High volume, low complexity tasks for example, are a good place to start. But there’s a significant risk that ignoring one of your channels will undermine the efforts and investment in others, as any lack of consistency in communication will damage customers’ trust and confidence, and variation in response times outside of clear SLAs will result in multiple contacts for the same issue, which is likely to hurt your brand and your pocket. Know what will work with existing systems, what can improve them, and what will demonstrate value, all while taking into consideration what agents and customers need from such technology and what can help improve the experience on both sides of the phone. These bespoke solutions cover every component of the contact centre – from call routing, unified communications, networking and security, right up to emerging technologies, such as AI chatbots and Robotic Process Automation. It’s also important to consider the agents when looking to implement a new automated system as they will be the ones using the technology on a daily basis. For additional Information in IPI Visit their Website or view their Company Profile, Copyright 147 Media Ltd 2020 - No part of this website can be reproduced without the written permission of the Publisher, Xdroid Applauded by Frost & Sullivan for Voice & Facial Analytics, PCI Pal Webinar: Payments: The Future of Security & CX, Boost Automation & Expand Customer Self-Service with AI, Hull City Council and Civica Create 100 contact centre Jobs, FourNet ‘2021 & Beyond’ Remote Working White Paper, Conn3ct secures Position on G-Cloud 12 Framework, The Changing Face of the Contact Centre​ Post Covid, CC33 Contact Centre Set to Create an Additional 400 Jobs, Tickets Go On Sale As ECCCSA 2020 Goes Virtual, 5-Step Checklist for Mastering Enterprise AI in Contact Centres, IP Integration (IPI) Announces Sat Sanghera as New CEO, CallCare Appointed To Manage COVID 19 Vaccination Helpline, Business Systems Announces Investment to Accelerate Growth Plans, Choosing Customer Service Channels for your Contact Centre, Calabrio ONE Now Available via Twilio Flex Ecosystem, CCMA Partner with Sabio to Deliver Benchmark Service. It’s been around in some form since the 1970s, led predominantly by the banking sector. Contact centre automation, especially in key processes, is an effective way to achieve this. If a customer does speak to an agent and can sense that the agent is giving them their full attention, rather that having to look through multiple interfaces to find the right information, their overall experience will be that much better. It also offers a range of professional services and devOps support, delivered by its highly accredited team of contact centre experts. The question is, how can automation deliver fantastic new outcomes for contact centres? The knock-on effects will not only see improved and increased human interaction, but will also be good for the bottom line by reducing agent churn and call handling times and increasing first call resolutions. Learn how it can help you deliver exceptional customer experiences, enhance agent value, and accelerate digital transformation. 3 use cases of RPA in contact centres. Hence, AI is a smart replacement to IVR for customer service augmentation. The Age of Automation. The Call Centre Sector. There’s no doubt that continued advances in robotic process automation (RPA), natural language processing, and voice-enabled devices will continue to increase the volume of complex enquiries that can be triaged or fully serviced without the need for someone to write an email or fill out a contact form. Attended automation. Automation technology will also be fundamental in empowering agents in their work as introducing a digital workforce alongside human agents has many benefits, from reducing costs and churn, to enabling agents to provide a better, more human service by allowing them to do work that holds meaning for them. In an increasingly complex, connected world the contact centre is set to become the interaction hub of the digital enterprise – responsible for support, interaction, education and data gathering. What is customer service automation? Many companies have already introduced RPA into their contact centres and seen the rewards. We use cookies to ensure that we give you the best experience on our website. Build IVR into your mobile apps. Customer experience is in the midst of mass disruption. Almost two thirds (65%) of contact centre employees believe that the introduction of automation and robotic technology is an opportunity to learn new skills and grow their role within the business, while 66% believe these technologies will have an overall positive impact on their role. Automation, it seems, is inevitable. If enterprises are to learn from any of the lessons of the past, the importance of being able to contact a human in customer service is unlikely to wane. Automation technologies help centralize information and make contact center processes far more efficient, customer-focused and quality-centered -- essential in the era of multichannel customer service. Enghouse Interactive enables you to create a ChatBot and AI strategy for your contact centre by connecting and simplifying the automation and connectivity process … Robotic process automation (RPA) has become a major trend in call centre technology, offering significant cost savings through accuracy, greater compliance and … Drive the conversation to where it needs to be. Now is the perfect time to revisit the prospect of automating your email processing, to free up budget and resources as an integral part of your digital transformation and further improve customer experience. Automation could just herald a new golden age for customer service. Did you find this article useful? Furthermore, many specialist providers have transformed their propositions to be consumed through cloud services, shifting to usage-based charging models supported by managed services, making them more cost-effective than previous capex-based on-premise solutions. By