Announcements/Press Releases
July 23, 2010
Announcements / Press Releases
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Announcements / Press Releases
Mid West Turnkey Call Center- Dynamic Direct
CINCINNATI, OH - Dynamic Direct, a Midwest call center and direct response leader is now offering their services to companies looking to outsource that business segment. The new venture is a part of Vianda, LLC, a leading nutraceutical company located in the Cincinnati area.
“After hiring third-party call centers to receive Vianda’s overflow calls, and seeing our frustration, it became clear we are very successful in our inbound, outbound, and customer care projects,” said Shannon Alexander, Business Development Director. “No doubt other firms have run into the same problems, and we now provide the opportunity to share our call center expertise with others.”
Over $6,000,000 in building and technology upgrades in June, 2009 provide clients with a state-of-the-art call center environment. “With 32,000 square feet and 300 workstations, we are an inviting call center alternative for any size business focusing on a strong sales approach,” said Mrs. Alexander. “Our company is built around doers, and our employees are trained extensively in providing strong up-sell and cross-sell techniques to increase client revenue. Dynamic Direct strives to put our clients and their customers first, with the highest integrity. And we have an effective quality assurance program that maximizes conversions and one call resolution.”
Dynamic Directs list of current clients include the Business Courier, Car Hawk and Master Touch Painting and Restoration .
Interested clients can learn more by visiting www.dynamic-direct.com or they can schedule a cell center tour by calling 800-956-6006 (513-674-4856 in Cincinnati).
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Cellular Sales Verizon Wireless Opens National Call Center in Knoxville
Knoxville-based retailer will hire 200 to 250 people immediately
KNOXVILLE, Tenn. – Knoxville-based Cellular Sales, the nation’s largest Verizon premium wireless retailer, announced today that it is opening a new National Call Center at 9038 Cross Park Drive NW across from the U.S. Post Office near Cedar Bluff Road.
Cellular Sales also announced it would hire between 200 and 250 new employees to work at the National Call Center within the next two months. The new operation – which represents an investment of more than $1 million by Cellular Sales – will employ supervisors, managers and customer service representatives in full-time and part-time positions.
For more information about Cellular Sales, or to find a Cellular Sales location near you, visit the company’s web site at www.cellularsales.com. Job seekers should call
(865) 531-9359 to schedule an interview.
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NY Metro ATA Day At
The New Yankee Stadium:
The NY Metro ATA Chapter will be hosting its annual Summer Social on Thursday, July 29th. They are returning to one of their favorite venues, Yankee Stadium, for a great afternoon of learning and networking.
You won’t want to miss this: Donna Fluss will speak on “The Analytically-Oriented Contact Center.” Analytics is a hot topic in contact centers and enterprises today. Contact center managers and senior executives have no shortage of reports and data, but they lack the visibility and actionable intelligence that analytics provides to proactively address performance issues that affect productivity, quality, and the customer experience.
All contact center managers and executives need to understand contact center analytics to increase productivity and effectiveness, enhance their customers’ experience, improve customer loyalty and quality, grow revenue, and reduce cost.
Donna Fluss is the founder and President of DMG Consulting LLC, a firm specializing in customer-focused business strategy, operations and technology services for Global 2000 and emerging companies. Ms. Fluss is a recognized thought leader and innovator in CRM, contact center and real-time analytics. For over 25 years, she has helped end users build world-class differentiated contact centers. She is the author of The Real-Time Contact Center and many leading industry Reports, including the Contact Center Performance Management Market Report, the Speech Analytics Market Report and the Quality Management/Liability Recording Product and Market Report.
And best of all they will finish up the day with an “insiders” tour of the New Yankee Stadium.
Attendees will be able to enjoy:
• A delicious buffet luncheon in the Yankee's "Executive Conference Room "
• Tour The New Stadium for an Insider's Look where ticket holders can't normally go
• Visit Monument Park (Touch Babe Ruth's Monument)
• Sit In The Yankee Dugout (Just like Jeter and A-Rod)
• Walk The Outfield Warning Track (Where Gardy, Grandy, and Swish Turn Home Runs Into Outs)
• And Best Of All, Visit the Yankee Clubhouse To See Where The Players Dress For The Game! (Player's Locker Room subject to availability)
• FREE PARKING!!!!!!!!!!!
To register, please click here: ATA Summer Social
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Canadian Finance Company Selects Workforce Management Solution from InVision Software
InVision Software, a leading international supplier of enterprise-wide workforce management solutions, was selected by one of Canada’s leading consumer finance providers to implement a new cost-saving workforce management (WFM) software for its contact center operations. The WFM system will bring operating efficiencies to the company’s contact centers that will result in better adherence to service levels and lower operating costs.
The company employs 550 call center agents handling incoming claims calls from customers at three sites across Canada and is committed to delivering a great service experience. Therefore, it has decided to implement a high-performance WFM software solution to improve efficiency by means of demand-oriented scheduling of its contact center agents. Using the PhoneLink interface within the InVision software, all relevant statistical information for planning and scheduling, e.g. call times, call volumes and call handling time from the Cisco telephone system, is automatically transferred to the new WFM system. Based on this historical data, the planners set up a detailed forecast of the expected working volumes and the required staff with the help of the InVision module ForecastPro. The AutoScheduler enables the planners to create rule-compliant schedules in a fully automated process covering the forecasted demand. The Infothek Interactive Schedule module will provide the agents with the opportunity to request and to swap shifts in an automated, paper-free process and to get at-a-glance information on their current schedules and upcoming changeovers to other activities, boosting their motivation and acceptance of flexible shifts.
