The Future of Contact Centers: What Technology Is Right for Your Customers

Laura Sikorski Erin Washington
With: Moderated by:
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The Future of Contact Centers: What Technology
Is Right For Your Customers?
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Quovim C3 is a Canadian leader providing complete Cross-Channel
Communications solutions to customer-driven organizations with contact,
distribution and/or service centers. No matter the means of communication your
client uses to connect with you — phone, email, chat, web, social media — using
a single integrated platform, you will benefit from a transparent all-in-one Contact
Center environment. Clients receive the same high quality experience, while you
gain greater clarity in your operations, generate cost-savings and strengthen
customer relationships.

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https://www.customerexperienceupdate.com/frs/11673565/the-future-of-contact-centers--what-technology-is-right-for-your-customers-/
https://www.customercontactcentral.com/frs/11673565/the-future-of-contact-centers--what-technology-is-right-for-your-customers-/

About Laura Sikorski
Laura Sikorski is a recognized expert in Call/Contact Centers, Project/Program Management and
Business Operations. She has worked with hospitals, utilities, automobile manufacturers and
numerous other industries across the nation. The Call/Contact Center policies, procedures,
technology improvements, training programs and implementation plans developed by Laura have
improved operational excellence. They have enabled staff to proactively anticipate customer needs to
resolve all issues through consistency and product knowledge, and ensure employees are consistently
meeting and/or exceeding customer expectations and satisfaction.
About Erin Washington
Erin went to the University of Georgia and majored in International Affairs with a minor in Spanish. She
gained customer service experience after working as a customer service representative for 2 years. She
now works as an Editor at Aggregage, providing some of the most interesting thought-leaders in customer
experience with a space to celebrate the diversity, depth, and experience of their professional cultures,
personalities, and passions.

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• Successful Contact Center
• Customer Needs/Thinking Like a Customer
• Digital Transformation Strategy
• Robust Contact Center Features
• Artificial Intelligence, Cloud, Mobile, Self-Service, Speech Recognition, Phone Trees,
Surveys, Test, Email, Voice Mail, Chat, Video, Social Media
• Project Management
• ROI From Technology Improvements
Agenda
The Future of Contact Centers: What Technology Is Right for Your Customers?

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Your Contact Center is the most customer (internal or external) focused area in
your organization and it is where
• Centralized conversation takes place
• The Voice Of The Customer is amplified
• The data captured is significant
Regardless of a customer’s touchpoint, there should be no point of failure or
frustration
Value Of Your Contact Center

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Should get accurate and courteous service from the FIRST person they
interact with without needing to be transferred to anyone else during
their interaction
They want and deserve the best service!
Your External Customers

8
• All employees should have quick access to information and the authority to make
decisions so that they can address your customers’ needs and concerns
• Technology influences your workplace and corporate culture*
• It is important that all staff know how to use your technology to create a better work
environment*
• Go beyond traditional internal communications such as town halls, video chats, or
instant messaging*
• Set-up communication channels for employees to collaborate, recognize one another
and provide candid feedback without fear of repercussion*
Your Internal Customers
*Source: Newsday Oct 27, 2019 How is Technology Changing Your Workplace Culture? By Doug Claffey

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• Combines the best of human interaction, automation and communications technology
• Management communicates formally and informally (Pre-shift briefings, staff and all-
hands meetings)
• Management keeps everyone informed
• Balances business messages with fun to stay motivated and focused
• Staff gets accurate information on time, at the same time, in the same format
Successful Contact Center

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• Position the Contact Center for Customer Experience
• Align the Contact Center with overall brand strategy
• Identify and share KPIs across your organization
• Create a Customer Experience Vision demonstrating the Contact Center’s role
• Create shared dashboards
• Award the entire team for achieving milestones
• Benchmark progress against rest of your industry to continuously improve
Successful Contact Center

