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WEB-ENABLED CALL CENTRES: Harnessing the Potential

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VoicenData Bureau
New Update

The

Internet is changing the way companies do business–both in a

business-to-business (B2B) and business-to-consumer (B2C)

capacity. It provides a new, flexible, and effective channel for

marketing, sales, service, and distribution functions. The Web

gives rise to a number of powerful customer contact

opportunities and is, by its nature, interactive. For these and

other reasons, many companies are looking to combine the

Internet and the call centre into a rich–and potentially

lucrative–new means of interacting with customers.

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Integrating the call

centre with the Web gives rise to exciting new possibilities for

customer interaction, including e-mail and online chats. Other

possibilities include collaborative browsing, where the Internet

browsers of both the agent and the customer become linked and

can be controlled by either party, and Voice over IP (VoIP), in

which voices are transmitted over a data network

While the convergence of

call centre and Internet technologies offers tremendous

benefits, it also presents several challenges. Though software

technologies for Web-enabled call centres are becoming readily

available, call centre managers and agents may not initially be

able to effectively harness the new functionality afforded by

the Internet. In addition, customers may be reluctant to try Web

interaction, especially if they have had difficulty using the

Web in the past. Several key technologies and techniques,

including queue management and work blending, reinforced by the

collection of real-time statistics and business intelligence,

can pave the way toward faster technology adoption and

accelerate an organization’s efforts to successfully leverage

both call centre and Internet technologies. 


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The Evolution

Call

centres have been gradually evolving over the past few years

from the simplest switch-only solutions to those incorporating

detailed computer-telephony functionality.

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According to Datamonitor,

a market research and consulting firm based in New York and London, "For companies wishing to combine the customer

focus of a call centre with the business potential of the Web, a

Web integrated call centre or multimedia contact centre is the next logical step of development." In the US, Datamonitor

predicts that penetration of Web-enabling technologies will be

10 percent by the end of 1999, rising to 32 percent in 2002.

Today’s implementations

of Web-integrated call centres might have the call centre

handling all customer contacts using the same queuing and

routing system. In other words, e-mails are handled and

distributed to agents in the same way as voice calls.

Web-integrated call centres are also likely to include a

"Web call me" facility that allows customers to

contact an agent within the company directly. However, this

approach may not scale or consider the unique requirements of

each media type. A modern, more scalable approach should

consider technology that coordinates various media systems–where

e-mails or other contacts are handled and distributed to agents

in a similar manner as voice calls.  Key Business

Drivers

Whether

a business Web-integrates its call centre, or call centre

integrates its web site, doing either affords numerous benefits.

A Web-enabled call centre allows a business to differentiate itself from competitors by providing new and useful services. In

addition, efficiency improvements can help boost company

performance through reduced costs, or higher revenues for

equivalent expenditures. For example, transferring expensive

repetitive telephone-based operations to the web site can

clearly reduce call centre operating costs. Using a new

distribution or service channel can provide new marketing

opportunities, and capture new market sectors that the company

has previously been unable to service or supply. The combination

of Internet and telephone technologies can also provide

round-the-clock customer sales and service which improves

customer loyalty and satisfaction, leading to an increase in

repeat business and customer retention, directly influencing

revenues.

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Call centre enabling the

web site also offers significant benefits. According to

Datamonitor, "Many e-commerce functions report that around

70 percent of customers who enter a site and fill an electronic

shopping basket abandon the contact before any transaction has

taken place for one reason or another." Adding "Web

call me" and other human interaction can help close these

sales. Agents will be able to reassure customers about security

issues, and perform cross- and up-selling, thereby improving the

revenue-generating function. Capturing some of these deflected

customers will greatly improve online revenues and help improve

call centre efficiency.

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Hurdles to

Overcome

In

spite of these benefits, according to Datamonitor, Web-enabled

call centre penetration will only reach about 10 percent this

year. One reason call centres have been slow to integrate Web

functionality is the significant time lag that can occur between

implementing the new technology and the ability of call centre

managers and agents to use the increased functionality afforded

by  the Internet. For instance, agents who may be highly

adept at selling on the telephone may not be able to rapidly and

accurately type–a skill that is necessary for sending e-mails

and conducting on-line chats. It is imperative to hire the right

agents and train them appropriately to ensure that whatever

technology is chosen is exceedingly easy to use.

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Another challenge is the

difficulty consumers have in using the Internet. For many

consumers simply connecting to the Web presents a dizzying array

of challenges, including selecting an ISP, installing software,

and configuring technical parameters. Moreover, unless a user

has a separate Internet and telephone connection, the technology

cannot really be utilized because the user cannot be online and

talk at the same time, unless they are using VoIP technology,

which currently requires well-engineered endpoints to provide

adequate functionality.

Then, once they are on the

Internet, many consumers find online shopping confusing.

Unreliable connections and browser software crashes may further

frustrate customers. Being able to

successfully rescue agitated online shoppers will be key to

retaining customers.  Getting the

Web Site Right

While

consumers are largely on their own when it comes to getting onto

the Internet in the first place, businesses can help them once

they are there. Good web site design can go a long way toward

ensuring an enjoyable and smooth online shopping experience.