“We are excited to broaden our customer portfolio in North America through our relationship with a leading Canadian finance company,” said Peter Bollenbeck, CEO of InVision Software. “We are looking forward to helping them improve contact center efficiency by putting the right people in the right place at the right time.”
The system went live in April 2010. The finance company selected InVision Enterprise WFM because it proved the best overall value in the marketplace – also with regard to user-friendly design and the depth of functionality the software provides.
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DENVER – Qwest Communications (NYSE: Q) announced it has added Qwest iQ® On Demand IVR (Interactive Voice Response) service to its Qwest iQ® Contact Center, call center suite of services. This new product is a portal-based application development tool that enables Qwest customers to create and manage automated contact management applications to caller experience, reduce the cost of new and on-going application development, and leverage business’ existing data.
KEY FACTS
· On Demand IVR includes full Interactive Voice Response capabilities enhanced with voice mail, speech recognition, call recording, and reporting and analytics. Leveraging the SaaS model, the service also enables customer’s IVRs to integrate with other applications, such as sales and customer service, and enterprise data to improve the caller experience.
· Building on its 10 years of experience offering network-integrated contact center solutions, and with more than 700 customers deployed, Qwest services approximately 5 million calls per month with its portfolio.
· Qwest partnered with Angel.com, a leading provider of enterprise-focused, cloud-based customer experience solutions to deliver this industry-leading IVR solution delivered via state-of–the-art Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) platform that puts the Caller FirstSM with every call.
· The easy-to-use Qwest iQ® On Demand IVR service is fast, affordable and adaptable. Users can develop a customized IVR application in real-time and create libraries of diverse applications that can be turned on or off at a moment’s notice to keep pace with evolving business needs and to respond to real-world changes before they impact business.
· Like all Qwest cloud-based offerings, the service has four key attributes: faster time-to-market, infrastructure costs are treated as variable operating expense, not capital expense; it has highly elastic capacity; and that it enables a pay-per-use model.
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Call Center Furniture Manufacturer Interior Concepts wins a 2010 Business Recognition Award
www.interiorconcepts.com/about-us/news/business-recognition-award/
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The Connection® Opening Contact Center in Rockford, Illinois.
BURNSVILLE, Minn. – The Connection (www.the-connection.com), a U.S.-based, award winning outsourced contact center company, announced the addition of a 400-seat contact center to be located in Rockford, Illinois. The facility is expected to begin operation in August, 2010. The Connection reports that it is expanding in order to meet the needs of new clients and growth of existing clients whose customers are calling for customer service or tier one or tier two help desk in the areas of wireless telecommunications, life and health insurance, financial services and retailing. These services will be supported in the Rockford facility via inbound live operator, live web chat and email response.
This is the second contact center opening for The Connection this year; they had previously opened a 330 seat facility in Penn Yan, New York in April. Rockford will be their sixth U.S.-based contact center.
When asked about the decision to open in Rockford, Fred Weiner, President of The Connection, stated: "the positive results from our labor force analysis, in combination with our clients’ desire to have a Midwestern location makes Rockford, IL the ideal location. We are very excited to get started and to bring much needed jobs to the community.”
The Connection®, founded in 1981, has been ranked by Customer Interaction Solutions magazine as one of the top 50 outsource contact center 3rd party service agencies nationwide since 1995, placing in the top 15 for the past seven years. In addition, The Connection was recently awarded with the 2009 MVP Quality Award. Their reputation as a quality focused, fast-moving, outsourced contact center provider has attracted many new clients in the telecommunications, wireless, catalog, financial services and health care industries. The Connection will have a total of six contact center facilities throughout the U.S. totaling over 1,500 workstations. In addition to this new facility The Connection has contact centers located in Minnesota, New York and Nebraska.
For more information on The Connection®, call 1-800-883-5777 or visit their website at www.the-connection.com.
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Ringio Integrates Rich Calling Service with Google Contacts, Gmail; Launches Solution on Google Apps Marketplace
HERNDON, Va. - Ringio, which launched in April with a cloud-based "Rich Calling" service that brings call-center-style screen-pop and call-routing functionality to small to medium businesses, announced the first of its CRM data integrations: Google Contacts. Ringio also announced its participation in the Google Apps Marketplace.
With the launch of this powerful integration, any company using corporate Google Contacts or employees' individual Gmail accounts can now use the information stored there to radically improve its phone-based customer interactions.
When a call comes in from - or goes out to - a contact, Ringio retrieves the contact information stored in Google and combines it with its system-generated phone data, such as call history, call-back requests, and voicemails. Ringio also retrieves relevant notes that have been taken by employees in the context of previous phone calls. Two-way synchronization between Ringio and Google keeps all contact additions, deletions and notations up to date for every call.
Presented on a PC desktop or smart phone screen together with the call, this data instantly creates a rich view of the company's relationship with this customer. It thereby gives the employee taking or making the call the context needed to determine the best way of handling the customer conversation.
Google contact integration also optimizes Ringio's intelligent call routing, even before an employee answers. When a contact stored in Google calls the company's Ringio-powered phone number, he or she is greeted by name and treated according to smart rules set in the Ringio application. For example, a contact calling repeatedly will always be offered to be routed to the last employee he or she spoke with as the default option, instead of going through the general public's phone tree.