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• Forecast Accuracy
• Schedule Fit
• Service Level
• Quality (FCR or ZCR)
• Employee Satisfaction
• Customer Satisfaction
• Strategic Value
Operational Measurement

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On their terms
When they want
On the method/channel of their choice
and . . . they expect the same service regardless of the method/channel
75% of consumers expect a consistent experience whenever they engage*
*Salesforce.com Blog
Customers Want To Do Business With You

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95.4% Telephone
87.8% Email
67.7% Internet/Website
53.6% IVR
40.1% SMS (Text)
34.4% Social Media
29.1% Chat
19.5% Mobile
Statistical information from Dimension Data’s 811 Report
Customer Channels/Touchpoints

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First Call Resolution
“Close” customer issue on initial interaction without follow-up
Zero Call Resolution
Proactively calling customers with changes/updates
First Call Resolution vs. Zero Call Resolution

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31%
40%
11%
5%
10% 3%
Immediately
5 Minutes
30 Minutes
1 Hour
1 Day

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Customer Service (CS) is what you do for your customers at a specific time to help with
an issue
• Poor CS almost guarantees that the next time your customer has a need, they’ll
look elsewhere
Customer Experience (CX) is how your customers feel about you and your brand (Service
and Products)
• Really helping customers and delivering a positive experience will create loyalty
Customer Service (CS) vs. Customer Experience (CX)

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The Amazon Factor
Amazon Video SLA
Mayday button Amazon Kindle
Fire
Was 15 sec -> now 9 sec

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Key Elements
• Convenience
• Consistency
• Empowerment
• Agility
Customer Journey
• How they contact you
• What they ask for
• Did you make it easy for them
• Will they “buy” again
Channel Experience

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Over half of customer interactions happen during a multi-event, multi-channel
contextual journey across touchpoints
Website, Mobile app, Contact Center, Back Office, Store
• Anchored in how customers think about contacting you
• An event that marks the defining experience of key lifecycles of a customer
• Typically multi-touch, multi-channel and cross functional
• An evolution in thinking over traditional touchpoint or “moments of truth” approaches
Customer Journey

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9.5 Can’t get a human
9.4 Too many phone steps
9.3 Long wait on hold
9.0 Extras are pitched
8.9 No apology for unresolved problems
8.5 Boring hold music
NR Being put on hold
Most Infuriating CS Problems
Source: Consumer Reports 1-10 rating scale

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70% of consumers say technology has made
it easier than ever to take their business
elsewhere*
Optimizing Your Technology for Your Customers
* Salesforce.com Blog

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• We are all customers of someone else
• What do they like
• What do they dislike
• Why do they go to your website
• Where/what can you improve
• Review your Feedback Surveys for the good, bad and the ugly
• Implement customer focus groups
• Your industry, competition, what are other industries doing
• Internal Stakeholders
Think Like a Customer

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• Definitions
• Adding non-voice channels (email, chat, video, text, social media)
• Automating tasks using self-service, speech recognition
• Incorporating Artificial Intelligence (AI)/Machine Learning, “The Cloud”
• Current Contact Center Departments/Future Contact Center Departments
• Sales, Order Entry, Billing, Appointments, Customer Service, Help Desk, etc.
• Current/Future application integrations including reports
• Internet of Things
• Desired End Result
• Personalization of the customer experience
• Improving the customer journey – contact center agents/front and back-office employees
Digital Transformation Strategy

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Definition - The theory and development of computer systems able to
perform tasks that normally require human intelligence, such as visual
perception, speech recognition, decision-making, and translation between
languages
“Everything we love about civilization is a product of intelligence, so
amplifying our human intelligence with artificial intelligence has the
potential of helping civilization flourish like never before – as long as we
manage to keep the technology beneficial.“ Max Tegmark, President of the Future of Life
Institute
Artificial Intelligence (AI)

