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2015 is Going to be a Great Year for Contact Centers

It’s hard to believe that it’s the end of another great year, but as the snow accumulates in Buffalo, it’s clear that it’s time to prepare for 2015. The contact center world is on fire (unlike Buffalo). Never before have enterprise executives so fully appreciated the contributions and benefits of these customer-facing organizations. Innovation is robust and rapid, driven by the new generation of cloud-based contact center infrastructure vendors who are not limited by the traditional 6- to 18-month software release cycle. Here are 4 hot contact center trends that are expected to attract substantial investments during 2015. All of these trends will make substantial contributions to their enterprises, customers and employees.
  1. Cloud-based contact center infrastructure solutions – The contact center infrastructure (automatic call distributor (ACD) and dialer) market has changed dramatically. Companies are no longer captive to a small group of premise-based vendors who dictate the functionality, implementation schedule and pricing for these solutions. Companies of all sizes – from those that need 2 agents to organizations that need thousands – now have access to a new generation of cloud-based contact center infrastructure solutions. There are currently more than 150 of these vendors with offerings of all types, sizes and functionality. Additionally, enterprises can easily purchase both private branch exchange (PBX) and ACD/dialer functionality from the same vendor on a worldwide basis.
  2. Speech analytics – Today, customer calls are being recorded for more than just quality assurance purposes. It’s time for organizations of all sizes to use the rich content customers share with organizations in phone conversations to identify trends, operational/technical issues and new opportunities. Post-call speech analytics solutions capture and convert unstructured phone conversations into metadata that can be analyzed and used for many purposes, but the 6 most common uses are: root cause analysis, trend analysis, emotion detection, talk-over analysis, script adherence and analytics-enabled quality assurance. The real challenge with speech analytics is implementing the best practices that will allow organizations to succeed with this enterprise change agent.
  3. Multi-channel contact centers – The time has come for companies to transition to omni-channel contact centers. (Omni-channel contact center is another name for multi-channel; vendors are trying to change the terminology to distance themselves from the failures of the past.) Customers are no longer willing to put up with having to start over and repeat themselves each time they transition to a new communications channel. Baby boomers and Generation X’ers were willing to put up with this dysfunction, but Millennials clearly are not. Millennials want to seamlessly migrate from one channel to another, in accordance with their needs. But there is more to this story. While it’s a good idea for companies to allow their customers to interact with them in the manner and channel of choice, the fact is that in many companies it is too expensive to continue to maintain the separation between functions. Yes, it will be painful, time consuming and costly to eliminate the silos, but companies that are doing the analysis and building the business case for this evolution are starting to see a clear payback, albeit one that is going to take 3 – 5 years.
  4. Adaptive and intelligent real-time routing – Companies can now provide personalized service. When an interaction (call, email, chat, SMS, tweet, etc.) arrives, the ACD’s routing engine can determine the value of the customer (and possibly even a prospect), identify the best way to achieve the objective of the interaction, and then route the transaction to the best qualified person or system to handle it. This type of one-to-one service is enabled by the deep level of integration between ACDs and other enterprise servicing applications (customer relationship management, sales, performance management, quality assurance, speech analytics, etc.). Using the new and sophisticated adaptive and intelligent routing capabilities that are emerging in the market, companies can truly optimize the service experience, and in doing so, greatly improve customer and agent satisfaction and productivity and reduce operating costs.
It’s time for companies to rethink their servicing strategies and begin the process of building their next-generation servicing organizations. 2015 is expected to be a great year for contact center investments. Start with a plan that takes into consideration the many ways that contact centers are expected to contribute to their enterprise, and prioritize the investments that will get you there quicker. At DMG, we’re always available to help. Please reach out to us with any questions you may have, and to learn how to make today’s innovative and powerful new technologies and best practices work for your organization. Contact Donna Fluss, President of DMG, atdonna.fluss@dmgconsult.com or 973-325-2954.
Wishing you a wonderful, healthy, happy, successful and fun 2015!

DMG IN THE NEWS

11/18/2014
DMG Consulting Releases 2014 Workforce Optimization Mid-Year Market Share Report

Ask the Experts

Question:
What is the difference between WFM and WFO?
Answer:
A workforce optimization (WFO) suite is a collection of 10 – 11 functional modules that work together to help companies optimize the performance of their workforce. DMG defines a WFO suite as a “collection of integrated modules designed to capture, analyze and give managers the information required to evaluate the performance of their department and staff, and the perceptions, needs and wants of their customers and prospects.” A complete contact center WFO suite consists of the following 10 functional modules:
  1. Recording – audio and screen recording for quality assurance, regulatory or speech analytics
  2. Quality assurance/management – determines how well agents adhere to internal policies and procedures
  3. Workforce management (WFM) – forecasts and schedules agent staffing needs; may include long-term planning capabilities
  4. Agent coaching – tools to communicate with agents to assist them in improving their performance
  5. eLearning – learning management capabilities that assist in the creation, issuance and tracking of training courses
  6. Surveying – Web and IVR-based solutions for creating, issuing, tracking and analyzing customer feedback
  7. Performance management – helps align contact center activities with enterprise goals; also provides scorecards and dashboards to improve the performance of the contact center
  8. Speech analytics (post-call and real-time) – captures, structures and analyzes customer phone calls to identify the reasons for them and to gather insights… Read More

DMG Consulting LLC is a leading independent research, advisory and consulting firm specializing in unified communications, contact centers, back-office and real-time analytics. Learn more at www.dmgconsult.com.