London:
After years of hype, the next generation 'virtual' or
'distributed' contact centre is finally becoming a reality
says London-based Datamonitor. The key enabler of the
'virtual' contact centre is internet telephony. This technology
makes it possible to have a phone conversation over the
internet or a dedicated internet protocol (IP) network.
By
IP-enabling the contact centre, organisations can utilise
geographically dispersed call centre agents and also if
need be, involve employees who are not normally part of
the customer service process, such as branch workers,
home workers or back office workers. A new report by Datamonitor,
Contact Centre Component Technologies 2005, predicts the
market for global contact center technology routing would
be worth $4.7 billion by 2009.
Much
of this growth will come from developing markets such
as India, China, Brazil, Eastern Europe, Mexico and North
and South Africa.
The
contact centre environment has never been more complex.
Aside from the traditional pressures to reduce operational
costs, contact centres also face the challenging task
of providing exceptionally high-quality service in order
to retain current customers and attract new ones. They
are becoming the hub of customer interaction within organisations,
taking on a more strategic role in building and maintaining
customer relationships.
These
changes have meant that the focus has moved away from
answering calls as quickly as possible to first call resolution.
However, contact centre managers often find it difficult
to accomplish this objective just using traditional contact
centre staff, especially during peak hours and unexpected
call spikes, or when the enquiry resolution requires the
assistance of knowledge workers with specialist skills.
Very often, these workers sit outside of the traditional
contact centre environment.
"The
problem with the traditional contact centre model is that
it creates a silo for customer service expertise and fails
to take advantage of all the expertise that sits outside
the contact centre in the branches and back office,"
says Robin Goad, senior contact centre analyst at Datamonitor.
"IP telephony really is the key enabler that allows
the contact centre to become more 'virtual', and more
and more organisations are realising the benefits that
this can bring."
The
aim of a virtual or distributed contact centre is to identify
the contact as it enters the organisation and then use
intelligent contact routing technology at the network
level to route the contact to the most appropriate customer
service resource. This routing decision should be based
on a number of criteria, including for example the value
of the customer, the resources available, the type of
media, the time of day.
Global
contact centre routing technology market is expected to
grow by 30 per cent between 2004 and 2009.
A
survey of 400 contact centre managers found that 19 per
cent of North American and Western European contact centres
are using remote workers. Over 20 per cent of new contact
centre agents shipped in 2004 were IP agents, double the
number that were shipped in 2003. By the end of 2005,
11 per cent of all global agent positions will be IP,
and Datamonitor estimates this will grow to 37 per cent
by 2009.
According
to Datamonitor the global contact centre technology routing
market was worth $3.6bn in 2004. The combination of investment
in new IP-based technology and more organic growth in
less developed markets means that it will grow by 30 per
cent between 2004-2009 to reach a value of $4.7bn. While
North America will remain the largest segment of the market,
Asia will be the fastest growing.
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