Outsourcers of phone-based customer care are not selling technology; they’re selling results. It is called “conversational relationship management” and maintains a connection between a company and its customers for purposes such as sales, retention, up-selling or trouble resolution.
Continue Reading October 18th, 2006 Dan Miller
The automated speech community’s flagship event led off with a keynote by Paul English, where he provided a prescriptive list of improvements that could be made to the user experience. He argued this would be more empowering to callers – more humanizing and less humiliating. His efforts have induced two leading technology providers – Microsoft and Nuance – to join GetHuman.com in an effort to produce a published “standard†of the practices that go into producing a user experience that is gratifying for the caller. But automated speech technologies represent only a small fraction of caller frustration with today’s call centers.
Continue Reading August 16th, 2006 Dan Miller
The drive to use IP infrastructure for a broader variety of distributed applications is occurring simultaneously with a general move to use resources around the globe to support self-service. As a result, outsourced self-service is enjoying revenue growth that exceeds speech automation, in general. The factors driving that growth are the topic of Vox 2006, which will be held in NYC on August 7, the first day of SpeechTek 2006.
Continue Reading July 20th, 2006 Dan Miller
For purchasers of voice self-service platform or hosted vendor services Sterling Audits, in conjunction with Opus Research invite you to participate in a groundbreaking survey. Upon completing the survey, you can register to win a free iPod shuffle!
Continue Reading July 17th, 2006 Derek Top
In declaring Monday, June 26, “Unified Communications Strategy Day,” Microsoft, along with partners, laid out its vision for filling out the solution stack for enterprise IP-telephony. The software giant held an event in San Francisco where top executives demonstrated new software and hardware components that round out Unified Communications (UC) solutions. But while Microsoft’s new UC umbrella may define an expanded solutions stack, it hasn’t completed the circle by demonstrating new functionality or compelling business value.
Continue Reading June 28th, 2006 Dan Miller
Oracle has announced its acquisition of Telephony@Work (T@W) and will package its product line as the core of its ‘CRM on Demand’ service that extends Siebel’s reach into mid-tier businesses. The new service is designed as a frontal assault on Microsoft by making the combination of intelligent routing, business analytics and interactive voice response easier to implement at a lower cost.
Continue Reading June 14th, 2006 Dan Miller
The release of Envox 6.3 is noteworthy because it marks a bundling of application development resources, SIP and VoIP support and flexible connectivity that is sensitive to the migratory patterns of today’s cost-conscious business enterprise.
Continue Reading June 9th, 2006 Dan Miller
To reverse a downward trend for 411-based directory assistance (DA) services, BellSouth is conducting a “411 Sweepstakes†whereby callers who register their home telephone numbers qualify to win the keys to a new Pontiac Solstice. Promotional gimmicks may serve to provide short-term life extension, but it is unlikely to build a base of repeat users that give rise to the sort of annuity that DA services had been in the past.
Continue Reading June 6th, 2006 Dan Miller
In April, Microsoft sent shockwaves around the speech community by announcing that both VoiceXML and SIP will be “native” to MSS 2007. What does this mean to the rest of the conversational access technologies (CAT) application development and platform community? Plenty.
Continue Reading May 19th, 2006 Dan Miller
With its acquisition of BellSouth, a newer, transmogrified AT&T is taking shape. Its new footprint resembles the coverage zones of Cingular Wireless, a GSM-based PCS service provider, augmented on the fixed-line side of the business by the geographic regions served by the erstwhile “Bell Operating Companies” called Ameritech, SNET, Pacific Bell, BellSouth and Southwestern Bell.
Continue Reading March 12th, 2006 Dan Miller