providing agents with a digital assistant who can help with tasks such as updating contact details, or filling in forms, agents will have more time to spend with the customer with more complex issues, allowing the agent to fully put their training into practice. The automation of information flows has significant implications for many businesses, but it is perhaps in the contact centre that these implications are the most significant. IPI is focused on creating intelligent contact centre solutions that deliver exceptional customer experiences. Intelligent automation defines a class of new technologies that includes robotic automation and cognitive learning, which can help organisations to deliver customer service more efficiently and effectively.Growth in this market is accelerating at a rapid pace, but with it comes the emergence of new terminology that is often confusing and at worst, misleading. Contact centre automation, especially in key processes, is an effective way to achieve this. Another benefit of email communication is the ability to describe issues in more detail or ask multiple questions, which other mediums like social media don’t allow. His focus has been on pioneering the development of self-service and compliance technologies for the contact centre space and he was recently awarded a patent for the co-invention of a revolutionary fraud prevention tool for contact centres. If contact centres and companies are to embrace the benefits of automation in 2020, they need to know how to make the most of an automated strategy. Contact Centre Agents Prepare To Work In Automated Contact Centre Of The Future. But first, we need to set a foundation … Definition of customer service automation. Robotic process automation (RPA) is a tactical, short-term fix to digitise common, reproducible agent tasks in the contact centre. The impact of Contact center automation Across all industries and all times, increasing efficiency and lowering costs has always been a driver for automation … With these figures in mind, Deloitte predicts that RPA will achieve near-universal adoption within the next three years. Skill-based routing. Automation will also free up valuable time and budget, allowing you to focus on other areas such as enabling self-service capabilities, and letting your contact centre agents handle interactions that require human decision making and knowledge of more complex issues. Maybe it’s because email isn’t as trendy as the more innovative customer experience technologies, or because it’s managed outside the contact centre. By communicating regularly with agents as well about the part that automation will play in their day-to-day jobs and what benefits they will see, will also quell any fears agents might have about loosing their job to a robot. From our heritage delivering and supporting traditional contact centres, through to new innovations in AI, Chatbots and Robotic Process Automation, we have been the trusted pioneer and evangelist of employee and customer experience for over 30 years with an enviable 98.7% customer retention rate. IPI partners with the industry’s leading vendors – including Avaya, Blue Prism, CX Company, Gamma, Genesys, Microsoft, Teleopti, Verint and VMWare – to provide a complete suite of contact centre solutions, available in the cloud, on-premise, or as a managed service. The majority of organisations continue to manage email through shared mailboxes, taking up a disproportionate amount of time, money, and resources, to ultimately deliver poor customer service any way. Furthermore, Gartner predicts that 25% of customer service operations will use virtual customer assistants this year. He is a regular contributor and speaker at customer experience and contact centre events around the world. Automated customer service (customer support automation) is a purpose-built process that aims to reduce or eliminate the need for human involvement when providing advice or assistance to customer requests. This collaboration between software bots and humans is called attended automation. This comprehensive approach also increases overall operational efficiency and productivity while reducing costs. Agents are key to CX and should be considered as part of the automation process with the aim of making their lives easier and letting them do what they’re good at. Just a few years ago, considering automation for processing emails would have led you to consider adopting one of the specialist solutions, such as eGain or Eptica, probably resulting in a considerable on-premise investment with the siloed solution being used by specialist team(s) outside the contact centre, alongside other workloads in the back office. A combination of rapidly advancing technology and increasingly high customer expectations is compelling businesses to transform the … Leave your high volume contact tasks and simple support questions to our integrated robotics, and free-up your contact handlers to focus on more valuable work - like complex issues, account management, client retention and CSAT improvement. Automation is the linking of disparate systems and software in such a way that they become self-acting or self-regulating. Indeed, as 2020 commences, automation technology will and must be at the front and centre of improving call centre customer service, especially for younger generations and future customers who expect to have a fully omnichannel customer experience (CX), putting their digital know-how into practice. Colin Hay Media archives within the contact centre solution are a perfect place to create a living library of machine learning and historical records of previous chat interactions. Whether helping agents with their workloads, reducing call and wait times, or improving efficiencies in the systems, it’s essential to know what problems having automation technology can fix and what outcomes digital workers can deliver. Deloitte found that and average of 20% FTE capacity was provided by robots after less than 12 months and that compliance improved by 92%, quality and accuracy