How to Integrate Voice-Powered Technology into Your Call Center Strategy

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Voice-powered technology has grown exponentially in the past few years. On its journey, it has become more sophisticated and intelligent, and has evolved to sound and behave more like a real human would. Advanced voice-powered technology has become a central component of call center strategies at some of the largest businesses around the world, causing many stakeholders in the customer service field to begin asking important questions about the future of call center service. Notably, many are asking whether voice-powered technology is a threat or an asset to call center employees.

Here’s a deep dive into how voice-powered technology is being integrated into call center strategies with great success.

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Vonage Acquires NewVoiceMedia – What Does it Mean?

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Vonage Acquires NewVoiceMedia – What Does It Mean?Big news in the call center world broke last week: NewVoiceMedia (NVM) was acquired by Vonage for $350M. What does it mean? Well, the obvious take-away is that cloud-based call centers continue to be a hot space and a great way to build value for investors.

Some commentators talk about a “wave of consolidation” as if it’s a time-limited event, but as I look back at the last decade, it seems more like a constant rhythm in the industry. As long as I’ve been following the space, this acquisition pattern has been ticking along reliably. The exits get the headlines but innovative new entrants are continuing to launch.

There are other takeaways, too: Vonage’s big plan, the Salesforce angle, the Twilio angle…

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Call Center 101 – The Golden Rules of SLAs [Whitepaper]

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Call Center 101: The Golden Rules of SLAsCome into the classroom, sit down, and let us begin today’s four-part lesson: Call Center 101 – The Golden Rules of SLAs. As the official written handshake shared by a vendor and a buyer, it is a tangible commitment that ensures specific services will be delivered. Really, it’s a promise, one you must keep in order to satisfy clients and maintain the service levels that will keep your long-lasting relationship with them buoyed. Anyone working in the service industry, be it in retail, health or finance, should get the low-down on Service Level Agreements (SLAs), and fast.

If it’s crunch time and you’re looking to quickly study up on SLAs, look no further. In this crash course, we provide you with:

  • SLAs in nutshell;
  • How to set a winning service level for your own organization;
  • Developing 20/20 vision with the industry standard of an “80/20 service level”; and
  • Strategies for meeting (and exceeding) your service levels in the future.

Read on: You’ll be an expert in no time.

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Interesting Customer Service Practices From Across The World

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Interesting Customer Service Practices From Across The WorldAs in any field, it’s important to be aware of key trends and best practices in customer service to ensure that you are delivering an experience that is on par with the best players in the game. From servicing customers on social media, to curating unique “real life” opportunities for consumers to interact with your brand, there are many emerging standards in the world of customer service that companies are striving to meet.

A company’s CS standards can set them apart if they always aim to go above and beyond for customers. And: The more unique, the better. One great source of inspiration is examining the customer service practices of different cultures – especially those outside North America. Many cultures have unique customs and practices related to service – some even date back centuries.  

Here are some great customs and practices from cultures around the world that can serve as a source of inspiration for your own business.

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How to Explain AI to Your Mom [Slide Share]

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How to Explain AI to Your MomWhen it comes to Artificial Intelligence (AI), there are many fear-mongering headlines in circulation. Recently, Elon Musk defined it as an “Immortal Dictator”, two words that reaffirm my mother’s belief that AI could mean the end of the human race. I can safely assume that you know someone who, like my mother, fears that AI is intimidatingly capable of taking over humans and their resources.

We’ve seen this reflected in post-apocalyptic movies like the Terminator series, The Matrix and Blade Runner. These blockbusters vividly play off of fears and force audiences to see AI as having sinister motives (like overtaking humanity). Yet, we have now seen this negative AI narrative emerge in sensationalized news pieces, videos, and industry articles. This has resulted in an endless wave of pessimistic chatter, and it is distracting us from exploring the many unique and positive outcomes of AI.

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How to Use Social Media to Support Your Customers

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How to Use Social Media to Support Customers

Tweet.

