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Free ICMI Webcasts
Thursday, November 20, 2008; 11:00 am Pacific Time (2 pm ET)
Disasters and emergencies can happen -- fires, hurricanes, blizzards, earthquakes, floods, you name it. When they do, they can disable normal call center functions and cripple customer communications with your business. The consequences of such an occurrence could be catastrophic, having a tremendous operational and financial impact.
During this Webcast, you'll learn more about the link between Remote Agents and disaster preparedness, including ways to:
- Minimize immediate damage and losses
- Continue critical business operations, even during a crisis
- Minimize the duration of a serious disruption to operations and resources
- Facilitate effective co-ordination of recovery tasks
- Reduce the complexity of the recovery effort
Peter Lyons, Vice President of Information Technology and Judy Smythe, Director of Business Integration at Mediacom, will discuss how they created a disaster recovery plan that combined minimal costs and high availability to result in increased customer satisfaction. Rick Chin, Solutions Marketing Manager from Interactive Intelligence will discuss how companies can deploy a solution that meets the demands of affordability, standard compliance and high service levels.
Date: Thursday, October 30, 2008
Time: 11 AM PT/2 PM ET
Duration: 60 minutes
Presented By Genesys and ICMI
The Millennials are coming, and few businesses are prepared. Please join us for this complimentary webcast to learn about key customer experience strategies for addressing the needs of the Millennial generation.
Companies are having trouble keeping up with Generation Y consumers who are now setting the technology agenda. Since many companies are not taking steps to prepare, this presents an opportunity for those companies willing to differentiate themselves. And the steps you take today will help with your larger customer base, too.
Genesys sponsored new research from the Economist Intelligence Unit to survey senior executives around the world about their perspectives on this generation, and the steps they are taking to attract and retain them.
During this Webcast you will learn about:
- Top factors that motivate the Millennial generation
- How companies should serve Millennial customers in these troubled economic times
- Eight strategies for building customer loyalty
- How customer service is a competitive advantage
Featured Participants:
- Kevin Panozza, Founder, SalesForce Australia
- Eric Tamblyn, Vice President, Product and Solutions Marketing, Genesys
Date: Thursday, October 16, 2008
Time: 9 AM PT/Noon ET
Duration: 60-minutes
Presented By Genesys and ICMI
Customer service is on the brink of a new era. Recent advancements in standards have made long sought after goals in customer service a reality. Learn how leading edge companies are leveraging the SIP standard to enable dynamic customer service that brings the entire enterprise to bear on customer communication.
During this Webcast you will learn about:
- Major shifts taking place in the customer service world
- How the innovation cycle is disrupted by disconnects between departments
- Using SIP to reduce operating costs related to customer service
Featured Participants:
- Elizabeth Herrell, Vice President and Principal Analyst, Forrester Research
- Darryl Addington, Manager of Product Marketing, Genesys
Thursday, October 9th, 2008; 10 AM Pacific / 1 PM Eastern
The pressure of faster market launches for new products and services often means increased call volume for the contact center, and longer order-completion cycle times for customers. This is not a good formula for delivering positive customer experiences — or enhancing revenue.
In this special webcast, we will learn how to optimize customer contacts while simultaneously finding ways to accelerate cash flow by influencing the "Order-to-Cash Cycle", also commonly known as the revenue cycle or quote-to-cash cycle.
At this Webcast, you’ll:
- Obtain an overview of the Order-to-Cash (O2C) cycle and learn how to focus energy on the pieces owned by the call center, and acquire new responsibilities in areas you can excel in
- Get practical advice to make the call center a leader in driving enterprise efficiencies by improving the flow of customer data with the rest of the organization
- Explore ways to expand your contact center to play a more strategic role in areas like order placement or technical support after the sale
- Understand a framework you can use to create a more effective, efficient O2C process and why the contact center is in the best position to impact the process
- Learn which components of the O2C process, depending on your industry, are most suitable for outside service providers
Register here.
Tuesday, October 7th, 2008; 10 AM Pacific / 1 PM Eastern
Are you still using a traditional interactive voice response (IVR) system to handle customer calls? You can’t afford to give your high- and low-value customers the same mediocre experience, especially when your customers’ expectations are being constantly shaped and heightened by their interactions with other organizations. If your IVR can’t deliver a great customer experience, you’ll soon see the effects on your bottom line.
