Telephony Convergence The New CTI

Transcription

1 Telephony Convergence The New CTI Powerful telephony automation for SalesLogix based contact centers. Enabled by Calltrol s Convergence Friendly architecture. Calltrol Corporation 400 Columbus Avenue Valhalla, NY All rights reserved Rev. August 2001

2 Introduction For years Calltrol s open telephony server products have been in use by savvy and rapidly growing contact centers. Now, our flagship product Object Telephony Server (OTS ) is available pre-integrated with the SalesLogix marketing, sales and support automation suite. This breakthrough SalesLogix add-on dramatically streamlines the implementation of sophisticated intelligent inbound and outbound telephone call routing in connection with the SalesLogix database. What only a few years back would require multiple hardware platforms and a six or seven figure budget now can be achieved through the addition of one PC server to your LAN no additional PBX/voic hardware is required. OTS will work with any existing telephony systems if you wish. Whatever the telephony need, from auto-dialing the record on the screen, to matching caller ID and touch tone entries to get information and route a call, it s all available in one simple package that s been proven at hundreds of sites around the globe. OTS also offers you performance tested predictive outbound dialing, automatic or manual digital conversation recording with screen activity, silent supervisory observation and coaching, interactive voice response and voice messaging. Besides auto-processing and routing calls within your center to save agent time and improve customer satisfaction, the Calltrol server can be used to conference, transfer, or forward calls to people outside the office according to any criteria you choose. OTS telephony enables your CRM applications quickly, easily and to your specifications. You only pay for what you need today, knowing that you can build upon a solid foundation in the future. The following pages are designed to quickly educate you as to the architecture of OTS and how it supports the SalesLogix add-on created through the combined efforts of Hilltop Information Systems and Calltrol Corporation. Your questions and comments are of great value and may be directed to dfriedman@calltrol.com. Thanks for your interest David M. Friedman Vice President of Marketing & Sales P.S. Please turn to the last section of this document for the OTS/SalesLogix Live Demo accompanying brief. 2

3 What is the opportunity? How can I or my CRM user Benefit? Extending the reach of your CRM initiative There s a very good reason you are implementing a Customer Relationship / Customer Interaction management solution to improve business performance. The promise of CRM is to consolidate business information for easy use throughout an organization to better service clients and cut the costs of doing so. Such systems typically allow users and even customers to access and manipulate data through a PC. Unfortunately, that is not how most communication is done in the real world it s done by talking on the phone. While many customers will use the web and even automated telephone scripts (IVR/VRU Interactive Voice Response/Voice Response Units) to place orders, check balances, etc., in order to achieve superior customer satisfaction every business must ultimately have a competent, accessible live staff. Additionally, for Outbound applications (collections, sales calls, surveys) talking to a computer is simply unacceptable to your valuable customer. Calltrol s Object Telephony Server (OTS ) facilitates the smooth extension of your core CRM initiative to your most important communication channel, the telephone. Besides being created exclusively as a CRM/ ebusiness software plug-in over the last 12 years, OTS provides all telephony functions needed by a modern business or call center in one consolidated platform. Unlike other CTI or Telephony Server strategies, OTS is a single solution for seamless linkage between your CRM application(s) and all of your Live and Automated, Inbound and Outbound telephone call processing. Improve Service A traditional CTI installation provides an intelligent link between telephone systems and database applications. Expensive CTI software shares data between PBX, IVR, Voice Mail and perhaps a desktop application. Results are rarely as hoped (hyped). Let s face it; most major companies still ask you for your account number several times per call. Increase customer and worker self service and cut time off live calls with Interactive Voice Response. IVR allows callers to access and manipulate any information in your CRM database through their touch tone phone (according to your specifications of course!) When appropriate transfer to specific live operators, the next available rep in a group, a sales rep on the road, or anything else your business requires is supported with ease. Whatever the business need: order entry, trouble ticket status, or balance inquiries, OTS allows your automated and live call routing to be scripted in any Win32 compliant language quickly. Unlike other solutions that have a limited breadth of telephony functions and proprietary scripting languages, OTS lets you combine any of it s capabilities into each and every call, in any way, with any language you choose. 3

