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AMR Research

Today, 90 percent of all contact center interactions are through email and phone channels, a statistic that will not change significantly in the next two years.

Web communication channels, such as co-browsing and chat technologies (along with the universal queue functionality that sometimes comes with them), are widely available. However, an AMR Research survey of contact center managers confirms that there is no competitive need to support these channels today.

Although 35 percent of companies have purchased some form of Web communication channels, this technology represents only 10 percent of all contact center interactions today. Email and self-service technologies are the only necessary additions to your phone-based support strategies for at least the next two years. Why? Because 48 percent of call centers have covered the spectrum of customer support by being fully operational with email and Web self-service.

AMR Research surveyed contact center professionals in a variety of industries (49 percent of them are manufacturing companies and 51 percent are services firms) about their use of communication channels and their routing methodologies for today, as well as their plans for the future;. we found the following:

• Seventy-two percent of companies are still routing interactions through individual applications rather than through a universal queue
• Thirty-nine percent of companies still have not integrated Web self-service to the contact center
• Sixty-three percent of companies with more than one contact center location do not share interactions between sites today, limiting their ability to provide efficient service

Equipping a call center with the necessary communication channels can require purchasing and integrating applications from more than one vendor. Although 35 percent of companies have purchased some form of Web communication channels, this technology represents only 10 percent of all contact center interactions today.

Despite the wide availability of real-time Web communication systems, 78 percent of contact center interactions are still completed by traditional channels — telephone, interactive voice response (IVR), and fax — and another 14 percent of interactions are completed through email. Unless customers specifically request support for Web communication channels, such as chat or co-browsing, there is no competitive need today to offer it, given the heavy reliance on the phone. In fact, our survey found that:

• Twenty-four percent of respondents say they would never consider implementing chat or co-browsing
• Only 35 percent of survey respondents have adopted chat and/or co-browsing. Some common reasons for adoption include perceived customer demand and improved efficiency
• Only one respondent has adopted Web communication channels to keep up with the competition
• Forty-eight percent of call centers have covered the spectrum of customer support by being fully operational with email and Web self-service

Universal Queues

Many people think that Web communication channels are the cheapest way to provide service; this assumption is not necessarily true. Costs per interaction vary widely across industries, but a rule of thumb is that the more real time the service, the more costly it becomes to offer. Providing support for phone, email, and Web self-service allows companies to cover the full spectrum of company involvement in their customer service — whether real-time, partial, or no involvement at all. In fact 72 percent of companies are still routing interactions through individual applications rather than through a universal queue.

A universal queue is a management system that uses one set of business rules to route interactions in the contact center across all locations and agent skill sets. The interactions it can handle include calls, chat sessions, Web collaboration requests, escalations from Web self-service, and emails. Universal queue benefits include the following: easier administration — because there is only one set of rules to enter and maintain — and the ability to make the best use of the agent's time by automatically prioritizing which contact the agent should take next. However, because an investment in a universal queue would require a significant infrastructure change, it is only necessary for companies that meet certain volume and complexity requirements:

• Contact centers with approximately 30 percent or more of their real-time interactions requiring immediate agent attention coming from the Web, like high percentages of chat, Web collaboration, or call me requests
• Companies that want to route calls using a complex set of business rules, such as a complex combination of customer identity, agent skill set, agent product knowledge, or type of question
• Companies with a high number of super agents, those who are skilled at both written and oral communication and/or product knowledge; they will be answering calls, chats, emails, and other requests
• Thirty-nine percent of companies still have not integrated Web self-service to the contact center

Integrating Web Self-Service

Many companies with Web self-service strategies and systems (in which customers can access important information online) are not integrating them with their contact centers. Sixty-three percent of companies with more than one contact center location do not share interactions between sites today, limiting their ability to provide efficient service. In fact, this lack of integration means that some customers are calling the call center after they have unsuccessfully searched for the information online and the agents they are speaking to have no record of their unsuccessful search.

When considering an investment to improve contact center efficiency, invest in integration to your Web self-service system in order to eliminate the following:

• Long phone calls
• Failure to take advantage of the self-service system's full benefits
• Missing out on valuable information on what customers are doing on your Web site

Your self-service vendor can help you integrate the product with your call center. Also, quality monitoring vendors are getting into the business of recording what customers are doing online; the company can then have a record of the customer's experience. For example, when customers can become frustrated when they have to explain their problem more than one time.

Increasing Service Levels

Organizations with contact centers always report that one of their major goals is to increase service levels by becoming more efficient overall. Sharing interactions across geographic sites can lead to significant improvements in efficiency, but the majority of companies with more than one site are not doing this today. Companies that have integrated their geographic sites have reported the following benefits:

• Use sites as backups for each other during times of high call volume; this cuts down on hold times and abandoned calls
• One user has reported an increase in service levels of about 10 percent
• Route the customer to the agent with the most appropriate skill set, experience level, or language proficiency, regardless of the agent's location. One company used routing technology to enable home-based workers, thereby reducing its yearly turnover rate from 65 to 5 percent
• Schedule agents more efficiently, and cut down on overtime, idle time, and head count in general
• Manage software maintenance costs by reducing the number of separate routing systems or call center applications
• Equipping a call center with the necessary communication channels can require purchasing and integrating applications from more than one vendor

A number of CRM suite vendors including Siebel Systems, Oracle, and Chordiant offer Web self-service, interaction management, and email functionality natively; meanwhile, other suite vendors, such as PeopleSoft, SAP, Pivotal, E.piphany, and Onyx, provide portions of these services, or they have original equipment manufacturer or integration relationships with other vendors that will provide the missing pieces.

However, for companies that simply want to build onto an existing phone and/or call center infrastructure, the vendor landscape is still complex. Web self-service along with email and interaction management are still widely available piece by piece from various vendors including networking and switching companies such as Cisco Systems, Aspect Communications, and Nortel Networks; interaction management vendors like Genesys, Apropos, and Interactive Intelligence; Web communication vendors such as Hipbone, KANA, and eGain; and Web self-service vendors including Kanisa, Primus, Serviceware, and RightNow.

Choosing a Vendor

Additionally, many of them have partnerships with each other or other vendors. Look for the following when choosing a vendor:

• Don't overbuy. Get what you need, but make sure the vendor can also supply functionality that your company may use in the future
• Your vendor is compatible with your existing call center infrastructure
• Check references. Your vendor should have customers with scalability requirements that are similar to yours

Remember to provide support for traditional communication channels, like email and self-service. Invest in better integration of the systems and sites you already have before considering new technologies like chat, Web collaboration, or universal queuing, and be sure your customers want and will use channels, such as chat and Web collaboration before investing in these applications. Investigate systems that will let you share interactions among geographic locations for greater efficiency. and consider universal queue systems if you have high volumes of real-time Web communication, super agents, or very complex routing rules. And finally, be sure to integrate your Web self-service strategy with your contact center systems.