CHANNEL REPORT Call and Contact Centres
AI and the Contact Centre
The Contact Centre is going through a huge transformation right now as consumer demands and
expectations on how they interact with businesses have never been higher. In this feature we take a look at
the Contact Centre market and how technology like Artifi cial Intelligence is fi nally having an impact
is the inconsistent and siloed
experiences across channels
that are all too common. For
organizations, resolving this
is often a huge pain point too,
especially if they think that they
need to rip and replace their
existing systems, rather than
evolving and integrating them
into one single, open uni ed
communications platform.
Many other common pain
points, like confusing selfservice
menus and tools, easy
access to assisted voice tools,
leveraging natural language
understanding and a lack
of personalised services can
stem from having this siloed
Matthew Clare, Director, Contact
Center Solutions at Mitel
According to Orbis
Research, in 2018, the
global Contact Centre
Market size was $27.7bn
and it is expected to reach
$40bn by the end of 2025, with
a CAGR of 4.7% during 2019-
2025. Other market estimates
puts this number much higher.
For Channel Partners, there
are still many challenges to be
solved. We asked our market
experts where they see the
biggest pain points for the
Contact Centre market.
Matthew Clare, Director,
Contact Center Solutions at
Mitel commented “I think the
biggest pain point for customers
approach, so resolving it should
be a key priority for contact
centres.”
Richard Kenny, Senior
Product Marketing Manager
– Contact Centre at Poly said
“Contact centres are facing three
key challenges: moving to the
cloud, data analytics to help
their understanding of omnichannel
and attracting and
retaining the best sta .
“Talent retention is a big
challenge in the contact centre
industry, with agent attrition
around 10% for small contact
centres and up to 25% for a big
organisation. With a cost of up
to £10,000 to replace an agent,
this can have a serious impact
on the bottom line, as well as
creating issues around agent
knowledge building, company
culture and quality of service.
“Breaking away from
traditional operating models
to meet the increasing demand
for exible working is key to
overcoming the talent challenge.
At Poly, we have achieved an
attrition rate of just 1%, in
large part because we equip
our agents with the tools and
headsets to work from home.
“Moving to the cloud brings
the exibility that organisations
need to create virtual contact
centres that allow agents to work
from anywhere, and also readily
adapt to peaks and troughs in
demand from customers. All
agents need is a reliable internet
connection and the best headset
for comfort and audio quality
for the optimum customer
interaction.”
Sunny Dhami, Senior
Director of Product Marketing
at RingCentral, added
“Queuing is by far one of the
biggest pain points of the entire
contact centre cycle. Let’s
face it, no one likes queuing –
whether it is in a physical store,
on the phone, or digitally in
a virtual queue. How contact
centres manage this queuing
experience can make or break
their business. A whopping
$62 billion a year is lost by
companies because of poor
customer interactions – and
research by CITE shows that
it requires ve times as much
e ort to win back a customer
than it does to retain them.
“ It is that rst experience,
when a customer picks up the
phone, or sends a message
that is vital – and it is the rst
response that sets the tone for
any further correspondence.
Businesses can ensure that
this rst interaction is the best
it can be by embracing new
technology. Digital platforms
are getting increasingly better at
simplifying the agent experience
and reducing queue times. e
solution is there, businesses must
simply start implementing it.”
Omni-channel experiences
We’ve been talking about it for
years, omni-channel contact
centres have been a focal point
24 | Comms Business Magazine | November 2019 www.commsbusiness.co.uk
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