4 Save Money Time is money, for you AND your customers. Properly implemented automation saves time and improves results. Calltrol s OTS in conjunction with SalesLogix CRM provides a unique foundation for successful implementation. There are plenty of solutions that make promises. The difference is our ability to deliver. Money is only saved once a solution is operating on time and within budget. The unique architecture and feature set of OTS, plus our commitment to the developer community, is your insurance policy. Just ask our global community of satisfied repeat customers whose businesses have grown for years with OTS. Customer & Team Member Satisfaction Fast effective service around the clock is the mark of today s leading firms, regardless of industry. Making sales, solving problems and satisfying customers are what keep top players on your team. Give them the right tools. Automate the tedious and often complex repeat tasks. Let them do what they know best focus their skills to serve and sell your customers. One program (SalesLogix) one telephone system (OTS ). 4

5 How is Calltrol s OTS different from other CTI products? Convergence vs. CTI While CTI (Computer Telephony Integration) has been around for years, the notion of Convergence is young. The open standards of the Internet have been behind the push. In a perfect world where a Converged solution exists, all information and communication media interoperate smoothly and to a large extent automatically. Until now the closest most have gotten to this ideal is traditional CTI expensive and complex patching between multiple communication systems and multiple computer applications, hardware and operating platforms. The result may be screen pops and auto-dialing from a database. While hardly the comprehensive call automation and routing one might hope for, many firms have spent millions to retrofit their legacy telecom environment to shave a few seconds off of each call with these techniques. This architecture, because it s a retrofit, provides no opportunity for true convergence and little value relative to the costs and other alternatives. Convergence means truly seamless call flows without data loss. Complete information awareness during every call segment, both within automated processes and at the live agent s desktop (even among multiple applications). Convergence Friendliness : 1. Streamlines hardware environment, lowering the number of vendors, API s and wasteful communications interfaces between systems having overlapping capabilities. 2. Presents a broad and highly flexible programming interface. The API contains both high and low level functions adequate to achieve all present and anticipated call handling requirements. It is hardware, operating system and programming language independent to insure long-term success. Convergence in the contact center means: Lower initial and maintenance costs Faster and more comprehensive call processing with less human intervention Flexibility to quickly modify system behavior to accommodate changing needs based on a lack of proprietary/hard coded configurations. 5

6 Comprehensive Telephony Support The ability of an OTS server to route and provide call processing is guaranteed to exceed the capabilities of any major PBX or ACD on the market today. Simply put, anything you can imagine in a telephone call flow can be done using the OTS server and API. It s the only piece of telephone equipment you will ever need for your contact center, yet can easily link to your existing systems. Broad call handling features, in one unified platform, is the first step in Convergence Friendliness for a telephony solution. Architecture Architecturally OTS is modular forming a logical break between external applications and the telephony platform itself. It is built for the future and evolves rapidly as a result of our persistent research and development efforts. By specializing in everything telephony and giving you control and options over the other critical elements of your solution, we provide a building block for exceptional results. Design Philosophy The genesis of the Calltrol product line was through the interests of software developers. Many application vendors in the call center space are focused on vertical markets. When peddling our original outbound dialing solution we found that the two basic components in such a system, the data processing and the telephony were each vastly different and benefit from exclusive expertise. This is particularly so when considering the wide array of verticals served by contact centers. While the core telephony features are relatively generic, telephony application development is a rare niche with few experienced players. Development of world-class telephony systems and each vertical market application requires considerable unique knowledge and experience. With this in mind, we set about to exploit our expertise in telephony development in such a way as to compliment the vast array of applications under development in the marketplace. The result: Object Telephony Server. A unified server for the provision of any and all high volume commercial telephony functions to any application. OTS and its predecessors have been in successful commercial deployment for over eight years. OTS is a product designed by and for software application developers, not end users. It is for this reason that it is the clear choice of CRM and ebusiness application developers and VARs around the world. 6