"Using Google Contacts with Ringio's Rich Calling application is the fastest and most affordable way for small businesses to set up a phone solution that rivals higher-end call center systems, which can cost tens of thousands of dollars and usually require professional services to implement," said Ringio co-founder and chairman Michael Zirngibl. "More importantly, by doing so they can have more informed and meaningful conversations with their customers and prospects, and ultimately become a better business with every call."
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Call Center Furniture Manufacturer Interior Concepts Wins Progressive Manufacturer Award
Spring Lake, MI: Interior Concepts has been selected as a winner at the sixth annual Progressive Manufacturing 100 Awards. The Awards, organized by Managing Automation Media, a Thomas Publishing Company, LLC publication, recognize outstanding innovation. Having previously made the ranks of the Top 100 Progressive Manufacturers, Interior Concepts now enjoys additional recognition as the Progressive Manufacturer of the Year for Small Company.
www.interiorconcepts.com/about-us/news/interior-concepts-wins-technology-award-as-most-progressive-manufacturer/
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Pipkins Participates in “At-Home Agent Seminars”
Workshops Teach Companies At-Home Agent Strategies for Success
ST. LOUIS, MO — Pipkins, Inc., a leading supplier of workforce management software and services to the call center industry, today announced that they will participate in four At-Home Agent Seminars designed to educate companies about the use of at-home call center agents. The interactive workshops, facilitated by Michele Rowan, former VP of Global Performance Management for Hilton Hotels, will teach proven strategies and best practices to companies considering the at-home model, currently in pilot, or expanding their existing model. Pipkins, provider of advanced software for at-home agents, will present innovative tools for at-home agent scheduling that significantly reduces supervisor intervention and allows agents to self-schedule.
Many companies are using at-home agent models because of reduced operating costs, including lower starting wages and reduced benefit, facilities, and support staff costs. At-home agents also translate to increased revenue, as well as improved agent retention and customer loyalty. Workshops include various topics such as building your strategic analysis, operationalizing your plan, recruitment and hiring, and how to build an effective pilot program. A 200-page step-by-step implementation guide as well as a 30-minute consultation with Michele Rowan is included. For more information or to register for the At-Home Agent Seminars, visit www.gohome.us.com/at-homeworkshop.
Dates and locations for the workshops are:
• May 18 – Washington, DC
• July 15 – San Francisco, CA
• August 19 – Denver, CO
• October 12 – Dallas, TX
About Pipkins Inc.
Pipkins Inc., founded in 1983, is the leading supplier of workforce management software and services to the call center industry. Vantage Point, Pipkins’ premier product, is the most accurate forecasting and scheduling tool on the market and enables managers to solve the complicated operational issues in today’s multi-faceted call center environment. Pipkins’ systems forecast and schedule more than 300,000 agents in over 500 locations across all industries worldwide. The company is headquartered in St. Louis, Missouri. For more information, visit www.pipkins.com.
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MISSISSAUGA, Ontario - CCEOC Inc. announced
that all three FedEx Express Canada Customer Service Centres have achieved
the prestigious Contact Center Employer of ChoiceR designation for 2010.
This is the seventh consecutive year FedEx Express Canada, a subsidiary of
FedEx Corp. (NYSE: FDX), has participated in the program and achieved
certification.
The Contact Center Employer of ChoiceR (CCEOC) program has enabled FedEx
Express Canada contact centres to enhance public perception, build
exceptional work environments, and attract, retain and engage
high-performing, culturally-aligned employees. By targeting the key
recommendations outlined in the CCEOC Summary Reporting, FedEx Express
Canada has experienced significant stress reduction, increased employee
satisfaction, increased customer satisfaction and reduced turnover. As a
result of their success, FedEx Express Canada Customer Service Centres have
become the global benchmark for measuring FedEx contact centres worldwide.
"FedEx Express Canada is the only contact centre to achieve Platinum ranking
two years in a row. This is an outstanding accomplishment", said Jeff Doran,
president of CCEOC, Inc. FedEx Express Canada has an exceptional
continuous improvement culture. From their "People, Service, Profit"
philosophy to their Purple Promise recognition program, they continue to
focus on their people and see tremendous results. "Their success with the
CCEOC program is a testimonial to all the extraordinary effort and
dedication in building a world-class culture where people are the most
important part of the operation", says Doran. "Being recognized as a
certified CCEOC re-enforces FedEx Express Canada's customer service division
as a preferred employer and one of the best organizations to work for in the
country."
"Each day, FedEx Express Canada employees strive to make our customers'
experiences outstanding. FedEx Express Canada is committed to providing
quality customer service and has earned a reputation for being an innovative
market leader in all areas of our operation," said Patsy Bertoia, managing
director, FedEx Express Canada Customer Service. "This accolade is a direct
result of the engagement of our employees who understand the unique needs of
those we serve locally as well as globally."
The Contact Center Employer of ChoiceR award is the industry standard for
recognizing and branding people-centric contact centers. Through a
proprietary assessment process, a contact center can quickly determine if it
meets the qualification standards. A center can achieve a Bronze, Silver,
Gold or Platinum ranking. Once the designation is achieved, the contact
center is profiled on the official CCEOC corporate web-site
www.ccemployerofchoice.com, receives a prestigious framed certificate and is promoted through various print and electronic news channels. The CCEOC designation is valid for 12 months.