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• 1-800-Flowers
• Facebook Messenger chatbot to help customer order flowers – the bot is trained to pick up conversational queues, can
suggest floral arrangements and show a picture
• North Face
• Uses Watson to create a personalized shopping experience
• Helps customers refine product selections based on answers to specific questions
• Dixons Carphone (UK)
• “Cami” is a product expert, recommends cases and insurance
• Ticketmaster
• Combats ticket fraud
• Buyers registers on their website and the bot analyzes if they are human
• Domino’s Pizza
• Facebook Messenger chatbot named “Dom”
• Customer sends a message “pizza”, the bot gets the details and the order is
completed faster that if they called the store or went through the drive-thru
Examples of AI

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Allows you to set up what is essentially a virtual office to give you the
flexibility of connecting to your business anywhere and at any time
Rather than purchasing expensive systems and equipment (CAPEX) for your
business, you can reduce your costs by using the resources of your cloud
computing service provider (OPEX)
“The Cloud”

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• Reduced IT costs
• Scalability
• Business Continuity
• Flexibility of Work Practices
• Access to Automatic Updates
• Monthly Operations costs
• Per Agent/Supervisor
• Maintenance/Support
Cloud - Benefits

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• Privacy agreement and service level agreement
• Security and data protection
• Location of data
• Legislation and regulation
Cloud - Risks

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Mobile technology is exactly what the name indicates – technology that is portable; it refers to any
device that you can carry with you to perform a wide variety of “tasks”
It is technology that allows those tasks to be performed via cellular phone, PDA, vehicles, laptops,
etc.
A standard mobile device has gone from being no more than a simple two-way pager to being a
cellular phone, a GPS navigation system, a web browser, and instant messenger system, a video
gaming system, ++
It includes the use of a variety of transmission media such as: radio wave, microwave, infra-red,
GPS and Bluetooth to allow for the transfer of data via voice, text, video, 2-dimensional barcodes,
++
Mobile Technology

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• Calls
• Text
• Web
• Apps
• Games
• Social Networking
• Music
• ++
Mobile Uses

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• Marketing
• Emergency notification systems
• Customer service
• Customer payments
• Inventory management
• Employee dispatching
• Travel directions
• Non-profit fundraising
• ++
Mobile Applications

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Is the mix of processing software that will provide your
• Customers with never fail choices to reach you
AND
• Staff with all the job tools they need
HAPPY EMPLOYEES MEANS HAPPY CUSTOMERS
Contact Center Technology Today

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Contact Center sets w/Visual Display
Headsets - Wireless
Agent / Supervisor Licenses
Virtual Assistant for all response query types
Simultaneous User licenses
IVR System
Speech Enabled IVR
Speech Recognition
Languages - Support for multiple languages
Internal Administration of IVR / IVA Self-Service
CTI Integration (Screen Pops) by Tel # and/or Account #
Wallboards or equivalent
Recorded Announcement Device
Reporting Standard and Custom
Silent Monitoring/Call Recording/Quality Management
Instant Messaging
Score Cards
Agent Screen Capture/Scrapes
Skills Based Routing
Speech Analytics
Co-Browsing
Last Agent
Workforce Management Software
Voice response queries/routing
E-mail response queries/routing
Chat response queries/routing
Video response queries/routing
SMS Text response queries/routing
Fax-on-Demand response queries/routing
Social Media response queries/routing
Virtual Hold/Scheduled Call Backs
Voice Queue "ETA"
Call Blending (in/outbound)
Post Call Survey
Outbound Dialer (Preview and/or Predictive)
InterQueue - Call routing by site
Softphone clients for Remote Agents (Home & Disaster
Recovery Sites)
Trunks (SIP)
Text to Speech
Speech to Text
Query (Context) integration to customer record
(software)
Query (Context) integration to customer record
Data Mining

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• Back to Basics
• Call your phone numbers
• Call Types/Reasons for calls
• Call Flow, Script, Routing
• Abandon Calls
• Reasons for “transfer out”
• Where are the “dead ends”
• Do you send customers to “Voice Mail”
• Features must have now vs. future
Voice

