Solutions

Communication between contact center and customer is generally via various digital channels nowadays. In the final analysis, what is decisive for the definition of a contact center is who establishes contact with whom.

If contact comes from “outside“ we refer to an ”inbound contact center“. If, on the other hand, contact is initiated from within the contact center, then we refer to an “outbound contact center“.

In-depth customer contacts mainly relate to:

• one-to-one consultancy services (e.g. telephone tariffs),
• product purchases (e.g. concert tickets),

• queries regarding the last bill,

• technical help in connection with equipment,

• or numerous other matters that may give rise to customers wishing to contact a staff member
  of the company.

An increasing number of companies with inbound contact centers are also interested in proactive customer services in order to also use their contact centers for cross-selling and upselling purposes.

With this in mind 2-steps-ahead consulting specializes in the application of modern IVR systems in order to pre-classify customer queries before contact with the agency is made via DTMF or speech input. This pre-classification ensures that the customer is connected with the agent who is best qualified to help him. This results in more questions being processed with one single call, and customer satisfaction increasing noticeably. Not to mention the fact that consequently you increase agent availability and, at the same time, reduce the total volume of calls in your contact center.

In the case of outbound contact centers it is the company employees themselves who call the customers, for example to:

• inform the customer that an ordered product has arrived,
• remind them that an invoice is still outstanding,
• perform a customer survey about the last auto repair visit,
• confirmation of a transaction, i.e. confirmation of an online banking transaction
• or merely because the customer has asked to be called back.

Outbound contact centers are mainly geared to telephone contacts, on the one hand because that is the traditional form of establishing contact and, on the other hand, because it still remains the normal procedure.

Most companies nowadays call their customers, only a minority send personal emails. Usually only promotional mails are sent by email as mass advertising, and many customers ban unexpected mails straight to the recycle bin as spam, while an unexpected phone call is more likely to arouse interest.

2-steps-ahead consulting offers various solutions in order to conduct outbound calls automatically with speech dialog systems. This means that in most cases these phone calls take place without agency contact, but it can be established anytime if the customer wishes. Besides the telephone channel also other media such as mobile web or chat are possible. In these cases the customer will be informed by a text message about this possibility, The customer then determines itself when and on which channel he/she wants to communicate.

2-steps-ahead consulting helps you set up your call center for future needs and to open up new communication paths. In close cooperation with you we draw up a concept of the vital steps to be taken towards setting up a modern contact center in place of a traditional call center.

A typical approach in this process is to migrate your existing system to a modern multi-channel system, such as, for example Voxeo CXP, so that additional channels such as web or instant messaging can be offered in the next stage.

In traditional contact centers the entire interaction between customer and center goes via personal contact with the agent.

Self-service centers, on the other hand, shift a high percentage of this work to automatic dialog systems such as IVR – interactive voice response. This changeover results in enormous cost savings and also speeds up response to customer queries. In this context there is often the term “Zero Distance”.

Zero Distance ” shortens the distance between customers and companies. It will be an integration and digitization of the front-end and back-end systems to provide “Automated Self-Services”. The informed and connected customer wants relatively promptly and quickly communicate with the company. “Zero Distance” ultimately shortens dialogues and the communication with the customers.

Nowadays a customer is a mobile client, which is well informed with a corresponding expectation. In this expectation, it is essentially a question: “I always want everything immediately and everywhere.” That is the principle. Companies need to adapt to this behavior accordingly and provide for services that can adequately communicate with the client. And those companies who do not will get into hard times.

Self-service systems are the answers to provide “Zero Distance”, they prompt customers to answer a few questions by giving a verbal answer, by pressing the relevant keys on the pad or by clicking the relevant hyperlink in a web application. Instant messaging is also an option. Each answer brings the customer closer to the information they are looking for. Such systems are being increasingly installed and are experiencing an ever higher degree of acceptance among customers.

The benefits for the customers are obvious. These systems are specifically designed to process customer queries twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, and even at peak times there is no shortfall resulting in a customer having to wait for a reply.

Typical application areas are the provision of simple information such as

• account balances,
• addresses,
• opening hours or
• procedure instructions.

But such systems are already capable of processing more complex transactions that go beyond mere information retrieval.

Examples of this are:

• online banking,
• changing tariff options for mobile phones
• transmitting meter count readings
• reserving cinema tickets.

2–steps–ahead draws on years of experience in building and remodeling multichannel contactcenters in various industries. As a specialist in this area, we also offer a range of pre-finished industry solutions that can be adapted without much effort on your needs.

A Visual Interface for your IVR

Voice IVR’s have inherent limitations, and, let’s face it, your customers don’t really love them. Endless menu trees, confusing options, poor voice recognition and limited ability to collect information (Just try entering an email address using touchtones…) the visual IVR displays the choices (menus) and the retrieved information visually on a smartphone or tablet.

In comparison to the auditory communication of information that is usually done sequentially and therefore always requires a memorization of the announced information, the visual representation of all  information provides crucial advantages:

• All information can be obtained at a glance, you can see all choices compared to each other. Now your customers simply touch their way through your IVR, with the ability to enter complex data and easily go back and choose different options.
• More complex infomration can be presented graphically preprocessed for better information transmission.
• Also more complex user inputs are possible using a visual IVR, one thinks, for example, to the input of addresses.
• Of course, the contact to an agent is also possible in a visual IVR as well, either through chat or by establishing a phone connection.

A visual IVR initially requires no telephony infrastructure, communication is done using the HTTP protocol. That’s an important fact, compared to the conventional IVR, the visual IVR provides a significantly cost saving potential. The telephony infrastructure is then only needed for establishing a call connection to an agent if required, but not already for the operation of the IVR itself.

We also support companys in turning their Voice IVR into a visual IVR or just extend the exisitng Voice IVR by the visual representation of their IVR. The new graphical interface then intergates seamlessly into the exisiting IVR infrastructure.

A visual IVR is used both in inbound and outbound contact centers as well as in self-service application. 2-steps-ahead will help you to create an appropriate and consistent concept for you that is exactly tailored to your requirements in order to realize your goals to please your customers efficiently.