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Ringio – Empowering businesses to communicate effectively
Every day, as many as a billion phone calls are made to small- and medium-size businesses in the United States. But the resulting experiences are not necessarily pleasant. Callers can find themselves ensnared in frustrating voice mail systems, misrouted or mishandled. The business employees, meanwhile, often struggle to manage the onslaught of calls they receive and determine which of their callers’ needs are most pressing.
Michael Zirngibl, Sam Aparicio and Ashish Soni are determined to change that scenario considerably by uplifting the caller experience and accelerating speed to satisfaction. Their new company, Herndon, Va.-based Ringio, launched in April 2010 and is the first cloud-based Rich Calling Service that intelligently routes calls to any phone in the world while displaying relevant information about the caller on a desktop PC or mobile phone. For small- and medium-size businesses, this convergence of conversation with context can be the key to improving customer service and communication.
A custom-made team
Prior to creating Ringio, Zirngibl, Aparicio and Soni were CEO, CTO and VP of Technology & Operations respectively at Angel.com, a successful speech- and interactive-voice-response (IVR) provider. The three worked together there for more than 10 years, building Angel.com into prominence as a provider of automated IVR & call-center solutions for medium and large businesses.
While their forte together has been creation, launch and monetization of Software as a Service (Saas) applications, each brings an important element to their new venture. Zirngibl, Chairman of Ringio, is an accomplished inventor who holds more than 30-voice technology patents. Aparicio, Ringio’s CEO, is a sought-after speaker at technology events and the author of numerous articles on technology, product design and management. At Angel.com, he designed and implemented the company’s Virtual Call Center. Soni, Ringio’s CTO & President, is an expert in building high-availability, scalable, cloud computing systems. He has managed more than 40 major software releases.
There was a time, Zirngibl said, when life at Angel.com seemed nearly perfect. But he, Aparicio and Soni all have entrepreneurial spirits. Eventually, the hunger to create something new started to surface. “We realized there were still a lot of opportunities out there,” Zirngibl said. They felt confident that with a great deal of work – and their combined technological expertise – they could build something unique that addressed a widespread need. The result was Ringio.
The human element
Ringio offers users an affordable, simple-to-use solution, one that rescues small and mid-size operations from the pitfalls of telephony limitations while equipping them better for a fundamental construct for SMB success: turning phone conversations into opportunities for revenue generation and deeper, lasting relationships with callers.
“There has been movement in recent years toward electronic communications through sites like Facebook and LinkedIn, and there’s nothing wrong with that,” Zirngibl said. “But there’s still tremendous value in a traditional phone call, in interaction between two humans.”
Ringio’s goal is to give employees of small- and medium-size businesses the information they need about callers, when they need it, do a better job with those interactions and, as a result, serve their customers better.
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INDIANAPOLIS and ALGONA, Iowa - Pharmacists Mutual Insurance Company has selected the Interactive Intelligence (Nasdaq: ININ) all-in-one IP communications software suite, Customer Interaction Center(tm) (CIC), to support its on-site and branch office employees.
CIC was sold by Interactive Intelligence reseller, Spanlink Communications (www.spanlink.com). Spanlink will also provide ongoing support of the system.
Pharmacists Mutual, a provider of insurance products and financial services to pharmacists, pharmacies and associated businesses, began looking for a new communications system following the H1N1 flu outbreak in 2009, according to the company's chief technology officer, Barrie Parker.
"The swine flu outbreak prompted us to reevaluate our disaster recovery plans," Parker said. "Providing financial peace of mind for our 46,000-plus customers is our number-one priority and it became evident that if an outbreak was to occur within our organization, our current phone system would limit us."
Pharmacists Mutual selected the Interactive Intelligence software because of its flexibility, rich feature-set and ease-of-use, according to the company's network administration manager, Brian Stamper.
"Our previous phone system was largely outdated, difficult to administer, and didn't meet our redundancy or flexibility needs," Stamper said. "Administering it required logging in to a number of separate applications - we had one application for our automatic call distributor, one for voice, another for our phones, and so on."
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Etech, Inc. Joins Hands with the American Cancer Society
On March 5, 2010 Etech team members and leaders joined hands with the American Cancer Society and the community in the fight against cancer. The Annual Relay for Life event for the Nacogdoches surrounding areas was held at the Nacogdoches Expo Center, represented by 56 teams, and brought in proceeds totaling approximately $89,000. Contributions from this event will aid in efforts to provide support, to spread awareness, and to find a cure for cancer.
The American Cancer Society envisions a future without cancer. Representatives of Etech, Inc. share that vision and have been proud supporters for over 10 years, donating their time, service, and contributions to a cause worthy of the acceptance of all.
The Relay for Life Event was founded in 1985 by Dr. Gordon Klatt, a Tacoma colorectal surgeon whose only intentions were to grow the funds of his local Cancer Society office. For over 24 hours, Dr. Klatt walked the Baker Stadium track in Tacoma, Washington resulting in an 83 plus mile marathon. Throughout the night, friends accompanied him, paying $25 to walk or run with him for 30 minutes. His efforts raised an astounding $27,000. Dr. Klatt extended his vision to include a 24-hour relay team to raise additional monies; thus the Relay for Life was birthed and has continued to be successful year after year.
