First we went from Call Centers which were either inbound or outbound (e.g. you were calling someone or they were calling you). Then we moved to "contact" centers where the thought was that customers could communicate with your company over the phone (call center) or email -- or maybe even via "live chat" over the internet.
Contact, whether by keyboard or voice!
The problem is that most contact centers didn't spring up instantly (like the goddess Athena who was born full grown out of the head of her dad, Zeus). Most start small and grow -- or we wind up with multiple call centers in various places (including India or China) that use different technologies. Some happened through mergers, some just over time. We have silos of information. Islands floating off by themselves.
All of these islands of contact points (distributed call centers, email, live chat, etc.) were put in place to reduce costs and yet still give decent customer service. To further complicate our global customer base we also have employees who telecommute or live in various cities.
How can all this complexity be unified? How can we simplify?
For one we make all these multiple points of communications (voice, email, fax, live chat) available from one point. When a customer (or employee) reaches out they make one connection and find the end point they need. No more phone tag. No more voice mails left on office phones and cell phones and punching "0" in the hopes of finding a live person who can help.
No more "let me transfer" you and getting disconnected.
Unified Communications brings the promise of true customer service at both reduced costs and high satisfaction.
Let me give a live example from my own life. A major credit card company (who shall remain nameless) has the world's worst call center. When calling in one is first faced with IVR hades. Push "1" for this "2" for that, and oh please enter for 17 digit credit card number and expiration date. . .and what was your mother's maiden name again???
By the time one reaches a human being (IF one reaches a live human being) the frustration level is high. The first agent invariably does NOT have your credit card number or mom's name so you have to repeat the exercise. Invariably again this agent cannot help you but must transfer you to another department.
Many times in this "transfer" I have been disconnected and have to start the entire misery again. Oh, yes, one can try to do this over the internet but the interface is clumsy and results in much the same result.
Assuming one does get transferred one must again repeat the information. It is the lucky person indeed who does not face a third transfer! This credit card company is so poorly IT challenged that they were unable to give me a record of a charge and suggested I call the retailer for it! This after being transferred numerous times only to be told they didn't have the very basic tools of their own business!
Now envision this contact center if it had unified communications. If you are a VIP you might have a direct connection in to a specific workgroup, but if not one can bypass the IVR rapidly and get to a live agent who has in front of them your information (on one of many CRM applications). That one person should have access to any and all information, but just in case they do need to transfer you they can see visually who is available and they can stay on the line with you as they hand off the call with the new agent.
COMMUNICATIONS. Not frustration! In this example my credit card record would have been emailed, faxed or snail mailed to be automatically. None of this is future and none of it is unrealistic. It is all available today and I dare say the credit card company in question would have saved considerable money considering the number of agents who handled (or mishandled) my call.
Wednesday, March 19, 2008
Internet Marketing -- at home at work and on your cell phone
July 2007 McKinsey published a report on how companies are marketing online.
The results are intriguing.
Although most savvy companies are using some form of online marketing (about 2/3rd per the report) online and offline marketing are often separate and non-communicative. Doesn't that seem odd in light of the whole "clicks and mortar" concept of combining the power of the internet with good old fashioned outlets?
A major reason for the disconnect is the old "silos of information" problem we're so familiar with. The systems that run traditional businesses don't have the necessary capabilities for Wiki, Blogs, viral marketing, etc. Even with today's sophisticated CRM software solutions that allow a prospective customer entry via the Internet, "click to chat", call center, email, fax, etc. most companies haven't implemented that technology -- let alone the next step that ties the Internet itself to their back end ERP or industry specific applications (such as HIS in health-care, BSS in Telecom, etc.).
So many companies have sophisticated "front end" marketing for their Internet presence -- SMS coupons to the cell phone for example -- but the back end is a little chaotic and highly manual.
Today when most people think of Internet marketing (if they think of it at all) they picture email SPAM and banner adds that may be linked to previous sites they've visited.
Thought leaders have long been blogging (hey, you're one of them -- you are reading this!) and using SEO (search engine optimization) to try and get their websites higher up on the coveted search engines like Google, Yahoo, Microsoft Live Search, etc.
We've moved from purely informational websites and B2C or B2B (business to consumer and business to business) to massively multi-player game sites (like World of Warcraft or Disney's ToonTown) and social networks (like FaceBook and MySpace).
Virtual worlds are the next phase past social networks. The are multi-dimensional sites where users can interact with each other in a cross between IM (instant messaging) and social networking.
Podcasts and ad hoc Webinars are another new marketing venue where the information is multimedia and folks can watch them online or download them. These can take the form of demos and infomercials and can be a very effective form of online advertising.
We've barely scratched the surface -- how about Wikis (like Wikipedia where anyone can contribute content) or Widgets (if you have Vista you probably have widgets showing the time or the stock market) and web services that do the work of making it all seem like magic. . .
Everyone seems to agree that online marketing is important and here to stay. 83% (per the McKinsey report) are using it for service management and 44% for pricing. The real trick here is to decide which form of online marketing makes the most sense for your company. To do that you must decide what your goal is (driving sales, improved customer satisfaction, leads, etc.) and then examining not only the various forms we've discussed here but which best suits your business model.
The results are intriguing.
Although most savvy companies are using some form of online marketing (about 2/3rd per the report) online and offline marketing are often separate and non-communicative. Doesn't that seem odd in light of the whole "clicks and mortar" concept of combining the power of the internet with good old fashioned outlets?