Join us for a complimentary Webcast to identify the challenges of self-service and to explore an easy-to-achieve approach to personalized service that will improve your customers’ experience and generate more revenue for your organization.
Insights from Datamonitor’s Ian Jacobs
The session will feature Ian Jacobs, senior analyst at Datamonitor, who will reveal key insights on why self-service has seen its challenges within the customer interaction world, as well as critical business trends, observations and results that you can’t afford to miss.
Create a Better Customer Experience
Genesys’ Mayur Anadkat and Voxify’s Dan Reed will show you how to create a strong customer experience using an intelligent Customer Front Door™. iCFD allows the IVR to identify callers using data from across the organization, assists them with unique, proactive services based on their intent, and routes them to the best live or self-service resource to meet their needs and your business goals.
You will learn about a new approach to contact center self-service that uses cross-channel customer data and existing infrastructure to:
- deliver a more personalized experience,
- determine relevant cross-sells and upsells to generate revenue, and
- proactively contact customers to effect transactions such as bill payment, prescription refills or flight check-in.
Speakers: Ian Jacobs, Senior Analyst, Datamonitor; Mayur Anadkat, Senior Product Marketing Manager, Genesys; Dan Reed, Corporate Vice President, Voxify.
Register here.
Thursday, September 25th, 2008; 11 AM Pacific / 2 PM Eastern
Unified communications is changing the face of how businesses communicate internally and with their customers. The contact center is a key part of that customer communication mix. Will the contact center continue its existence as a stand-alone island? Join Interactive Intelligence and Microsoft for this free Webcast to learn how Unified Communications and the contact center will successfully evolve together.
The presentation, followed by an expert online Q&A session, will include:
- How presence can be deployed across the entire enterprise to improve first call resolution
- How applications such as multi-channel routing, speech recognition, and interactive voice response can be utilized inside and outside the contact center
- How to plan for a migration to VoIP/SIP as part of a multi-step UC strategy
- How adding contact center functionality to Microsoft Unified Communication solutions (Microsoft OCS, Microsoft Dynamics" CRM 4.0, and more) can create a comprehensive solution
- Microsoft Unified Communications Overview
Register here.
Tuesday, October 7th, 2008; 9 a.m. Pacific Time/12 p.m. Eastern Time
Last year, more than 800 call centers worldwide participated in our Customer Service Week webinar. Join us for the fun this year, and help your agents understand why they are part of a true profession.
ICMI's Linda Riggs will host industry experts Rebecca Gibson and Wanda Sitzer. Your reps will be inspired and will gain tips on how to share their Spirit of Service with every customer they encounter. Plus, we'll announce the three winners of ICMI's Spirit of Service Award — given to frontline representatives who go the extra mile for their customers, company and co-workers!
In this year's celebration, we'll share with your agents:
- The importance of their jobs, and how their attitudes affect customers.
- How they can "drive" the conversation to success — even if the answers are not what the customer wants to hear.
- Three agents that exemplify the Spirit of Service — and how they stay motivated day after day.
Join customer service professionals from all industries around the world in celebration of their service to your organization.
Register here.
Tuesday, August 12, 2008, at 10 AM PST (1 PM EST)
SSPA member case studies show that customers satisfied with problem-resolution interactions are eight times more likely to remain loyal than those who are unsatisfied.
Join us for a live Webinar on August 12th to hear SSPA analyst John Ragsdale make a business case for improving the customer-support experience and how it directly translates to increased customer loyalty and corporate revenue.
We will also go behind the scenes of Everon, an award-winning support operation that has utilized GoToAssist¨ remote support to dramatically improve the customer experience and maintain a near 100% customer satisfaction rating.
Key Reasons to Attend:
- Hear from the SSPA about the increased visibility of support for the customer experience, customer loyalty and ultimately, customer revenue.
- Learn best practices for using remote support to improve the customer experience and track and report on customer-satisfaction levels.
- Learn the story behind EveronÕs near-perfect customer-satisfaction record and how they translate this into loyalty and revenue.
