New Research Examines Transformation of Customer Contact Centers

Empirix Inc., a provider of service quality assurance solutions for new IP communications, announced the results of an industry survey, conducted by Opus Research, about the adoption of online tools into enterprise customer care programs. A majority of respondents believe that improved customer service through new community-building and collaboration platforms and tools will help them gain a competitive advantage. However, concerns over issues such as network complexity and performance have impeded the adoption of these resources. In fact, 45 percent of respondents claim they do not use social media to communicate with end-users.

In "A Survey of Multi-Channel Customer Care" conducted among 985 respondents earlier this year, Opus found that social networks and Web chat were already employed more than 45 percent of the time to find and purchase by products and to get technical support. Use of the application programming interfaces (APIs) which enable enterprise IT departments to gain access to the cloud-based cash registers, product reviews, marketplaces and message exchanges operated by the likes of Facebook, Amazon and Google is growing exponentially. Both of these sets of findings provide dramatic evidence that companies have to offer their customers and prospects rapid access to a broad set of services in order to meet their expectations.

Key findings include:

-- Transformational times in the Contact Center - Contact center personnel are increasingly engaged in multi-modal, multi-channel and social interactions. Though most believe they are doing an excellent job in meeting customer requirements, nearly 40 percent admit they are on par with their competitors, and only 8 percent feel confident in their leading position in the marketplace. A majority of the executives realize that improved customer service will help them gain a competitive advantage through new communication platforms and tools (e.g., social media).

-- Nearly half of respondents already incorporate social media - Facebook, blogs and Twitter lead the way; Facebook alone has become another viable marketing channel and also helps organizations boost their search engine optimization.

-- Social nets and "cloud-based" apps are in the mix - The majority of organizations surveyed already treat e-mail and Web chat as customer-facing channels, and deployment plans will move outbound alerts, home agents and screen sharing into the mainstream.

-- Facebook and Google Apps are on par with Unified Communications (UC) stalwarts - Cisco and Microsoft OCS dominate UC discussions, but, according to the survey, Facebook, LinkedIn and Google Apps are establishing presence "inside the firewall," showcasing the growing need for UC assurance.

-- More video and mobile apps are coming this year - Organizations are anxious to reach their "anywhere/anytime" customers and prospects, adding another layer to the already complex network.

-- Performance monitoring and testing gain importance - Respondents indicate they are monitoring in order to "improve customer service" and "success rates," both of which create a better customer experience.

-- Overall impressions of social media - Most organizations have not made social media channels a priority (33 percent); however, 31 percent have deployed social media platforms as a low-cost way to communicate with customers and almost no organizations believe that social media for customer care is merely a "fad."

More information on contact centers can be found at www.SupportIndustry.com.