this article, you will learn how to calculate call centre CSAT, what a good CSAT score is and how to improve your score. Read on for a detailed guide to call centre CSAT scores.

First, you must gather enough customer feedback.

To calculate call centre CSAT, the call centre must collect many customer responses to understand the customer journey accurately. A sample size calculator will help you determine how many people to survey for accurate results.

Post-call surveys are common for call centres and can be completed immediately over the phone or shortly after by email. Whichever method you choose, you need to ask a basic CSAT question: ‘How satisfied were you with the service you received today?’

The rating scale is 1–5, with 1 being ‘very unsatisfied’ and 5 being ‘very satisfied’.

Tip: Use a customer survey template such as our customer satisfaction survey template.

The next step is to analyse the feedback data by identifying the number of customers who rated their experience as a 4 (satisfied) or 5 (very satisfied).

These responses will form the basis for calculating your call centre’s CSAT score, indicating overall customer satisfaction.

To calculate call centre CSAT, you need to work out the percentage of satisfied customers out of the total number of responses. Use this formula:

CSAT percentage = (Number of satisfied customers / Total number of responses) × 100

For example, if 80 out of 100 customers gave scores of 4 and 5 on a scale of 1–5, the CSAT percentage is 80%.

(80 / 100) × 100 = 80%

To interpret the CSAT score, consider it similar to a test mark.

Generally, a score of 80% or higher suggests the call centre delivers excellent service, meeting or exceeding customer expectations.

Conversely, lower CSAT scores indicate areas where service may not fully align with customer needs, highlighting opportunities for improvement.

Regularly monitoring your call centre’s CSAT score is essential for tracking fluctuations and improvements. It reveals trends over time and the effectiveness of training programmes or technology updates.

Consistent measurement, ideally every quarter or more frequently, provides valuable insights into how changes impact customer satisfaction. This allows you to make timely adjustments to enhance service quality.

Now that you understand how to calculate a call centre CSAT score, how do you know what is considered good? A good CSAT score typically falls in the 75–85% range. However, this can vary depending on the industry and customer expectations.

With this in mind, you should always examine industry benchmarks to see what other companies in your sector are averaging for CSAT scores. Industry benchmarks are extremely helpful when measuring customer satisfaction and can shed light on customer expectations in your industry.

Are you wondering how to improve CSAT scores in call centres? We are going to share five tips for offering excellent customer service. Follow these tips to improve your customer satisfaction score and grow customer loyalty.

Onboarding is a crucial period for new employees to receive training and understand the responsibilities of their roles. Low customer satisfaction may signal that new hires are not receiving enough training to perform well in their roles. Fortunately, this can be remedied.

You could send an onboarding survey to gather employee feedback and identify areas for improvement. Employees may want more technology instruction or support from management.

The better informed employees are, the better they will perform at work.

Employee experience (EX) is critical to employee performance, affecting customer satisfaction. If employees are unhappy at work, it is unlikely that they will provide positive customer experiences.

Think about it. A disgruntled, unhappy call centre employee is more likely to project those negative emotions onto customers.

Human resource professionals can use anonymous employee satisfaction surveys and employee benefit surveys to gain candid feedback. This feedback helps companies meet employee expectations for benefits, work-life balance and professional development, boosting morale and engagement.

Building positive connections with customers by providing consistent, empathetic service can increase satisfaction and loyalty. However, customers are likely to be unsatisfied if your employees do not demonstrate customer care.

You can promote more positive customer interactions by applying customer care to your call centre’s customer service. This fosters stronger loyalty to your brand and can help to scale your business through referrals from satisfied customers.

To improve customer satisfaction ratings, evaluate customer service representative compensation. Is compensation based on the number of calls they complete each day or are they assessed on how many customer tickets they close each week?

Quotas such as these may be harming call centre customer satisfaction. Customer service representatives may struggle to exceed customer expectations if they are only concerned about meeting a quota.

To prevent this, call centres should consider tying employee compensation to performance and rely on customer service metrics. This encourages employees to provide the best customer experience rather than rushing customers through.

Excellent customer service is built on understanding. Incentivising performance and customer satisfaction is a sure way to improve CSAT scores.

Sometimes, the issue is that your product does not meet customer expectations. Call centre representatives can impact product development because they receive direct feedback. Nonetheless, they do not have direct control over the product.

This comes down to product teams and their need to support customer service representatives. Opening clear lines of communication to discuss recent product issues, improvements and fixes is vital to call centre success.

By focusing on product design and clear communication between teams, call centres can help improve their CSAT scores.

Call centre customer satisfaction reflects a company’s success at meeting customer needs and expectations. Call centre CSAT scores correlate with:

What is the difference between CSAT and Net Promoter Score® (NPS®)? A company may use these two customer satisfaction metrics to monitor customers' feelings about their business.

CSAT measures customer satisfaction with a product, service or experience. CSAT is typically measured on a 1–5 scale, with 1 being ‘very unsatisfied’ and 5 being ‘very satisfied’. Companies usually send CSAT surveys to gauge customer satisfaction at scale.

NPS is used primarily to measure customer loyalty to a company or brand using a 0–10 scale. NPS surveys ask customers, ‘How likely is it that you would recommend this company to a friend or colleague?’ Customers then choose a number from 0–10 (10 being extremely likely).

These two metrics work together to help businesses monitor customer satisfaction and loyalty as they grow over time.

If your call centre needs help improving its CSAT score, SurveyMonkey allows you to measure customer experience through customisable feedback surveys. You can collect valuable feedback to gain insights that help you make informed decisions for your call centre.

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