Speakers:
John Ragsdale,
VP of Research, The SSPA
Josh Clifford, CSO, Everon Technology Services
Todd Smith, Sr. Manager, Customer Insights, Citrix Online
Thursday, June 26, 2008 at 9:00 AM Pacific Time / Noon Eastern Time
According to a 2007 Forrester Research survey of business and IT
executives, 57% of respondents thought that their company's
telephone customer service was average, below average or poor. Today,
innovations across technology, process and people in this area have
reconfigured the economics and flexibility of phone-based customer
service.
As most companies struggle to find ways to provide superior customer
service experiences, a savvy few are already grabbing the "low-hanging
fruit" that has been there for the taking -- the clunky old phone
channel! By innovating in the phone arena, while unifying with other
channels, these companies are enhancing brand loyalty, extending their
competitive advantage and reaping operational benefits.
We'll Learn
- The gap between what customers say they want and what companies
provide
- The financial business case to invest in customer service
innovations and best practices
- Forrester and eGain benchmark data showing how far off companies
are in providing great customer service through phone and other
communication channels
- Checklists and self-assessment to get started
- Innovations and best practices exploited by industry-leading
companies to reinvent phone customer service
Featured Participants
- Dr. Natalie Petouhoff -- Senior Analyst, Forrester Research
- Don Muchow -- Senior Solutions Consultant, eGain Communications Corp.
Register here.
Thursday, June 26, 2008 at 9:00 AM Pacific Time / Noon Eastern Time
Have you ever wondered how to take your contact center to the next level of business communication? How your IP telephony solution can simplify everyday management tasks to empower you to reach record levels of efficiency, effectiveness and customer service? Join us to discover how to outpace the competition by harnessing the power of an all-in-one contact center platform, and expand the capabilities by utilizing easily customizable applications, including multimedia queuing, skills-based routing, interactive voice response, and more.
Discover how to:
- Shift the focus from quality policing to developing your contact center into a profit center
- Set record service levels by reducing transfers and abandons and empowering agents with immediate, real-time caller information
- Automate recording and reporting functions to improve revenue generating techniques
During this webinar you will learn how VEGAS.com tripled agent efficiency, processed nearly double the number of incoming calls, and increased per agent sales all while significantly reducing operating costs. Sound like a tall order? It's all possible with an all-in-one platform for IP business communication.
Register here.
Thursday, June 5th, 2008 at 9 AM Pacific Time/Noon Eastern Time
Interested in learning how Dell, the leading direct-sale computer vendor, delivers high-class customer service while balancing operating expense improvements and sales increases? Find out how the best-in-class technology provider leverages performance management to align individual employee goals with corporate objectives — creating a culture of continuous improvement.
Join us for a free webcast featuring Dell's Senior Manager of Global Reporting Aparna Fernandes and Merced Systems' Vice President of Business Consulting Matt Katz to explore best practices for creating a performance management culture in your operation.
You'll find out:
- How Dell utilizes performance management to automate all metrics, goals and employee coaching to ensure a closed-loop effort focused on the customer
- How Dell aligns company strategy with individual goals to boost operational performance
Register here.
What are the ingredients for delivering a perfect technical support experience with every interaction?
Hear first-hand how BigBand Networks developed a best-in-class support operation that maintains 100% customer satisfaction.
During this interactive Webinar you will:
- Hear Frost and Sullivan share industry research on how Better Support leads to a higher revenue experience, increased profitability and customer loyalty.
- Learn how to leverage remote support technology to create a customer experience that's intimate as well as efficient.
- Hear how BigBand Networks uses GoToAssist remote support to maintain 100% customer satisfaction quarter over quarter.
Our speakers for this FREE Webcast will be:
- Keith Dawson, Senior Analyst, Frost & Sullivan
- Keith Sommers, Director of Support, BigBand Networks
- Gretchen Nemechek, Product Marketing Manager, Citrix Online
Register here.
Thursday, March 13th at 9 AM Pacific time / Noon Eastern time
The evolution of the customer service contact center naturally grew from targeted technology solutions, beginning in the late 1970s with the invention of the first automatic call distributor (ACD). As requirements for handling customer contacts — both inbound and outbound — became better defined, high-tech companies focused on better and better enabling technology addressing very specific requirements, known today as "point solutions," or in the aggregate, "multi-point solutions." These multi-point solutions included popular names such as automatic dialers, call routing, call recording, interactive voice response (IVR), computer telephony integration (CTI), and many more.