The vision started with one and has progressed to millions as this event has spread to 21 countries worldwide.
Etech, Inc. recognizes all who have reached back to receive the baton to join in the efforts for a cure. Participants of the 2010 Relay for Life event were Team Captain, Marty Harper, Donna Brown, Terry McMiller, Mary Sommers, Lori Maxfield, Ashley Ramey, Donna Brown, Olivia Blankenship, Elizabeth Woodson, Brian Sowell, Shem Delafield, Aimee Henschel, Lacey Hatcher, Michael Owen and Matt and April Rocco. Thank you team for the commitment you have made to the lives of others.
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Enkata Unveils Activity Tracker, a Data Capture Breakthrough for Analytics
SAN MATEO, CA - Enkata, a leading provider of
analytics-powered performance management software, announced the
availability of Enkata Activity Tracker. This technology innovation
captures data directly from service agent desktops to support
analytics-powered applications thereby eliminating the need for costly,
time-intensive IT data integrations.
The Impact on Contact Center and Customer Operations
. - Enkata's Activity Tracker is a major shift in how contact centers
source and leverage data - shifting from integrations with enterprise-based
data sources to capturing data at the point of customer interaction - the
agent desktop.
. - The technology minimizes or eliminates the deep integrations with
enterprise data sources that are often associated with contact center
analytics applications. Projects can require integration efforts of 6-9
months and as a result, routinely fail to pass IT governance. With
Activity Tracker, solution deployments are dramatically reduced to as little
as 6-8 weeks and require little or no IT resource commitments.
. - By simplifying implementation requirements, Activity Tracker
delivers on the promise of software-as-a-service (SaaS). Enkata performance
management solutions can now be fast tracked for deployment. As a result,
the company expects much wider adoption of analytics-driven performance
management applications.
Industry Leader Assessments
- According to Donna Fluss, president of DMG Consulting, LLC. "The top
two enterprise goals for 2010 are providing an outstanding customer
experience and reducing costs. Executives are looking for innovative ways to
optimize the performance of contact centers to achieve these goals. They are
increasingly turning to analytical applications to provide actionable
insights that empower them to make improvements in near-real-time."
- Ron Hildebrandt, founder and senior vice president of marketing at
Enkata. "This development is core to delivering on the promise of analytics
to improve contact center and customer operations. The data extraction
problem that bogs down analytics deployments has essentially been solved.
With this technology, companies can deploy performance management
applications without the barrier of a lengthy IT governance process."
Product Facts
Enkata's performance management solutions, including Automated Contact
Reasoning, First Contact Resolution, Enkata Manage, and Enkata Discover, are
now available with Activity Tracker.
. - Activity Tracker is a software component on an agent's desktop
that captures any and all data relevant to the customer interaction.
. - Activity Tracker has the flexibility to capture data displayed
for all types of desktop applications, including mainframe applications, yet
is secure enough to mask and disable capturing of personally identifiable
information.
. - Unlike screen-capture applications that simply capture and
replay a "movie" of desktop screens for quality monitoring purposes,
Activity Tracker logs all desktop activity as data, and captures screen
patterns, field entries, displayed data, and viewed information at the level
of data fields within desktop applications.
. - Activity Tracker is a highly secure, Windows-based service
application that is deployed with minimum IT involvement.
. - Activity Tracker will be delivered with Enkata's performance
management solutions in Q2.
About Enkata
Enkata is the market and technology leader in software-as-a-service (SaaS)
performance management solutions for customer operations. Enkata's
analytics-powered applications distill every customer interaction to provide
actionable data to improve the customer experience. Directed by Enkata's
advanced analytics, service operations are able to optimize employee
development, service policies, and self-service channels to deliver
differentiated service on every contact. Enkata is deployed in customer
contact centers with 100 to 20,000 service agents. Enkata solutions
analyze over 1 billion contacts per year for some of the world's largest
global service operations.
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Angel.comR Announces Breakthrough Business Intelligence Analytics and
Reporting for Voice Solutions with MicroStrategyR
McLean, VA - Angel.com, a leading provider of enterprise
focused, cloud based, customer engagement solutions, announced a major
new product launch, Caller First Analytics, a fully integrated, drill-down business intelligence analytics reporting capability from MicroStrategy (Nasdaq: MSTR) for voice solutions. The robust analytics enable users to make better decisions and implement improvements based on insight into the performance of voice applications.
Similar to the power of packages like Google Analytics for website
performance tracking and performance optimization, Caller First Analytics
provides key views, dashboards, reports, and volumes for all
IVR and call center activities. With this detailed, easily accessible and customizable information, businesses can analyze data and make iterative changes to enhance the caller experience to facilitate the achievement of business
goals such as revenue optimization, cost reduction, and optimal agent
resourcing.
"Recently the marketplace has been expressing interest in the merits of
integrating business intelligence with IVR," said Jay Lassman, Research
Director at Gartner, Inc. "This marriage offers the possibility for large
enterprises to better analyze and understand customer needs as well as voice
call data, which should lead to improved customer satisfaction and business
growth."
The new package provides deep insight into how a voice application is being
used, including the most popular customer selections and the most common
caller path patterns and hang-up points. Armed with business intelligence,
companies can quickly make positive changes to the call flow, contain common
call issues with automation to reduce agent load, and increase customer
satisfaction by addressing caller needs quickly.