by 90%, productivity by 86%, and cost was reduced by 59%. This practice remains prevalent today, resulting in poor SLA management, processing inefficiencies, unwanted repeat contacts, and inconsistent, unhelpful responses. The benefits of improving efficiency metrics and being able to work round-the-clock are two-fold, helping both customers and agents through the customer journey. Steve Murray is Solutions Director at IPI. Change to customer information is a common contact centre request. If you continue to use this site we will assume that you are happy with it. Steve is IPI’s Solutions director, leading the development of contact centre applications to deliver intelligent technology solutions to IPI customers. If you’d like more advice to help ensure your customer experience strategy is successful, read more here. Contact center automation needs to deal with the fuzziness of human communication to maximize the number of successful journeys and minimize friction. Without automation, contact centers are doomed to limp along, suffering from inefficiency and poor customer service. Alongside continued efforts to remove and deflect the need for email communications into the business, the ability to consistently and efficiently process the remaining emails, plus voice and other digital back-office interactions, is crucial to a successful customer experience strategy these days. The contact centre industry is a genuinely global one. According to 2017 statistics, the European call centre market generated $49 billion. Many call center agents face a common problem: they have a customer on the phone and need to collect some information about their account to learn more about their order history. key to a successful customer experience strategy, organisations continue to manage email through shared mailboxes, taking up a disproportionate amount of time, money, and resources, inbound and outbound voice solutions such Maintel’s Callmedia, advice to help ensure your customer experience strategy is successful, read more here, Common enquiries that can be made available via self-service, Customer responses that could be consistently served across a variety of channels, Reducing costs and releasing staff to focus on more meaningful interactions, Serving those customers who have a preference for email communications efficiently and within SLA, Complementing self-service methods with a consistent and reliable channel to support more complex enquiries. Source: Forrester. Hence, it becomes imperative for them to be driven by excellent customer service standards. Contact centers are the face and voice of BFSI, Retail, CPG, Hospitality, Tourism, Healthcare and many other sectors. Millennials and Gen Z in particular, who are more digital-savvy than previous generations, are championing automated technology in their consumer journeys, with Guthrie Jensen finding that 75% of millennials prefer to solve their own customer service issues and that Gen Zers have higher expectations for technology and are more willing to experiment with new automated platforms. The contact centre space has proven to benefit a great deal from artificial intelligence, enhancing the customer and agent experience through intelligent automation designed to drive faster resolutions and response times for customers. The contact centre of the future will be a place where skilled employees deal with complex issues, solve problems for customers, drive value for their employees and have greater job satisfaction. Looking at how to select the right processes to automate and considering what it means for the human agents on the front line are key places to start. Skill-based routing (SBR) directs customer calls to the next available agent who … And, as agents are able to perform tasks faster, call durations and wait times decline, enabling the agents to help more people than ever before. Contact centre agents are uniquely positioned to bridge the gap between the customer and the computer that they’re using to purchase a product, or complete an application etc. For agents, having an automated assistant in place to help with the mundane tasks that crop up on a daily basis is essential in today’s world of instant answers to both satisfy customer demands and keep agents happy. If you’d like to be the first to receive the latest updates and insights from our team here at Maintel, sign up to our newsletter by clicking the banner below! If you’re one of those organisations that still manually manages emails from one or more shared inboxes in this way, now is the time to reconsider automation, as many technology vendors in this space have made acquisitions, merged technologies, and developed new solutions to make contact centre workloads like email and web-chat more accessible and affordable, which will in turn benefit the customer. Harnessing the power of contact centre automation for a positive customer experience ... With the rapid advance of technology, however, self-service is fast becoming an important part of streamlined customer service. There’s also a considerable offshore call centre market. Messaging apps are growing to be an increasingly popular part of the customer conversation, and businesses are constantly turning to new channels to boost their service scenarios. Automatic call distributor (ACD) technology made it possible to filter and route calls to the right agent at the right time, dramatically reducing call waiting times. At that time, many businesses would’ve considered the volume of emails, their complexity, and the widely anticipated reduction in email contact, and decided the investment in automation wasn’t justified or affordable. The latest industry trends reflect that … Contact centres deal with vast quantities of complex and unstructured information and information that is vital to customer satisfaction. Be the first to hear about our upcoming product releases, events and regular expert insights by completing the form below: Financial Results & Shareholder Communication. 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