7 How does it work? What do I get? Core Functions In addition to the robust array of call handling features in OTS, we allow complex combinations of these features within the handling of any individual telephone call. Unlike turnkey call center packages that have pre-programmed methods of routing and handling calls, OTS developers have full, logical, real-time control over call flow. Your calls flow based on your real-time CRM, staffing and business strategy. OTS supports all manner of live and automated outbound calls, unlimited routing options on inbound calls, full voice processing and tone generation/detection, conferencing, agent monitoring and coaching. It also provides a simple, scalable hardware platform that includes any combination of standard digital and analog communications interfaces including VoIP. A common OTS implementation would include the telephony server (telephony hardware & OTS core logic), a campaign manager to either route incoming calls intelligently or load records into OTS for outbound calling (such as Zedak s Buzzworks), and a CRM/Database client at the agent s desktop to display caller s records and further control phone calls (such as Interact Commerce s SalesLogix). Unlike other solutions the agent can do everything through a single interface. External Applications OTS functions primarily as a telephony appliance on your network. It is completely driven by external routing logic and user interfaces. There is no limit to the number and scope of applications that can work with an OTS server. Our simple, world-class development tools make integration, regardless of application environment quick and easy. We offer a Software Developer s Kit, OTS system simulator, run-time development licenses and free professional Application Design Assistance. Success is assured, prior to full system purchase, by our exclusive developer only support team. OTS Hardware Components OTS can be a PBX/ACD, voice mail, predictive dialer, call recorder, call monitoring system, IVR system or any combination thereof. OTS supports a wide variety of standard call processing hardware components. Vendors such as Intel-Dialogic, Aculab, Audiocodes, and others manufacture the industry 7

8 standard SCSA and H.100 boards that comprise an OTS switch providing call processing capabilities and voice network interfaces. These boards are available pre-configured in application specific industrial grade computers or can be customer supplied. OTS Software Components The software side of an OTS server includes: 1. Appropriate drivers for hardware components selected. 2. OTS server application with GUI for passive real-time status and hardware configuration. The OTS server application supports thousands of outside socket connections from agent, campaign management and call routing client applications. OTS is a server-only requiring additional client applications for real world use. The Software Developer s Kit includes working sample client applications for a variety of popular implementations. Calltrol s SDK (Software Developer s Kit): OTS simulated mode (Predictive Dialing) Programming Interface Documentation Connect via socket/ocx/java Beans Sample Campaign Manager/Call Routing (VB 6) Sample Agent Client (VB 6) Full runtime features (up to 4 ports)* SalesLogix basic integration** * Enhanced version requires Dialogic hardware ** Additional license for SalesLogix forms & OCX Add-On products Due to the server-only nature of OTS a number of complementary products are available to bring your call center toward Convergence bliss. You may also create or mate your own products with our free integration support and Application Design Assistance. Here s an idea of the options. SalesLogix by Interact Commerce Corp. integrated by Hilltop Information Systems. Includes SalesLogix integrated campaign control clients. Full Time Screen and voice recording by Calltrol Corporation. Works with any agent or control client. 8

9 Buzz Works Outbound Campaign Management (Web/Java) by Zedak Corp. Works with any agent client. Agent Status Display by Zedak Corporation. Java based GUI into your contact center. Works with any agent or control client. We telephony enable your favorite CRM applications including formal partnerships with SalesLogix and Siebel. We are compatible with virtually any commercial or internally developed contact center application on any platform supporting TCP/IP. We have successful customer implementations under all versions of Windows, DOS, Java/HTML, even AS400 with RPG legacy programs! Want to get started with something that will run out of the box? VAR demo bundle. A turnkey, small scale system integrated with SalesLogix sample database. This includes a scripted presentation of all major telephony functions highlighting ease of customization and integration with SalesLogix forms and database. Turnkey bundles from a variety of developers not listed here address your application, scripting, database and reporting needs. These bundles typically include agent, campaign management and call routing client applications pre-configured to work together and with OTS for a quick, reliable, zero development installation. 9