Beta customers for the new Caller First Analytics solution include Astra
Zeneca, Pfizer, Barnes and Noble, and Hughes.
Based on industry leading business intelligence solutions from
MicroStrategy, Caller First Analytics provides call volume dashboards,
performance and voice user interface analysis reports, and call data reports
for visually appealing and informative graphs, charts, and information. All
of these reports are customizable into preferred dashboard setup, accessible
via the Internet, and configurable based on distribution, export, and access
preferences.
As a fully on-demand, cloud based solution, no investment in hardware,
software, or staffing is required. Caller First Analytics is integrated
directly into Angel.com's online Site Builder interface, helping enterprise
organizations realize immediate and long-term ROI.
"The combination of cutting edge analytics and reporting from MicroStrategy
and the advanced Angel.com on-demand IVR solution allows us to offer new
intelligent customer engagement solutions," said Dave Rennyson, President
and COO of Angel.com. "Early adopter excitement and feedback has been
tremendous, as enterprise businesses with heavy customer voice interaction
are recognizing the value of insight and intelligence to the top and bottom
line."
"It is a natural extension to integrate our advanced analytics and reporting
to the IVR function," said Sanju Bansal, MicroStrategy's Chief Operating
Officer. "Caller First Analytics puts all the discipline and decision making
power of business intelligence at the fingertips of enterprise companies to
innovate their voice application performance and profitability."
Angel.com has deployed a variety of Caller FirstSM customer engagement
solutions, focusing on in-bound and outbound IVR and virtual call center
offerings. The deployment of customer engagement solutions focus on
Angel.com's core mission of putting the Caller First in all its customer
engagement solutions.
Caller First Analytics is available immediately from Angel with pricing
starting at $500 per month.
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The Connection® Named in the top 10 of the 2010 Top 50 Teleservices Agencies Ranking
Burnsville, MN, — The Connection announced today that Technology Marketing Corporation (TMC®), a global integrated media company, has ranked The Connection as the 9th largest inbound contact centers in the U.S. on its 25th Annual Top 50 Teleservices Agencies by its publication Customer Interaction Solutions®.
The Connection (www.the-connection.com) is an award winning, U.S.-based outsourced contact center service provider. The Connection provides extensive sales and customer support specializing in inbound and outbound teleservices, email response, live web chat and interactive voice response (IVR) services. With multiple contact centers located throughout the nation, The Connection provides uninterrupted 24x7 support 365 days each year. The Connection has provided contact center support since 1981. Industries include: telecom, wireless, broadband, cable, healthcare, pharmaceutical, Life and Health Insurance, financial services, Internet retailers, catalog, publishing, crisis management, product recall and direct response.
The 25th Annual Top 50 Teleservices Agencies Ranking recognizes the top inbound teleservices agencies, both domestic and international, well as outbound Teleservices and interactive inbound, as measured by the amount of billable teleservices minutes they have completed during the past year.
The Connection has met the stringent criteria set by the editors of Customer Interaction Solutions. Their billable minutes were verified by the editors for accuracy and reliability and submitted a letter of verification from its telephone service providers certifying the number of minutes billed during the 12 month period from November 1st, 2008 to October 31st, 2009.
For additional information contact:
Erin Brooks, Sales and Marketing Specialist – 800-883-5777 or sales@the-connection.com
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Etech Inc. Expands Bilingual Contact Center in Pasadena, TX
Nacogdoches, TX: Etech, Inc., a global business process outsourcer, has announced plans to continue expansion of their dedicated bilingual contact center in the Houston suburb of Pasadena, Texas.
In 2007 a Fortune 10 company and one of Etech’s business partners recognized an opportunity. The marketplace for their services was under-penetrated particularly with Hispanic customers. Etech responded boldly by making a commitment establishing a bilingual contact center to serve these customers. As individuals were able to engage in the language of their preference, Etech has seen Spanish as the language of choice in more than six of ten interactions. This client’s foresight around this opportunity and Etech’s partnership paid dividends as sales conversion rates, sales per hour, revenue per hour and customer satisfaction experienced significant and sustained increases. This client is realizing the positive benefits for their brand, in customer retention and overall to their bottomline.
Etech’s bilingual contact center started with just 20 team members doing outbound sales. Today the center has grown to over 100 team members doing outbound and inbound sales, customer service and web chat for clients in a variety of verticals. It is expected that by the end of 2010 the center will grow to 250+ team members.
According to Matt Rocco, Chief Operating Officer, “We are excited to announce these expansion plans. The city of Pasadena has been wonderful to work with and they continue to demonstrate they can provide the labor market to meet the demands of our customers.” Rocco stated, “The fastest growing demographic group in the US is Hispanic. Presently, they spend about $700 billion dollars annually and are expected to surge to over $1 trillion per year by the end of the decade. Our Fortune 150 customers continue to seek call center partners who have access to bilingual skills within their labor markets. The team members we continue to recruit in Pasadena are highly talented, fluent in both English and Spanish and have great attitudes. With competition continuing to escalate we expect more and more companies to creatively pursue new and expanded relationships with this demographic . . . the Hispanic group is an economic powerhouse and Etech is prepared to help our partners reach them effectively through outbound, inbound or web chat channels.”
