Why should you consider purchasing a Contact Center Solution and Points To Remember!

Introduction

Before talking to vendors about contact center solutions, it’s important to identify the objectives you want to achieve with the new system. This includes quantifiable objectives, such as new revenue potential, cost savings, increased number of calls handled per representative, etc.

This will enable you to have a more productive conversation with vendors so you can make the best decision for your needs and budget.

A contact center solution should help you achieve some very specific objectives:

 -     More efficient, streamlined operations

-     Improved staff productivity

-     Better overall customer satisfaction

-     Reduced costs

-     Increased revenue opportunities

Contents

-     Key Questions to Ask

o What will my usage patterns be?

o How much are you willing to spend for the return on investment you expect to get?

o What will be needed to install the system and have it work reliably on an ongoing basis?

o What kind of customer support do you need?

-     Important Features to Look for

o Compatibilities

o Predictive Dialing

o Call Routing

o Management Control, Tracking, and Reporting

o Automated Interactive Voice Response

o Speech Recognition

o Security

Key Questions to Ask

After you specify your objectives, here are four important questions to consider as you identify your needs.

1. What will my usage patterns be?

Consider the types of calls your business makes on the average business day, as well as slow and busy days. Do you have mostly inbound calls, outbound, or mixed? Also, consider what times will you need they system, when will the biggest usage periods be, and what volume of calls you expect.

Also think about how many agents will use your system today and in the future, and where they will be located. You’ll want a system that can scale both in number of users as well as geographically as your business grows, without incurring unplanned costs.

2. How much are you willing to spend for the return on investment you expect to get?

Contact center solutions can range in price from $4,000 to get started, for smaller call centers with about five reps, to $50,000 for bigger organizations with 100 or more representatives. When considering your budget for the project, take into account scalability. How will the new system scale with your business and what will the associated costs be?

3. What will be needed to install the system and have it work reliably on an ongoing basis?

In addition to set-up and installation times and costs, you’ll also need to take into account ongoing maintenance. For example, all vendors perform software upgrades. Be sure to ask your sales representative how upgrades are handled, how often they make them, and also – how often and for how long their systems are down as they perform maintenance. You want to ensure that your business does not come to a grinding halt when your vendor is performing maintenance on their system.

4. What kind of customer support do you need?

You’ll want to get specifics from your vendor on their level of customer support if you run into issues or need additional training. For example, is their support available 24/7, and are they available by phone, live chat, or just email? What are average response times and hold times to talk to an agent during peak hours? Will you have one account manager to talk to or will you be calling into a call center? How does the vendor handle system failures and emergencies?

Important Features to Look For

When you talk to vendors about contact center solutions for your organization, here are some key features to look for.

Compatibilities

Make sure your new system will be compatible with your other technologies, including computers, CRM tools, telephones, email clients, and calendars. Computers that are integrated with your telephone system enable your representatives to quickly access, add and edit the customer’s information as they speak to them. The key is to be as streamlined and efficient as possible.

Predictive Dialing

For outbound calls, predictive dialing is useful for connecting your representatives to a live person. The majority of outbound calls are not answered by a live person, so predictive dialing enables your reps to calls and connect with more live people faster, instead of wasting time waiting to hear if they’re going to get a voice mail.

Call Routing

Call routing enables you to direct in-bound calls to the most appropriate representative, with the right priority, and then to the next rep if the first one is not available. Call routing can improve efficiencies dramatically by putting your customer in contact with the right representative (based on needs, issues, product, etc.) – faster, so that issues are addressed efficiently. This not only makes for a better customer experience, it also boosts your overall productivity by having the right person for the job handling the most appropriate issue.

Management Control, Tracking, and Reporting

Another important feature to contact center solutions is the ability for managers to monitor calls and representative’s productivity. Workforce management enables managers to balance workflow with their reps and to get the most productivity from their team. It’s also a valuable tool for coaching and training. Ask your vendor about features such as reporting, live stats, and call recording. Also, consider whether you need central control for your contact center or location-based control. Other control features include access to reporting, level of reporting detail, various levels of permissions, audio recordings, compatibility with CRM tools, etc.

Automated Interactive Voice Response

If you handle a large number of inbound calls, it makes sense to have an automated feature that can address customer issues, if possible, before connecting them with a live person. This feature enables you to “walk” callers through self-service applications or to gather the information you need to connect them with the most appropriate rep.

Keep in mind, however, that there are some very poor processes and systems out there. Think about the times that you’ve called a customer service line to get a specific answer to a problem or even to make a purchase, and you were put through a maze of menu options before your needs were addressed. By taking into account your own positive and negative experiences with contact centers, you’ll be able to ask your vendor the right questions so your business is the kind that provides a great customer experience.

Speech Recognition

The ability to convert speech into text or data, as well as text into spoken words, is a valuable addition to many contact center solutions today. This enables you to provide information to callers dynamically and automatically, which can also greatly boost productivity and customer experience.

Security

Finally, consider the level of security you need with a contact center solution. This includes data privacy and system reliability and the impact of worst case scenarios. For example, for hosted contact center solutions, ask if the API is encrypted. Also ask how the system works with firewalls. Describing a worst case scenario to your vendor will enable them to respond appropriately with how their system is designed to protect against worst case scenarios.

Best of luck with your purchase!