10 What about support? Technical, Sales & Marketing? Calltrol history Since 1989, Calltrol Corporation has provided tools and systems to telephony enable ebusiness and CRM applications. Primarily used in telesales, market research, customer service and support contact centers, OTS seamlessly integrates with client applications under any operating system. Productivity enhancement up to 400% is common. Over 700 systems have been licensed world wide to a fiercely loyal, successful and growing customer base. Technical Support Policy Calltrol Corporation s success is directly related to our commitment to supporting the developer community. Since we offer our Software Developer s Kit (SDK) at little cost, we must be certain that developers understand and successfully implement OTS to grow our business. We estimate that our developer support costs exceed SDK revenue by as much as 5 times. This is a small price to pay for the outstanding long term relationships we have built. Solution Provider Program Overall Any individual or corporation that has developed a product for resale using the Calltrol telephony platform (OTS ) can enter our Solution Provider Program. Solution Providers sell turnkey and customized contact center applications to a variety of end users worldwide. Solution Providers maintain the relationship with their end-user with no involvement from Calltrol unless specifically requested on a case-by-case basis. Solution Providers benefit from wholesale software pricing, discounted maintenance and support programs, lead referral, development assistance, co-marketing and joint selling initiatives. Certified Classification as a Calltrol Certified Solution Provider conveys to existing and prospective clients that you are an authorized, trained, and preferred Value Added Reseller of Calltrol software and related products. Other benefits of being a Calltrol Certified Solution Provider include the authority to display the Calltrol Certified Solution Provider logo in your advertising and marketing communications (subject to program guidelines). Certification also entitles you to a higher level of co-operative advertising rebates, joint press releases, priority notification of new products, and priority placement on our web site of your company logo, product summary, and free link to your site. 10

11 Wrap Up Calltrol Corporation A pioneer in contact center telephony and media convergence with our first open telephony platform shipped in Object Telephony Server (OTS ) The latest in a long history of reliable, innovative and cost effective contact center telephony solutions. SalesLogix/CRM The world s leading mid-market CRM package, offering comprehensive functions, integration friendliness and a committed support team. Additional Publications Available to You New Solutions for Old Challenges: Seamlessly Converge World Class Telephony with your Contact Center Applications using Proven Technology Today. (Includes real world case studies) Calltrol OTS Contact Center Developer s Brief Calltrol Corporate Brochure Calltrol Product Brochures: OTS SDK Brochure (Software Developer s Kit) Calltrol Outbound Brochure Calltrol Inbound/IVR Brochure Calltrol Recorder Brochure Contact Information Your interest is appreciated. Your comments and questions valued: David M. Friedman, Vice President of Marketing & Sales David B. Rubin, Solutions Manager dfriedman@calltrol.com drubin@calltrol.com 11

12 Appendix OTS/SalesLogix Live Demonstration Overview Goals: Provide a tangible example of how Telephony can be used to enhance CRM applications. Demonstrate the flexibility of Calltrol s Convergence Friendly architecture, both in terms of how the call management can be tailored and the tight, easy integration with SalesLogix and other external databases and applications. Create a package that our partners/resellers can also use to educate people about enhancing their CRM with telephony. The demo shows only a small fraction of what can be done with OTS. Only your imagination limits how OTS may solve a client problem. Here s what you will see: Inbound call purpose and client identification DNIS & ANI. Routing to IVR scripts, live agents and voice mail based on SalesLogix data, DNIS, ANI. Automatic record lookup for live agents, data retrieval and delivery to caller via IVR scripts. Supervisor monitoring & digital call recording. How we did it: Built a small scale, fully functional OTS based telephony platform Combined our sample inbound & outbound control applications (from the OTS SDK) and made the SalesLogix database the source for outbound predictive dialing numbers (Visual Basic but can be any language). Created voice processing and call routing routines and compiled them into a single OTS Extension DLL (Visual Basic but can be any language). Modified SalesLogix user interface to become an OTS agent/tsr client application. Equipment Server: Workstations: Pentium III 600, 192MB RAM, 20 GB HDD, Windows NT 4.0, SP6, Server Dialogic MSI-SC (standard telephone interfaces & conference features) Dialogic shared voice resource card (voice processing, dialing, call progress analysis) SalesLogix & SalesLogix/Support server components for MS SQL Calltrol control application and OTS Extension for IVR scripts Calltrol supervisory monitoring sample application Voice file storage for prompts and voice mail messages Voice mail database Windows 98 notebook running SalesLogix & SalesLogix Support clients Hilltop Information Systems OTS integrated forms for SalesLogix Acme Telephony Corp. OTS/SalesLogix communication OCX Each workstation can establish multiple OTS client sessions via multiple instances of SalesLogix. For each agent login a separate telephone headset is required with a unique telephone extension number. 12