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• Interactive Voice Response
• Phone Tree Menu – Speech Recognition, Self Service + CTI, Live Agent + CTI
• Time in Queue/Call Backs
• Last Agent
• Interactive Virtual Assistant
• Self-Service
• Machine Learning
• Phases – easiest first
• Communicate and involve all Departments early in the process
• Reports
Voice Routing

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Self Service
Source: ICMI
91%
40% 45%
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
70%
80%
90%
100%
CUSTOMER WOULD USE DIGITAL IF AVAILABLE AND
TAILORED TO THEM
CUSTOMERS WHO CALLCONTACT CENTER AFTER SELF-
SERVICE
LIKELY TO ABANDON DIGITALIF NO QUICK ANSWERS
TO QUESTIONS
DIGITAL SURVEY STATS
The Future of Contact Centers: What Technology Is Right for Your
Customers?
The Future of Contact Centers: What Technology Is Right for Your
Customers?

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• High marks for its high completion rate, accuracy and vocabulary
• Customers only have to “register” once using their voice and voice patterns
are recorded on file for future transactions
• United Airlines: 97 % completion rate with speech recognition
• Numerous press options to gain flight information ( press “x” for flight information, then arrivals or
departures, day of flight they are checking, flight number, etc.)
• “I want to check an arrival flight for today. I don’t have the flight number.”
• 4 rounds of DTMF have been eliminated and customer effort and frustration have been reduced or
eliminated
Speech Recognition

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Know your customers and the services you want to showcase
• Do not make it difficult to reach a “live” agent
• Fewer options 4x4
• Simple direct words (not company jargon)
• For ____, Press “x”
• Self service: touch tone vs. speech recognition
• Be sure staff knows hidden options
• Use 2 methods for authentication
• Measure and track IVR performance and modify as needed
Standardize Phone Tree(s) – Open & Closed

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A post call survey should be used to capture the voice of the
customer
Provides feedback on
How well you are serving your customers
Perceived value of all programs
Ease of use of program components
Help improve the customer experience
Post Call Survey

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Right Customer to the Right Agent at the Right Time
Success depends on accurate:
• Planning and forecast (call volume and staffing)
• Agent skill definitions
• Base staff calculations
• Rostered (shrinkage)
SBR is NOT a substitute for good planning
Skills Based Routing

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• The purpose of a telephone system is to facilitate talk between a company and its
callers
• Voice mail has a growing reputation as a barrier to this communication rather an
aid
• The use of voice mail has enabled callers to demand the acceptance of their call
and the expectation is that you will respond immediately
• Whenever you invite a caller to leave a message, you should make the callback
within a reasonable time
• An acceptable time is generally within an hour unless you state otherwise in your voice
mail greeting.
Voice Mail

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Having an individual agent listen to and return voice mail calls presents many challenges
• ACD tracking is lost
• When do you take this agent “off of” answering inbound calls?
• Callers time in queue will increase
• Abandoned calls will increase
• 17% of all abandoned callers do not call back and you will experience lost revenue
• What happens if the caller is not available when the agent calls back?
• How many times do you try to leave a message?
• Do you reassign another agent to make the callback and how do you track?
• What if the caller has already called back and has had the reason for their call satisfied?
• What do you do on the day you experience an unexpected increase in call volume & more calls are going to VM?
• How do you schedule callbacks when you already do not have enough staff to answer incoming callers?
Voice Mail

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• Special Processing group - how many email conversations at one time
• Integration with Active Directory
• Reply time standards for customer inquiries (i.e., 1-hour, same day, 24
hours, 48 hours)
• Signature components – actual name vs. department name
• Vacation/out of the office message
• Standardized email responses for the various inquiry types
• Reports
Email Routing

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• Too much information
• Difficult to navigate for answers
• Customer Service – FAQs
• E-commerce
• Click options to route calls, emails, texts, chats, videos
• Reports
• Co-Browsing
Website