ABOUT ETECH - Etech, Inc. has provided Business Process Outsourcing services for over twelve years. We are a Tier One preferred provider for several Fortune 500 companies, with diverse clientele in the telecommunications, education, retail, financial services, travel, data provider and yellow page publishing industries.
Etech is PCI Compliant, ISO 9000 certified, a certified Minority-owned Business Enterprise (MBE) and a designated Corporate Plus member of the National Minority Supplier Development Council with 2,000 team members across our U.S., India and Montego Bay, Jamaica facilities. We maintain high standards of quality, customer service and sales skills and are the first choice in providing inbound and outbound sales and service, web chat, quality assurance, email fulfillment, collections and business process outsourcing. Visit www.etechinc.com to learn more about our business, our service offerings and our customers.
CONTACT:
John Tusa, Vice President
Etech, Inc.
Office: (936) 559-2231 Fax: (936) 559-2225
Email: john.tusa@etechinc.com
www.etechinc.com
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Pipkins Celebrates Twenty Seven Years of Excellence
Workforce Management Solutions Company Reports Increased
Customer Base and Significant Software Upgrade for 2010
ST. LOUIS, MO — Pipkins, Inc., a leading supplier of workforce management software and services to the call center industry, announced that year end 2009 brought an increase in new name accounts of almost 50% from the previous year. Founded in 1983, Pipkins has been creating and delivering superior workforce management products for call centers for 27 years and maintains its reputation for developing cutting edge solutions with thirteen industry-first applications. “Pipkins has shown consistent growth in the face of an economic downturn, which validates the effectiveness of our software,” states Bob Webb, VP Sales. Pipkins is poised for a software upgrade in the second quarter of 2010 which will revolutionize at-home agent scheduling and provide enormous cost savings for businesses.
For the third year, Pipkins will participate with quality monitoring company, VPI, in the Call Center Optimization Forums. The forums are designed for executives, managers, and IT decision-makers of businesses who need to stay informed about the latest industry trends, best practices, and rapidly evolving contact center optimization technology. Attendees will have an opportunity to learn about industry best practices from multiple experts in the field at one time and see demonstrations of the latest advancements in call center technology. Pipkins will discuss workforce management best practices. Eight forums will be held across the U.S. and Canada between April and November, 2010 and businesses of all sizes are invited to attend. The first forum will be held in Phoenix, Arizona on April 8. For more information, visit www.pipkins.com and click on the Call Center Optimization Forum registration tab on the home page. Register by March 31 and reserve your seat for only $99, an $80 savings off the $179 registration fee.
About Pipkins Inc.
Pipkins Inc., founded in 1983, is the leading supplier of workforce management software and services to the call center industry. Vantage Point, Pipkins’ premier product, is the most accurate forecasting and scheduling tool on the market and enables managers to solve the complicated operational issues in today’s multi-faceted call center environment. Pipkins’ systems forecast and schedule more than 300,000 agents in over 500 locations across all industries worldwide. The company is headquartered in St. Louis, Missouri. For more information, visit www.pipkins.com.
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Angel.com® Announces New Customer Additions
Angel.com's Cloud-Based Customer Engagement Solutions Launch with PNC Bank, AstraZeneca Canada, US Marine Corp, North Carolina State University, & National Institutes of Health
McLean, VA - Angel.com, a leading provider of enterprise focused, cloud based, customer engagement solutions, announced the recent addition of over 120 new customers, including PNC Bank®, Astra Zeneca Canada®, the US Marine Corps®, North Carolina State University® and the National Institutes of Health® .
Angel.com has deployed a variety of Caller First™ customer engagement solutions, focusing on in-bound and outbound IVR and virtual call center offerings. The deployment of customer engagement solutions focus on Angel.com's core mission of putting the Caller First in all of its customer engagement solutions.
"Angel.com is thrilled to add so many new enterprise customers across a variety of industries and channels. It is clear that large enterprise companies and government agencies are embracing cloud computing and all of the benefits it brings," said Dave Rennyson, President of Angel.com.
When PNC Bank's Treasury Management Group needed to improve their Pay-By-Phone solution, they turned to Angel.com's easy to deploy Caller First™ Inbound IVR Solutions. When Astra Zeneca Canada wanted to launch outbound surveys to medical professionals countrywide, Angel.com recommended and implemented its Caller First Outbound IVR solutions. And, when the US Marine Corps wanted to develop a voice-based notification system for power outages and emergency base situations, they turned to Angel.com's dependable Caller First Inbound IVR Solutions. All three deployed solutions improved customer satisfaction and reduced costs by better containing calls and/or reducing agent phone time.
About Angel.com
Angel.com is a leading provider of enterprise focused, cloud based, customer engagement solutions, including Caller First focused Interactive Voice Response (IVR) and Call Center solutions. These solutions enable enterprise organizations to quickly deploy voice, SMS, chat and business intelligence applications. More than 1,600 customers worldwide turn to Angel.com's proprietary customer engagement technology to power customer experience, marketing and sales needs. Angel.com's solutions are built on an on-demand, Software as a Service (SaaS) platform and require no investment in hardware, software, or human resources, balancing the need for high quality communications with affordable pay-as-you-go pricing.
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New York, NY – Plum Voice, the leading single-source provider of Interactive Voice Response (IVR) solutions, announced it has partnered with Tyler Technologies, Inc. (NYSE: TYL), a leading provider of end-to-end information management solutions and services for local governments. Plum Voice will supply its VoiceXML IVR platform to enable Tyler to deploy an automated voice application as part of its Eden Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) solution designed for the public sector.
