Transforming Call Centers Into Customer Interaction Centers
With almost all CEOs (93 %) ranking customer interaction management as critical to success, BellSouth Business announced today a new unit dedicated to helping its mid-sized and large business customers improve interaction with their customers. By combining the latest technology with top-tier professional services, BellSouth's Customer Interaction Services unit is transforming companies' traditional call centers into sophisticated multimedia "interaction" centers.
Call centers are changing rapidly, due to new technologies and improved process designs which have produced dramatic results for early adopters. These new interaction centers provide end-users the flexibility to access information and conduct business with companies anytime, anywhere by using a variety of communication technologies including: e-mail, web chat, web callback, IP telephony, speech recognition, fax, voicemail, interactive pagers, video kiosks - and, of course, the telephone.
"BellSouth continues to respond to businesses' needs with practical, innovative solutions," said Berge Ayvazian, executive vice president with the Yankee Group. "Companies are waking up to the possibilities for integrating traditional call centers with Web-based tools to create Cyber Call Centers, capable of improving customer retention, supporting e-commerce and increasing revenues. Yankee Group research demonstrates that most businesses need both the advanced technology and consulting services that BellSouth is providing to improve their customers' experience." To bring these benefits to its business customers, BellSouth has created the infrastructure of professional services resources, facilities and tools needed.
"Our strategy was to capitalize on our experts and best-of-breed technologies to develop measurable solutions that help businesses decrease costs, increase revenues and improve their customers' interaction experiences," said Tony Floyd, vice president and general manager with the Customer Interaction Services unit. "Today, the dramatic financial and competitive results experienced by early adopters of new call center technologies are becoming mainstream. However, we've discovered that businesses and their vendors have underestimated what it takes to design, implement and manage call center applications successfully. At BellSouth, we have trained, experienced professionals and our know-how comes from real customer experience."
The Customer Interaction Services unit provides comprehensive solutions including:
- Consulting Services - BellSouth professionals provide high-level expertise in call center analysis, customer interaction strategy/process analysis and design, custom reports design and hardware/software procurement.
- Hardware/Software Platforms - BellSouth rigorously tests and evaluates the latest technologies to bring "best-of-breed" capabilities to businesses. The portfolio includes multimedia call centers, multimedia self-service, computer telephony integration (CTI), digital recording, speech recognition and other capabilities.
- Implementation Services - To ensure smooth execution of customer interaction strategies, BellSouth provides: project management, application development, system/application integration, hardware/software staging and installation, and system/application testing.
- Training Services - For maximum effectiveness, BellSouth customizes training sessions for call center agents, supervisors, managers and executives covering topics such as user tools, custom reports, scripting and routing, database administration, etc.
- Support/Management Services - To ensure peak performance once the solution is installed, BellSouth offers systems monitoring, application maintenance, hardware/software maintenance, change management, skills development services, agent recruiting services, call center management services and business continuity services.
The Customer Interaction Services unit capitalizes on BellSouth's existing capabilities including voice and data services, network management, e-commerce, customer premises equipment and Internet services.
BellSouth already supports thousands of enterprise call centers. However, customer demands for anytime, anywhere interaction and increased competition continue to challenge businesses to innovate quickly. Underscoring this need is the fact that acquiring a new customer can be 10 times more expensive than keeping a current one, according to Bain and Company, making customer retention essential.
With these pressures, call centers are evolving from cost-centric operations to strategic business functions, reflected by the exploding call center market which is expected to reach $13 billion in the Southeast by 2001.