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• Outbound campaigns
• Upcoming event
• Appointment confirmation
• Product delivery delay
• Inbound responses
• Accept invitations
• Input authentication codes
• Accept new delivery date
• Reports
Text Routing

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• Offer a “click to chat” in your “Contact-us” tab
• Time frames to offer chat capability pop-ups
• Live Agent only – How many chat conversations at one time
• Virtual Assistant only
• Virtual Assistant to Live Agent
• Customer Print Capability
• Reports
Chat Routing

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• Routing to a Live Video Agent
• Collaboration
• Customers/product how to’s
• Doctor/Patient/Family
• Reports
Video Routing

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• Integration with “spider” software
• Special Processing group - how many email conversations at one time
• Positive/Negative Comments
• Ability to quickly respond
• Reports
Social Media Routing

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• Measure the degree a product or service meets a customer’s expectations
• Obtained from customer feedback surveys:
• Purchase of a product
• Interacts with service
• Experience with your company
• Sample questions:
• Were you satisfied with ____? (Yes or No)
• On a scale of 1-10, how satisfied are you with ____? (Yes or No?)
• How would you rate your satisfaction with ____? Unsatisfied, Somewhat Satisfied,
Very Satisfied, etc.)
Customer Satisfactions (CSat)

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• Measures customer experience
• Ask a question using a 0-10 rating scale
• On a scale 0 to 10, how likely is it that you would recommend our company
(product or service) to a friend, family member or colleague?
• 9 to 10 are Promoters (are loyal enthusiasts who will keep buying and refer others, fueling
growth)
• 7 to 8 are Passives (are satisfied, but unenthusiastic customers who are vulnerable to
competitive offerings)
• 0 to 6 are Detractors (are unhappy customers who can damage your brand and impede growth
through negative word-of-mouth)
Net Promoter Score (NPS)

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• Measures how much effort your customers have to exert in order to get
their issues resolved
• If their CES is high, it will likely affect your overall customer satisfaction in
a negative way
• Do not get confused
• A high CSat or NPS is good; however, a high CES is bad
Customer Effort (CES)

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ROI From Technology Improvements
INTELLIGENT
ROUTING
(IVR & SKILLS)
20%
IVR
SELF-SERVICE
15-30%
CTI
20%
26 Seconds off
Talk Time
(Authentication)
WORKFORCE
MANAGEMENT
4-20%
DIALER
10-300%

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• Project Manager
• Request for Proposal (RFP)
• Feature Matrix by vendor for Native, Optional, 3rd Party
• Day 1 features
• Phase 2, 3, etc.
• Stakeholders
• Kick-Off Meeting
• Project Plan
• Importance of the Request for Proposal (RFP) and the Statement of Work (SOW)
• Methods of Communications
• Plan for Contingencies
Project Management

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Customers Will Take Control of Their Journey
Internet of Things
Cloud Momentum
Chat Will Increase
Social Media as a Strategic Channel
Proof of Concept Implementation Phases
Sikorski’s Think Abouts

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QUESTIONS?

Q&A
Erin Washington
With: Moderated by:
Independent Contact Center Consultant
LinkedIn page: /in/laura-sikorski-63b84611/
Twitter ID: @Laura Sikorski
Email: lsikorski@laurasikorski.com
Website: www.laurasikorski.com
Laura Sikorski
Editor, Customer Experience Update and Customer
Contact Central
LinkedIn page: /in/erin-washington-1b557b130
Twitter ID: @CXupdate
Email: erin.washington@aggregage.com
Website: customerexperienceupdate.com
https://www.customerexperienceupdate.com/frs/11673565/the-future-of-contact-centers--what-technology-is-right-for-your-customers-/
https://www.customercontactcentral.com/frs/11673565/the-future-of-contact-centers--what-technology-is-right-for-your-customers-/

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