Today, the concept convergence is generally recognised as key to the efficient management of customer relationships.
As part of this, in bringing voice and data together, IP telephony (or VoIP) solutions technology has moved firmly centre-stage in both business and consumer markets. Indeed, as a recent survey undertaken on behalf of Frontrange Solutions has confirmed, though there is a high level of understanding and planned implementation of VoIP solutions, there is also a significant level of misunderstanding as to the benefits it will bring.
One in three respondents anticipated direct improvements in customer satisfaction and retention rates, for example. Yet it is simply not the case that, on its own, IP telephony can deliver customer-facing benefits as well as internal efficiency gains. Companies seeking call centre technologies which will improve customer satisfaction and retention levels therefore, will need to look elsewhere.
Other technology developments, such as service-oriented architecture (SOA) and enterprise service bus (ESB) solutions, also enjoy a high market profile at present. Yet, as the underlying software in such responses is essentially static, these too don't go far enough in providing the necessary and flexibility to meet the problems of today and tomorrow in dynamic markets.
Common Platform
The result of such internally-focused developments is that barely a day goes by without someone at home or in the office regaling you with yet another horror story of poor call centre service.
Another recent UK study, by the Citizens' Advice Bureau (CAB) looked at the most annoying aspects of call centre service. It found, for example, that 40 per cent of respondents reacted badly to being put on hold for too long; 25 per cent felt that there were too many complicated automated options; 18 per cent wanted to speak to someone face-to-face; and 17 per cent believed that too often they went round in circles and were simply shunted from department to department.
All these issues and others which contribute to an adverse customer perception of call centres can be addressed by taking convergence one critical step further – by linking CRM and telephony on a common platform.
To take the complaint of too many complicated options as an example: a traditional call centre for an automotive business might welcome the caller by offering, 'press one for Jaguar, two for Saab, three for Chrysler' and so on.
Yet the knowledge of what marque the customer owns already exists within the business: the caller can thus be identified at the outset by the telephone number or customer pin number and, by 'intelligent' routing, be connected automatically with the service agent they spoke on the previous call.
In this way, not only does the company benefit financially from a more efficient call centre operation, but equally the customer experience is also significantly improved.
Eco-System
The key to effective customer service delivery here is understanding the level of integration required to make this happen. Some vendors believe that, by taking aspects of a customer's CRM and voice telephony systems and linking them by an 'umbilical' cable, they will achieve the benefits of convergence.
The reality is that this only goes so far. True integration is only achieved if both voice and CRM applications are on the same platform, so that, for example, a customer record only needs to be input once, rather than on each separate database. The result, in effect, is a single technology 'eco-system' which is both easy to purchase and self-administer and which delivers consistent better service.
In the case of the automotive business above therefore, if the systems are linked but not on a common platform, problems will arise if the CRM database has not been updated correctly. The result is that the telephone system, CRM database and CTI application will be out of synch. On receipt of the call therefore, when the telephony system interrogates the CRM database it may receive an instruction to route the call to a Saab expert, when the caller actually owns a Jaguar, leading to a negative customer reaction.
By contrast, with telephony, CRM and all other business applications on a common platform, there is a single record for each customer, together with a common security model, business process engine, reporting administration and analytics. In addition, real-time access to the customer history allows the business to prioritise calls based on the importance of the customer and to use only those prompts relevant to the individual caller in directing them to appropriate agent or automated solution.
Such solutions are available today and provide an effective mass-market solution for customer-focused businesses. Looking ahead, by profiling customers effectively this will respond to the growing demand for customer choice in the way they are managed: some customers are perfectly happy with – and indeed may prefer – the speed of an automated response, whereas others do not understand such systems and will continue to find the experience inherently unsatisfactory.
Business Processes
In some cases, poor customer management is not the result of technology deficiencies but rather inadequate or unfocused business processes.
Recognising this, many companies have also started to adopt such service management best practice exemplars as IT Infrastructure Library (ITIL) and ISO20000 in order to improve their business process architectures. Thus, when a call is received, the relevant call-flow processes are in place to ensure it is handled effectively.
As ever, therefore, the most effective responses must address eternal 'holy trinity' of technology/people/process. In short, truly converged solutions requires truly converged thinking.
About Ivanti:
LANDesk Software provides systems management, security management, service management, asset management, and process management solutions to organizations. It is one of the oldest companies providing this type of product.
Published: Monday, September 18, 2006
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