As early as the 19th century, “tweet” was a charming term in the English language, evocative of the gentle vocal stylings of small birds. Now it refers to the music of a rather different beast, one that, at its loudest, can deafen and defeat businesses. Twitter, among other social platforms, has in recent years become a mighty digital megaphone for many frustrated (or conversely, happy) customers. A Tweet has become so much a part of communication in certain cultures and how they interact with the world that it is not just a noun: It’s a very powerful verb. And, as we’ve seen in now notorious cases (lest we forget the United Airlines incident), it’s become a way for customers to size up and shout about serious blunders in customer service to an ever-growing court of public opinion.

That being said: Social media platforms aren’t solely used for public brand-shaming. In fact, we should regard them with even a smidgen of positivity, as they are unique conversation channels that present pathways towards establishing and maintaining relationships with customers. For those of us invested in improving our customer support offerings, we must acknowledge social media as a remarkable space in which to play. It presents a unique opportunity to offer customer support and service for legitimate customer support questions; that is, it’s possible to have a non-turbulent tête-à-tête on Twitter, Facebook, and other channels.
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What Does it Mean for Commerce to be Conversational?

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Conversational CommerceI just returned from the excellent Conversational Commerce Conference. It’s not a big event (just one track over two days), but it is very focused. I heard two excellent success stories on recent bot deployments. I think I need to revise downward my bot-skepticism a bit.

The highlight for me was a fireside chat with Dan Miller, Mitch Lieberman and Chris Messina over what exactly is meant by saying something is “conversational”. It’s a term with multiple meanings, all of which are central to the future of commerce, customer service and, more broadly, how people and companies are going to interact in the future.

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Goals: How One NHL Team Scored a Customer for Life

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The Goal: How One NHL Hockey Team Scored a Customer for LifeI’m sitting here in Canada, a vast country with an ever-debated culture. Part of that debate is our collective, enduring love of hockey, one that sometimes puzzles me. It’s not unheard of to read sentiments like “Hockey, what is wrong with you?” or “Hockey, I’m through with you” in major Canadian publications in recent years. There are also subsets that are rather grim about its future. Lawrence Martin of the Globe and Mail writes: “In the context of its celebrated history, our national sport is clearly past its prime, clearly on the decline … Hockey’s heyday was the Cold War era, 1950 to 1990. It was then that … hockey became an identity sport, occupying a role in society much grander than that of a game.”

Ah, identity. So this is why hockey, and sports in general, endure even in the face of the above takes, rising ticket prices, alleged growing disinterest, and declining enrollment. This is also presumably why hockey is inextricably linked to the cultures of many other countries, a handful of whom produce some of the jazziest players in the world. Regardless of place, hockey is a marker of personal and community identity. It’s not just “Canada’s game”; it’s a massive, global, community fan experience. Paul Greenberg gets it right: “Sports doesn’t need to create advocates — the type of customer that most companies can only wish they had. Sports has them by the millions. They’re called fans.”

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Why Customer Experience Management is Important

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Why CX Management is ImportantThe global market has become a battle ground where brands fight to win consumers. From new entrants to established business houses and online giants, every organization is vying for a customer’s attention and his business. So, the consumer’s perception of a brand becomes vital to its survival, growth and success. Brand perception also translates into customer experience (CX).

But the modern consumer is well-informed. He doesn’t rely only on sporadic ads or isolated press releases in forming his opinion of a brand; he shrewdly draws his judgement from every single interaction with it. So, in modern times, managing customer experience is the new brand imperative.

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Humans vs. AI in Customer Service … It’s Complicated

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Humans vs AI in Customer Service… It’s ComplicatedWe got a lot of feedback on last week’s blog, both in private and in public (see this thread on LinkedIn, for example). Contemplating the eventual fate of humans in the customer service process leads to some spicy conversations. This is a) partly because terminology around AI is problematic; b) partly because objective data is sparse; c) partly because the loudest voices have, well, let’s say motivated reasoning; and d) partly because there are multiple overlapping questions.

On that last point, the debate led me to some new ways to think about the problem that will help to separate the overlapping questions (somewhat, at least).

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