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Taking on the Multi-Channel Call Center

Proven Strategies that Increase Productivity and Improve the Customer Experience

Knowlagent at a Glance

Call center agent productivity solution Headquartered in Atlanta, GAFounded in 1995300,000+ agents in 17 countries using Knowlagent SaaS

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© 2011 Forrester Research, Inc. Reproduction Prohibited3 © 2009 Forrester Research, Inc. Reproduction Prohibited

Art SchoellerPrincipal AnalystContact centersUnified Communications

4Entire contents © 2011 Forrester Research, Inc. All rights reserved.

Eight emerging trends for contact centers

SocialMedia

ProactiveCommunications

SpeechIVR platforms

Multi-channelIntegration

Unified Communications

SIP replaces CTI

CustomerAnalytics

Video and Mobile support

5Entire contents © 2011 Forrester Research, Inc. All rights reserved.

Market forces drive a renewed interest in true contact center architectures

Phone Email Web Video SMS Chat

Formal center Home agents

Remote expert

Knowledgemanagement

Presence

AnalyticsBusinessIntelligence

ComponentReporting

Workforcemgt.

Quality monitoring

Perform.mgt.

eLearning

IVR

Multimedia customer interaction platform (CTI) or SIP

Expert Access

BusinessApps

Virtualization

Social Media

6Entire contents © 2011 Forrester Research, Inc. All rights reserved.

Communication channel usage trends…today

7Entire contents © 2011 Forrester Research, Inc. All rights reserved.

….and tomorrow

8Entire contents © 2011 Forrester Research, Inc. All rights reserved.

And interactions will cross channels as well!

In Person

Web

Contact Center

Mobile

Browse Facebook page

Tweet

IVR

Sales Agent

Mobile

Service Agent

SocialBrowse

community forum

Browse

9Entire contents © 2011 Forrester Research, Inc. All rights reserved.

Base: 304 North American and European networks and telecommunications decision-makers at companies with 50 or more contact center seats.

Source: Forrsights Networks And Telecommunications Survey, Q1 2011

Which of the following upgrades is your firm planning for your contact center(s) during the next 12 months?Multiple responses accepted

Other

Don't know

None of the above

Multimodal support such as mobile SMS and video

Contact center managed services

Multichannel integration

Add speech recognition applications to IVR

Social media support

Upgrade IVR

Upgrade to IP

Proactive outbound notification

Computer telephony integration

Support for home workers

Workforce optimization

2%

4%

8%

14%

19%

21%

25%

31%

35%

36%

39%

40%

40%

43%

Where enterprises will invest

10Entire contents © 2011 Forrester Research, Inc. All rights reserved.

Proactive Communications becomes cost effective way to reach customers

• Outbound notification and alert systems for

– Emergency notification

– Collections

– Customer care

• Customer care represents fastest growing market segment

• Reduce incoming calls and support revenue generation activities

• Stand alone offering or blended IVR application

• Support alerts to multiple devices, phones, cell phones, SMS, email

• Allow customer to transfer to agent as needed

• Uses advance speech technology for automated interactions

11Entire contents © 2011 Forrester Research, Inc. All rights reserved.

Mobile device and video support are becoming core requirements

• Mobile device processing power and increased bandwidth open new opportunities for self service

• Market growth due to increased use of cell phones as smart devices such as iPhone and Android to contact customer service

• Video or video clips to smartphones become increasingly popular in EMEA where video phones widely supported

• Integration to contact center means another pathway for connecting with an agent

12Entire contents © 2011 Forrester Research, Inc. All rights reserved.

Observations

• Smaller volumes – may not require full queuing, routing, reporting structure

• Highly unstructured

• The entire industry is ‘on a journey’ exploring social media metrics

Recommendations

• Connect with departments leading social media effort – marketing for branding and demand

generation, consumer response for complaint handling, support teams managing ‘crowd

source’ communities

• Ensure that issues that are surfaced in other departments get visibility into the contact center

(entry into knowledge base)

• The need to textual analysis skills in the enterprise. Can be leveraged across knowledge

base, social media, email, chat, and speech analytics

• Possibly position social media handling as career path for senior agents

Contact center integration of social media

13Entire contents © 2011 Forrester Research, Inc. All rights reserved.

Implications for agent skill development

• A new call for ‘blended’ agents?

• How to engage the home agent?

• The unstructured nature of social media

• New self service channels (mobility, proactive outbound) – what happens when a call is extended to an agent from these channels?

• With a continued tough economy where turnover is low – how to keep agents engaged and ‘fresh’?

Multi-channel Support Increases Complexity and Impacts Agent Performance

Impact of Agent Performance on Service Metrics

Source: November 2010 Knowlagent

Time Invested for ImprovementsIndustry Average Composition of Secondary Loss

Source: 2010 Contact Center Shrinkage Survey

Category 1

60%

11%

17%

12%

9%

9%

11%

16%

17%

21% Training

Coaching

Team Meetings

Projects

Paperwork

Call Research / Follow-up

17% - Email, Call Back, Knowledgebase, Etc.

Secondary Loss

Primary Loss

Wait time

Call Handle time

Category 1

60%

11%

17%

12%

Wait Time: Five Weeks of Really Bad, Boring Vacation

Wait time = Five weeks; 2 minutes at a time.

Secondary Loss (off-phone work)

Primary Loss (Absenteeism, vacations, etc.)

Wait Time

Call Handle time

24 x 2 minute breaks/ day

120 x 2 minute breaks/ week

480 x 2 minute breaks/ month

5,760 x 2 minute breaks/ year

Costs our industry $30 billion/year

Source: 2010 Contact Center Shrinkage Survey

Category 1

60%

11%

17%

12%

Wait Time: Five Weeks of Really Bad, Boring Vacation

Wait time = Five weeks; 2 minutes at a time.

Secondary Loss (off-phone work)

Primary Loss (Absenteeism, vacations, etc.)

Wait Time

Call Handle time

Source: 2010 Contact Center Shrinkage Survey

Active Wait

Shifting Shrinkage into Active Wait

Measurable productivity gains are realized by shifting 4.5 hours of training, coaching, and communications into Active Wait time each month.

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Shrinkage $8,640,000

Wait Time $3,024,000

Handle Time $17,136,000

Shrinkage $8,640,000

Wait Time $2,214,000

Handle Time $17,136,000

Active Wait Time

Labor Savings$810,000

Call Volume

Occupancy

Tomorrow

Today

Occupancy

Call Volume

Push Almost Any Activity From Shrinkage to Wait

Training/Knowledge

Performance

Communication

Back-Office

Weekly union communications

Claim or application processing

Compliance trainingFCR training

Coaching on quality

Customer SatisfactionGetting First Call Resolution Done

Using Knowlagent to deliver more training, coaching, and communications to over 45,000 agents

Increased Delivery“Delivered more training time to a site in 5 days using RightTime than was delivered over 1 month when manually scheduling time”

Improved Take Rate“71.7% take rate for RightTime vs. 59.4% take rate for pre-scheduled breaks”

Major U.S. Telecommunications Company

Key Takeaways

• Emerging trends in the multi-channel contact center increase complexity of agents’ job.

• Improving agent performance is crucial for enhancing the customer experience.

• Enterprise investment in workforce optimization and support for home workers is on the horizon.

• Wait time is abundant and when optimized, lessens the impact of incremental costs of improvement.

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