HOLD EVERYTHING: The results are in.
Onholdwith.com, the Fonolo-powered site that mines Twitter for real-time complaints about being put on hold (and folks, there are many, many complaints), has today made its annual list of hold-time offenders available for all the world to see. And you may be surprised by who made the list.
OnHoldWith.com, launched by Fonolo a few years back, this year collected over a whopping 165,000 posts mentioning the phrase “on hold with” from Twitter. And as those of us in customer service know to a sobering degree, Twitter has quickly become a go-to platform customers use to shout about frustrating customer service experiences. The tweets informing the report this year confirm that: a) customers are increasingly turning to social media to publicly out companies for poor customer service handling; and b) a benchmark of this poor service is placing a customer on hold.
While the companies on this year’s top 10 list are doing exquisite things in their industries (and trust us, we are big fans of all of them), the results of this year’s report signal that brands could be doing things even better, starting with sprucing up their customer service offerings.
So, here’s a good question: Did your company make the list?
It’s been a big year for Avaya, probably the most important 12-month period in the company’s long, storied existence. In January, Avaya emerged from bankruptcy with a newly listed stock (NYSE: AVYA); a balance sheet much lower in debt; a new management team; and a renewed focus.
Last week, Fonolo hosted an insightful live discussion on the three main forms of text-based communication battling for the future of customer service: Messaging, chat, and text. The expert panel discussed the impact of messages on customer service, the importance of chat, the implications of engaging through text, and so much more! To save you some time, we’ve extracted video snippets showcasing highlights from the discussion.
Some quick history: 10 years ago, I attended a conference called Emerging Communications (eComm). It was an eccentric and inspiring collection of people focussed on the next chapter of voice and telecom technology. (It came on the heels of the “Voice 2.0” movement but with a broader vision.) The shared vision there was that a wave of innovation was coming because communication functionality would soon be as easy to access as web functionality (I’ll circle back to “the vision” at the end of this post).
Consumers 
A number of call center companies reported earnings in the last few weeks, so it’s time once again for an informal, semi-regular, not-at-all-intended-as-investment-advice look at what’s going on. Twilio and RingCentral both had a bumper crop of news and their stock prices have reflected that; this continues the momentum from the 
There is no question that customer service is changing quickly. From website FAQs, to live chat options, to social media platforms, there are an increasing amount of channels which consumers can use to reach out for help. 
Everyone involved in customer service wants to understand consumer channel preference. Otherwise, how can you allocate resources between phone, email, chat, SMS messaging and social channels?
