Call center automation software integrates next-gen technologies like artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning and more to elevate customer experiences. This guide will explore the leading solutions to optimize your contact center operations.
Globally, there are over 3 million call centers with nearly 2 billion customer service calls handled every day. Call center automation enables meeting key service level targets in the face of such high volumes while maximizing productivity.
It also empowers your team to resolve more complex customer issues, resulting in increased first call resolution rates and higher customer satisfaction scores.
How Call Center Automation Drives Value
Transitioning to an automated call center powered by AI delivers quantifiable improvements across critical metrics:
- 75% reduction in average handle time
- 2x improvement in first contact resolution
- 15% increase in agent capacity
- 30% higher customer satisfaction (CSAT) scores
- 55% decrease in customer churn/attrition
Let‘s explore the top software solutions that can optimize your contact center operations.
Key Capabilities to Look For
When researching call center automation software, below are some of the pivotal capabilities to evaluate:
Conversational AI – Virtual agents and chatbots enable natural language conversations to handle common inquiries and self-service needs. This allows live agents to focus on complex issues.
Comprehensive Reporting & Analytics – Robust speech analytics provide customer sentiment analysis. Dashboards track KPIs like handle time, resolution rate etc. in real-time.
Flexible APIs & Integrations – Software with open APIs and an ecosystem of third-party integrations provide freedom to customize workflows.
Omnichannel Support – Connect and engage with customers across voice, email, SMS, social media, mobile messaging apps and more through a unified interface.
Intelligent Call Routing – Leverage skills-based routing, priority queuing and more to dynamically route calls to optimize outcomes.
Workforce Management (WFM) – smart forecasting, flexible scheduling, real-time adherence tracking and more to maximize staffing efficiency.
Now let‘s explore the top software solutions on the market that deliver these capabilities.
Leading Call Center Automation Software
Nice InContact CXone
Notable Features
- Speech analytics providing sentiment analysis
- AI-powered self-service with chatbots
- Highly customizable using low-code tools
- Skills-based intelligent omnichannel routing
- Flexible reporting with over 100 out of the box reports
NICE inContact CXone helps large enterprises infuse AI across the customer journey – from chatbots gathering initial details to agents being guided in real-time to resolve complex issues faster.
It brings conversational AI, actionable analytics and robust customization together in one platform. This enables highly personalized, seamless experiences across channels.
Genesys Cloud
Notable Features:
- Predictive routing and next best actions to enhance resolution
- Sentiment analysis from call transcripts with AI
- Employee experience analytics identifying coaching opportunities
- APIs and app store with over 500 third party integrations
- Scales to support tens of thousands of agents
Genesys Cloud leverages automation, AI and analytics to onboard customers faster, efficiently route them to appropriate agents and provide hyper personalized service.
The Conversation AI Genesys uses listens in on all calls to uncover insights to refine operations. It provides enterprise grade security meeting over 50 compliance certifications.
Bright Pattern Contact Center
Notable Features:
- Real-time speech analytics displaying emotional analysis of customers
- 100+ out of the box reports and custom reporting capabilities
- Omnichannel conversations persisting context across voice, digital channels
- Multiple workload distribution strategies – skills-based, geo-based etc.
- APIs for system integrators to customize workflows
Bright Pattern delivers an end-to-end cloud contact center platform combining simplicity for admins with sophisticated tools improving agent productivity.
It enables securely engaging customers across their channel of choice while optimizing back-end operations using AI-driven insights.
Other Leading Solutions
Here are several other popular options I recommend exploring:
RingCentral Contact Center offers IVR menus, intelligent call routing functions, and tools to track agent performance and sentiment analysis.
Omina ContactPro combines contact center capabilities with CRM and help desk functionality in an integrated suite.
8×8 Contact Center seamlessly brings together voice, team chat, analytics and robust integrations with business applications.
Agile CRM offers strong contact center features and is popular with smaller businesses given its simplicity and affordability.
Key Implementation Considerations
When preparing for deployment, below are some vital factors to evaluate:
On-Premises vs Cloud
Let‘s compare on-premises and cloud-based software:
| Factor | On-Premises | Cloud-Based |
|---|---|---|
| Upfront Costs | Higher for hardware/infrastructure | Lower with subscription model |
| Scalability | Limited and requires upgrades | Autoscaling to manage spikes |
| Customization | Very high control | Configurable though less control |
| Integration Effort | Can integrate with on-prem systems | Easy cloud SaaS integrations |
| Reliability & Uptime | Dependent on internal ops | 99.99% uptime guarantees |
Cloud-based systems lower initial investments and administration overheads. They also provide higher uptime and simpler scaling.
On-prem allow deeply customizing to existing infrastructure with maximum configurability. Hybrid models offer a balance where suitable.
Key Takeaways
Leveraging call center automation tools powers exceptional customer and agent experiences. AI-driven insights help managers continually optimize operations. Prioritize capabilities like conversational AI, actionable analytics and robust integrations during vendor evaluation.
What aspects of call center automation are you eyeing to transform customer engagement? What challenges do you foresee when implementing such software? Let‘s keep the conversation going!