Some consumers remain wary of transmitting confidential

information such as credit card numbers over the Internet. Businesses can help by clearly indicating the level of security

available on their web sites.  Web
call me buttons, easy to

launch Web collaboration windows, and telephone numbers that consumers can dial for human interaction should be in plain view

on critical pages or at critical times during the online

experience. To further minimize consumer frustration, the web

site should be robust and stable enough to accommodate a large

number of simultaneous customer

interactions.

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Good web site design can

also help agents to more easily handle Web-based customer

interactions. It is important to ensure that Web-based forms are

easy to find and that the web site is easily navigated. When

customers indicate that they are having trouble with a specific

section of the web site, agents should be able to quickly

discern where the customer is having difficulty.

The Power of

Business Intelligence

Within

the call centre, there are several ways to maximize the

potential of Internet technology and to reduce the latency

period between software technology availability and the

propensity to learn and use the software by call centre agents

and managers. Agents must first be armed with sufficient

business intelligence. They must be aware of every customer

interaction (any contact between a single customer and a human

or automated agent within the enterprise) that has taken place

across all interaction channels. Without this knowledge, an

agent may not be aware that a customer is already agitated from

having an unsuccessful online shopping experience. The agent who

knows if the customer is ready to buy or highly frustrated is

the agent who will be successful in selling products, or

improving customer loyalty by resolving an issue. Further,

business intelligence should utilize key indicators for managers

to measure performance against specific business targets. When a

central repository is used across CRM appl
ications, it

becomes easier to correlate operational performance in the call

centre with business results. Integration Is

the Key

Technologies

focusing on universal work queues and sophisticated work

blending applications are being introduced that will readily

adopt new media types via a standard media

"access" interface. The interface will simplify and

abstract media access for agent applications to enable

inbound/outbound telephony, e-mail, and Web interactions. This

will enable applications to operate with less concern about the

details of a given medium and allow software providers to focus

on improving business applications functionality that support

customer interactions. The media access interface will manage

each media system for the agent application, whether it is an

inbound or outbound telephony system, an e-mail interaction

system, or a Web collaboration system. The architecture will

also support flexibility in incorporating new media as they

become available, and include the ability to normalize the

delivery of media across various routing and queuing models.

The multimedia call centre

tracks customer interactions across all the media types to

create customer history and valuable business intelligence from

well conceived and integrated customer interaction data, thereby

providing robust business and operational transaction data. This

powerful capability is exemplified by this simple statement: the

more you know about how and why a customer touched you, the more

you will know how to best service him. 

Ensuring that the web site

is fully integrated with the company’s call centre is as

important as integrating to a company’s other business systems

(for example, IVR, self service applications, back office

systems for shipping information or contract data). Without full

integration, invaluable customer information could be lost or

not fully leveraged. But with CRM applications linked to repositories of business intelligence, not only can customer

information be used to its fullest, but also call centre

managers can better analyze and understand trends in customer interactions. This will enable companies to understand what

types of skill-sets agents will need today, and in the future. Managing

Multiple Work Activities

Some key questions call centre managers should consider:

  • Does

    the call centre application



    integrate new forms of customer interaction such as
    e-mails or is each new medium "standalone"?

  • Do new media types

    provide the same kind of advanced routing (based on

    skills or customer records) and queuing capabilities

    that call centres have come to expect with inbound

    Automatic Call Distributors (ACDs) so that customers

    can be serviced more quickly and expertly?
  • Are there any

    capabilities within the system that allow the call

    centre manager to optimize staffing to support the

    additional customer channels?

The

addition of new media types into the call centre typically calls

for additional support staff. In order to provide customer

service cost-effectively, businesses must manage agent work

assignments across multiple media. Work blending technology,

which dynamically adjusts an agent’s work assignments across

the various media to insure that business rules such as those

for levels of service are met, is a valuable capability for the

multimedia call centre. Call centres that allow agents to

dynamically "blend" work across inbound and outbound

telephony, e-mail, and the Web can optimize staffing while

improving customer contacts across new and varied media. Rapid Adoption

The

benefits of Web-enabled call centres are clear. They are poised

to dramatically change the experience of interacting with

companies for both customers and agents. Because the Web lets

customers serve themselves for simple activities such as

requests for information, agents will have to handle fewer

repetitive, routine tasks. This alone could help to reduce

turnover among agents. By taking advantage of self-help systems,

companies will also be able to reduce costs and improve sales.

As the call centre moves

from traditional telephony applications to Web-enabled,

multimedia applications, it should effectively address the

unique technology requirements of each new customer channel

while maintaining a common model for customer interactions. 

Through a combination of

available and emerging technologies and techniques such as

universal work queues and work blending, companies can reduce

the time it takes to train agents and introduce new channels of

customer interaction seamlessly into the workflow. By taking advantage of these new technologies, businesses can more quickly

and effectively harness the full power of the convergence of

call centre and Internet technologies. 

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