13 Phones: Comfort Aries noise canceling, binaural, professional headsets with single line telephone integrated base. Standard single line telephones with 3 one button speed dial positions to demonstrate the results of using different DNIS/ANI. Terminology OTS client: Any application that establishes a communications socket with the OTS server either on behalf of a live agent or for purposes of campaign management and third party call control. Control application: An OTS client dedicated to campaign management and/or third party call control. Agent client: An OTS client application that provides a user interface to a live operator in a contact center. Agent clients typically provide OTS login service, some type of first party call control (answer, dial, hang up, hold, transfer, conference, record, etc.) and automated lookup of record to accompany transferred calls. DNIS: Dialed Number Identification Service. Upon calling an 800/900 number the carrier will deliver to the call center along with the call the last 3, 4, 7 or 10 digits of the number dialed to support automated routing and custom greetings and scripts. ANI: Automatic Number Identification is the number of the phone calling the 800/900 number and accompanies the DNIS. IVR: Interactive Voice Response is the use by telephone of an automated system of menus, data entry and data retrieval using recorded voice prompts and touch tones. Monitoring: A supervisor may silently observe or coach an agent using their headset and an appropriate control application. Inbound Example The demonstration telephones have programmed into their speed dial buttons 3 distinct combinations of DNIS/ANI. In the real world these two values would be generated by the telephone network based on the number being called and the number from which it is being called. For demonstration purposes the OTS server will simply capture these values in the form of DTMF/touch tones and use them to process the call. The control application upon sensing the incoming call directs it to the OTS Extension DLL. All the steps for handling the call (excluding transfer to human operator) are encapsulated in the Extension. While we have elected to use only one Extension, code may be separated into multiple Extensions that can call one another as many times as needed. Upon taking over call control the Extension checks the call_info which by default contains the DNIS/ANI captured from the telephone network subject to any additions and changes made by the control application. Based on the DNIS information an appropriate initial greeting and routing is established, and the caller is prompted to press 1 for sales or 2 for service, at the same time, the ANI is searched in the SalesLogix database to identify the caller. If there is no match, the caller is given an opportunity to manually key in the phone number associated with their account and upon a second failure is routed to the next available agent in the department they are calling. 13

14 If the call is for sales, a transfer to their account manager is attempted, if the manager is not available they are transferred to that person s voice mail. If the call is for service, the Extension checks the account for open support tickets. If there are none, the call is sent to the next service rep. If there are open tickets, the quantity and status of open tickets is played to the caller and they are then given the opportunity to transfer to the next support rep. In any case where a call is transferred to a live agent, the account record is automatically displayed on that agents screen. While this example barely scratches the surface of the potential sophistication that can be achieved, it is a solid example showing the flexible nature of the call prompting and scripting besides the direct data access from SalesLogix both on automated and live call portions. Outbound Example There is a check box on the control application to enable outbound predictive dialing. Our implementation is very simple compared to what is often done in a real outbound center. We continuously cycle through the numbers in the SalesLogix database. The system only dials when there is an agent logged in to the outbound campaign and is ready to receive calls. Upon call transfer to the agent, the called party record displays on the SalesLogix screen. If the call is not a live person it is not transferred to an agent, thus the benefit of predictive dialing. Supervisory/Administrative Example Aside from the control application already referenced above, we have included a simple agent monitoring interface. This program displays a list of all agents on the system and allows a supervisor to select on screen an agent to monitor or coach during a call. These applications may be easily expanded or replaced. Often times users will develop reporting suites to accommodate their unique needs. SalesLogix Integration Details The basic SalesLogix/SalesLogix Support integration provided by Hilltop Information Systems includes the following components: Softphone form embedded in the SalesLogix application OTS server & project login Automatic dialing of account/contact phone number with one click Manual dialing of phone numbers Ready button for Inbound ACD or Outbound Predictive calls Digital call recording initiated from SalesLogix application Automatic recording based on Boolean statement* Hold, Conference, Transfer* Quick phone books including personal speed dial (doesn t require SalesLogix account entry)* Recent call list (inbound & outbound)* * Pending at time of printing While the basic integration package is under constant improvement, it s a snap for you to customize it to your client s needs. This is an excellent opportunity to increase revenue for yourself and your client. If you prefer, we offer consulting services to enhance and customize the basic integration to spec. 14