The 4th Annual Customer Experience Summit In Miami

Posted by Shai on May 15, 2012

Customer Experience SummitWe’re excited to attend IQPC’s fourth annual Customer Experience Summit in Biscayne Bay, Miami, on May 21-23. Building on the excitement from last year, the show will include even more innovative workshops, networking opportunities, and keynote speakers to help you deliver the ultimate customer experience.

Fonolo focuses heavily on providing the ultimate customer experience with your call center. We’ve been blogging a lot about best practices and will be hosting a webinar on Thursday, May 17th. Customer experience is high on the priority list when it comes to corporate strategies and with customers expecting immediate customer service whether on the web, social media, mobile, call center, or in the store – it’s time to take action.

Meet Me At The Summit

If you’re planning on attending the show and want to connect with me, I’d love to further discuss customer experience trends. Send me a note here shai@fonolo.com or via Twitter @shaiberger.

Hope to see you there!

Meet Shai at The Customer Experience Summit
 

5 Call Center Technologies Heating Up Customer Service

Posted by Omar on May 14, 2012

Emerging Contact Center TechnologiesLet’s face it, most people don’t associate the call center world with innovation or excitement. For many, it’s a business expense, a necessarily evil, a source of many headaches, or a dreaded project.

I see things a bit differently. If you look past the surface and dig a little deeper, the North American call center industry is going through an unprecedented transformation, driven by the influential power the customer has on major business decisions.

At the forefront of this transformation are 5 innovative technologies that are changing the call center experience and inspiring businesses to think differently.

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Working at a Startup: Identifying the Office Bully

Posted by Xania on May 9, 2012

Working At A Startup Part 4The other day, I was in an impromptu meeting with one of my colleagues when Shai hovered over my shoulder, anxious to have his blog post edited – right away.  Jokingly, we called him a hoverer, chastised him about being a micromanager (which he’s not) and had a really good laugh. All day we took jabs at one another – ok, I took jabs at everyone – about being bullies. The reality is, we have a family vibe at Fonolo, so our teasing is comparable to how siblings would act – it’s all out of love.
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How Social Media is Nudging Call Centers to Get Their Act Together

Posted by Shai on May 8, 2012

Social Media in the Call CenterFonolo is all about fixing the call center experience, yet we spend a lot of time talking about social media through whitepapers, webinars and our blog (see 6 Steps to The Ultimate Social Contact Center).

The connection between call centers and social media might not seem obvious, so let me explain.

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The World’s 5 Most Innovative Contact Center Providers

Posted by Omar on May 7, 2012

The World's Most Innovative Contact Center ProvidersWith double-digit growth forecasted in many emerging markets such as China, India, Russia, and Brazil, the contact center market continues to evolve. Vendors are increasingly offering contact center software in addition to more traditional hardware-centric offerings.

Cisco, Avaya, and Alcatel-Lucent continue to dominate with over 70% of market share in the global market. However, other vendors are growing revenue by targeting emerging markets, niche applications or specific verticals (ie: service providers). They are also competing on technology, especially when it comes to cloud-based offerings.

Let’s take a look and see which vendors are giving ‘the big three’ a run for their money.

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NICE Mobile Reach: Another Attempt at Smartphone Customer Service

Posted by Shai on May 2, 2012

Nice Mobile Reach Smartphone Customer ServiceThe intersection of the call center and the smartphone has become one of the most exciting spaces to watch in enterprise IT. To understand why, look at the typical consumer-facing enterprise – a bank, airline or online retailer. They have a call center whose operational costs are substantial and rising (mainly due to rising labor costs). At the same time, that call center produces an experience despised by most consumers, due to frustrating IVRs, long hold times and the need to repeat information to agents. These are problems the industry has been struggling to fix for decades, to no avail.

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Working at a Startup: Brand Evolution

Posted by Xania on May 2, 2012

What’s Your Brand Fashion Style?

Working At A StartupShortly after I joined Fonolo, I suggested the company revitalize their brand.  As a newbie, it was tough to come in and immediately shake things up. However, it was necessary.  Fonolo was one of the finalists for the ‘Best in Show Award’ at the Enterprise Connect Conference in Orlando and quite frankly, our brand needed some TLC.

I think it’s important for brands to revaluate their image and how it impacts key components of their business. There’s a visual and technological evolution that start-ups tend to overlook – busy working on other projects, business development, administrative, resources – the ‘to do’ list is endless but ignoring your brand can kill your company.

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Top 10 Social Customer Service Blogs of 2012

Posted by Omar on May 1, 2012

Social Customer Service BlogsIn my six years with the customer service industry, the adoption of social media as a mainstream support channel has been the most exciting trend I’ve come across. However, I’ve always been frustrated with the difficulty in finding quality customer service blogs, especially those that deal with social customer support.

The space is lacking high quality content and in an effort to highlight companies who are providing information worth mentioning, I’d like to profile the best blogs on my personal list. I’ve ranked them in order based on overall appearance, frequency, uniqueness, and value of information presented.

Please let me know what you think of this list, and feel free to share your favorite customer service blogs in the comments section.

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Upcoming Webinar: Best Practices in Social Customer Service

Posted by Omar on April 26, 2012

WebinarMost organizations are taking social media seriously and have placed it at the top of their priority list. It’s one thing to recognize the challenges but finding solutions has left many executives scratching their head and asking themselves, “How can my contact center provide proactive and effective social media customer support?”

Topic: 5 Social Media Best Practices Every Customer Service Executive Should Know
Date: Thursday, May 17th at 2:00pm ET
Presenter: Shai Berger, CEO, Fonolo

Who Should Attend:

  • VP’s & Directors of Contact Centers, Customer Service, Web/Social Media Strategy

Topics Covered Include:

  1. Social interaction channels your customers prefer most
  2. Identify and measure social key performance indicators
  3. A look into the profile and characteristics of today’s social customer

 

Register