Plum Voice’s IVR technology will enhance the account management functionality of Tyler’s citizen-facing application designed for local governments and municipalities by adding a system to automate a business process over the phone.
“Plum Voice’s dynamic VoiceXML IVR platform and hosted services will support Tyler’s underlying telephony application for its customers and establish a way to automate a repetitive, but critical business practice,” said Andrew Kuan, chief executive officer, Plum Voice. “This partnership is a natural extension of our business because as IVR system specialists, we are able to supply a cost-effective, high-performance and versatile solution to Tyler Technologies to help them better serve their customers.”
Leveraging Plum’s IVR solution, Tyler’s customers will be able to automate routine, day-to-day phone-based operations, allowing personnel to concentrate on more time-sensitive issues. For example, IVR can handle several common account inquires such as current balance, overdue bills, payment history, and the technology can also process bill pay transactions.
“Tyler’s partnership with Plum helps deliver an added layer of support to our public sector clients. With IVR technology, they can extend capabilities of their customer service channel and offer more efficient service to their citizens,” said Brad Green, chief operating officer, Tyler’s Eden ERP solution. “Plum Voice’s professional services combined with their easy-to-use, all-in-one solution allowed us to effortlessly configure the Tyler application and implement an IVR extension.”
With its VoiceXML platform, Plum Voice offers businesses, across several industries, with a cost-effective and reliable way to deploy IVR solutions. Its versatile hosted IVR infrastructure scales seamlessly to grow with and complement a company’s business needs. By delivering telephony automation solutions, Plum Voice enables companies to exceed their goals and streamline their processes.
About Plum Voice
With offices in New York, Boston, and Denver, Plum Voice is the leading single-source provider of automated telephony solutions. For businesses of all sizes that demand high-performance, versatile, scalable IVR (Interactive Voice Response) systems, we offer a unique combination of proprietary technology and complete professional services. For more information on pricing and a complete list of product features, please visit www.plumvoice.com.
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The Connection® Adds Another Contact Center in Western New York
BURNSVILLE, Minn. – The Connection (www.the-connection.com), a U.S.-based, award winning outsourced contact center company, has announced the addition of a new 340-seat contact center to be located in Penn Yan, New York. The facility is expected to be up and running in March of 2010 and will bring up to 450 new jobs to the Penn Yan area. The Connection is expanding in order to meet the needs of its growing client base in the areas of wireless telecommunications, healthcare, financial services and retailing. Services that will be supported in the Penn Yan facility include live operator inbound voice, email response and live web chat customer service, sales and tier-one and tier-two customer/help desk support.
Over the last four years, The Connection has opened two other contact centers in the Western New York area. The first was a 300-seat facility which opened in Jamestown, New York in 2006 and the second was a 350-seat facility in Olean, New York in 2008.
When asked about the decision to open in Penn Yan, Fred Weiner, President of The Connection, mentioned both the quality of the workforce and the success of the Jamestown and Olean facilities as instrumental in the decision to open the center in Penn Yan, New York. Weiner said in a statement: "We are thrilled to have the opportunity to expand in upstate New York. The quality of the workforces in Jamestown and Olean have been superb and we trust that, in Penn Yan, we will be able to replicate those qualities."
The Connection®, founded in 1981, has been ranked by Customer Interaction Solutions magazine as one of the top 50 outsource contact center and service agencies nationwide since 1995, placing in the top 20 for the past seven years. In addition, The Connection was recently awarded with the 2008 MVP Quality Award. Their reputation as a quality focused, fast-moving, outsourced contact center solution has attracted many new clients in the telecommunications, wireless, catalog, direct response, financial services and health care industries. The Connection will have a total of five contact center facilities throughout the U.S. totaling over 1,100 workstations. In addition to the three facilities in New York, the company also has contact centers in Nebraska and Minnesota.
For more information on The Connection®, call 1-800-883-5777 or visit their website at www.the-connection.com.
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InVision Software and HigherGround Form Strategic Alliance
Lisle, IL (USA) / Ratingen (Germany) — HigherGround, Inc., a software developer of call recording, data integration, and business intelligence tools, and InVision Software, Inc., a leading international provider of solutions for enterprise-wide workforce management, announced that the two companies have just formed a strategic partnership.
InVision Enterprise WFM is a web-based software solution that supports the whole process of demand-oriented workforce management in contact centers – from forecasting to scheduling, optimization, and time management. HigherGround’s Fusion Series 7™ suite of call recording and quality assurance solutions improves agent performance, enhances the customer experience, and assists contact centers with their compliance and risk management activities.
“Teaming with InVision continues our corporate strategy of providing our customers with superior quality and best-in-class innovations,” said Jim Ballard, Vice-President of Sales for HigherGround, Inc. “The Enterprise WFM solution developed by InVision is the most robust and feature-rich workforce management solution that I have seen in our industry.”
The two organizations have previously worked together on implementations with several mutual clients. This technology partnership expands upon the existing referral agreement between the two organizations and will provide a seamless integration between their call recording and workforce management software applications.
“Forming a strategic alliance between two stable, well-respected companies will benefit our customers by providing them with a combined offering of impressive performance optimization solutions that are reliable and easy-to-use,” stated Peter Bollenbeck, CEO of InVision Software.
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