A major reason for the disconnect is the old "silos of information" problem we're so familiar with. The systems that run traditional businesses don't have the necessary capabilities for Wiki, Blogs, viral marketing, etc. Even with today's sophisticated CRM software solutions that allow a prospective customer entry via the Internet, "click to chat", call center, email, fax, etc. most companies haven't implemented that technology -- let alone the next step that ties the Internet itself to their back end ERP or industry specific applications (such as HIS in health-care, BSS in Telecom, etc.).
So many companies have sophisticated "front end" marketing for their Internet presence -- SMS coupons to the cell phone for example -- but the back end is a little chaotic and highly manual.
Today when most people think of Internet marketing (if they think of it at all) they picture email SPAM and banner adds that may be linked to previous sites they've visited.
Thought leaders have long been blogging (hey, you're one of them -- you are reading this!) and using SEO (search engine optimization) to try and get their websites higher up on the coveted search engines like Google, Yahoo, Microsoft Live Search, etc.
We've moved from purely informational websites and B2C or B2B (business to consumer and business to business) to massively multi-player game sites (like World of Warcraft or Disney's ToonTown) and social networks (like FaceBook and MySpace).
Virtual worlds are the next phase past social networks. The are multi-dimensional sites where users can interact with each other in a cross between IM (instant messaging) and social networking.
Podcasts and ad hoc Webinars are another new marketing venue where the information is multimedia and folks can watch them online or download them. These can take the form of demos and infomercials and can be a very effective form of online advertising.
We've barely scratched the surface -- how about Wikis (like Wikipedia where anyone can contribute content) or Widgets (if you have Vista you probably have widgets showing the time or the stock market) and web services that do the work of making it all seem like magic. . .
Everyone seems to agree that online marketing is important and here to stay. 83% (per the McKinsey report) are using it for service management and 44% for pricing. The real trick here is to decide which form of online marketing makes the most sense for your company. To do that you must decide what your goal is (driving sales, improved customer satisfaction, leads, etc.) and then examining not only the various forms we've discussed here but which best suits your business model.
Everything old is new again -- VoiceCon
VoiceCon is the big telephony convention. It is underway in Orlando -- just next door to DisneyWorld. The location seems somehow ironic. Just as Disney is expert and re-inventing itself one sees "old" players insisting that they are new and improved.
But everything new is old again -- and the reverse is also true.
Along with Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) and going "green" we have the even more secure networking vendors -- and the biggest buzz of all? Why, Unified Communications of course!
UC (as it is known to its friends) is focused on making people "reachable" where ever they are -- on one device. These days the average person has an office phone, a cell phone, a home phone, corporate email, personal email, an instant messenger (or two) and probably more I've forgotten to mention. I seem to recall a statistic that said the average American has seven (yes, 7) ways to be reached.
So we are forever checking multiple places and playing "phone tag" ad naseum. The promise of UC is that we can identify "where" we are and UC will let those we want to find us find us. (Those we try to avoid may still wind up in voice mail heaven). In UC verbage this is called "presence awareness."
In other words big brother (UC) knows where you are. This is your "presence."
At VoiceCon Avaya introduced their Intelligent Presence Server which they say takes UC another step forward -- not just presence awareness, but presence information across multiple sources.
Nortel's big pitch at VoiceCon is based on "mobile" UC. Siemens has had this for awhile-- your office phone number is the one number given out and it can be routed to any device -- including your PC or your cell phone. Nortel is tying the idea of UC with FMC (fixed mobile convergence) so that when you are at your office you don't pay the cell phone company for minutes -- your call is switched to a WiFi connection.
The problem here isn't the technology but the cell phone companies who (for the most part) won't allow phones that can be FMC capable on their networks. They aren't dumb and they don't want to lose the 30-50% of network revenue that goes away with FMC.
Still, that is Nortel's pitch.
Cisco announced enhancements to its CCVP® professional-level certification. Why no big announcements like Nortel or Avaya? Hey, they don't have to. Cisco is the leader in Unified Communications by far - with 50,000 Cisco Unified Communications customers worldwide and more than 70 percent of all Fortune 500 companies using their UC offer.
But everything new is old again -- and the reverse is also true.
Along with Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) and going "green" we have the even more secure networking vendors -- and the biggest buzz of all? Why, Unified Communications of course!
UC (as it is known to its friends) is focused on making people "reachable" where ever they are -- on one device. These days the average person has an office phone, a cell phone, a home phone, corporate email, personal email, an instant messenger (or two) and probably more I've forgotten to mention. I seem to recall a statistic that said the average American has seven (yes, 7) ways to be reached.
So we are forever checking multiple places and playing "phone tag" ad naseum. The promise of UC is that we can identify "where" we are and UC will let those we want to find us find us. (Those we try to avoid may still wind up in voice mail heaven). In UC verbage this is called "presence awareness."
In other words big brother (UC) knows where you are. This is your "presence."
At VoiceCon Avaya introduced their Intelligent Presence Server which they say takes UC another step forward -- not just presence awareness, but presence information across multiple sources.
Nortel's big pitch at VoiceCon is based on "mobile" UC. Siemens has had this for awhile-- your office phone number is the one number given out and it can be routed to any device -- including your PC or your cell phone. Nortel is tying the idea of UC with FMC (fixed mobile convergence) so that when you are at your office you don't pay the cell phone company for minutes -- your call is switched to a WiFi connection.
The problem here isn't the technology but the cell phone companies who (for the most part) won't allow phones that can be FMC capable on their networks. They aren't dumb and they don't want to lose the 30-50% of network revenue that goes away with FMC.
Still, that is Nortel's pitch.
Cisco announced enhancements to its CCVP® professional-level certification. Why no big announcements like Nortel or Avaya? Hey, they don't have to. Cisco is the leader in Unified Communications by far - with 50,000 Cisco Unified Communications customers worldwide and more than 70 percent of all Fortune 500 companies using their UC offer.
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