Less than five years ago, astute design engineers began to realize that point solutions, though solving individual requirements very well, were a nightmare to install and maintain, usually requiring an army of IT professionals as well as expensive outside consultants. Thus, the birth of the "all-in-one" solution that arrived at the contact center fully integrated and ready for very ordinary professionals to install, and program, and maintain.
During this Webcast, you will hear Joseph A. Staples of Interactive Intelligence discuss:
- What are the functional differences between multi-point and all-in-one solutions?
- Is there a real cost difference between all-in-one and multi-point solutions?
- Are there hidden cost differences that matter?
- What is the true cost of ownership?
- Are there differences between all-in-one on-premise versus off-premise?
In addition to sharing his insights on these topics, Joseph will answer your questions about the cost comparison between all-in-one solutions compared to the alternative multi-point solutions.
Register here.
Thursday, February 28th at 9 AM Pacific time / Noon Eastern time
The companies that will thrive in 2008 will be those that retain customers. To do so, they will need to define and attain service goals that reflect the aims of customers. In short, successful companies will have to be customer-centric.
Are you ready to lead your organization toward customer centricity? During this Webcast, you'll learn from Bill Durr, author of the book Customer Centricity through Workforce Optimization, how combining quality assurance with customer feedback enables your company to retain not only customers, but also the agents and back-office personnel who are most skilled at assisting them.
In addition to sharing his insights, Bill will answer your questions during this Webcast about what you can do to achieve customer centricity across your business.
Register here.
Thursday, December 6th at 9 AM Pacific time / Noon Eastern time
Too many companies today rely solely on the monitoring of internal performance indicators to assess the performance of their contact center operations. It is imperative that these indicators be expanded to include external data gathered directly from the "Voice of the Customer."
According to Ken Landoline, Program Manager with the Yankee Group, "Post-interaction surveys and speech analytics are prime examples of under utilized technologies that can address the gap in service perceptions existing between the enterprise and the customer."
Attend this live, complimentary Webcast to hear Ken Landoline of the Yankee Group provide an overview of the methods and tools available to capture the Voice of the Customer in your contact center.
Mr. Landoline will share his findings on the best practices for implementing post-call surveys and speech analytics to ensure contact center performance optimization.
During this Webcast, you will learn about:
- The tools and technologies available to gather the Voice of the Customer;
- Contact Center trends for the implementation of customer feedback and analytics technologies and processes;
- Best practices and customer case studies for gathering customer feedback and analytics; and
- Suggested ways to raise the perceived strategic value of the contact center within the enterprise by leveraging the Voice of the Customer.
Register here.
Thursday, November 29th at 9 AM Pacific time / Noon Eastern time
You may not be able to prevent disasters, but you can mitigate their impact on your ability to assist customers.
At this Webcast, we'll outline the essential components of a viable business continuity plan for your customer care team. Through real-life examples, we'll describe how a flexible approach to technology implementation – including hosting – and a flexible approach to staffing can ensure that your company is available to customers who depend on you the most.
Whether you're preparing a business continuity plan for the next holiday season, or for years to come, you'll find this Webcast to be a valuable starting point for enabling your company to sustain its commitment to customers, even in the most challenging circumstances.
Register here.
Thursday, November 15th, 2007 at 9 AM Pacific time / Noon Eastern time
Want to ensure customer service is a valuable contributor to your organization, and not a cost of doing business?
To do so, you have to make a compelling case within your organization for why your customer care team is the most important source of intelligence about the people you serve.
You also have to demonstrate how, by applying this insight in the design and delivery of a more meaningful experience, you advance your company's strategic goals for building deeper and more lasting customer loyalty.
At this Webcast:
- We'll advise you on how to convey the strategic value of your customer care team throughout your organization, including among your colleagues in sales and marketing; and
- We'll reveal how you can influence the way your company defines goals for attracting, as well as retaining, customers.
Register here.
Thursday, November 1st, 2007 at 9 AM Pacific time / Noon Eastern time
Think enabling agents to work from their homes is a risky venture for your customer care team?
You may be surprised to learn that at-home agents have become mainstream in many companies. What's more, they're typically among the top performers and longest-tenured agents in call centers that employ them.
At this Webcast, featuring a case study from Horizon Air, you'll learn how to combine the latest technological resources, including IP telephony applications, with proven methods of identifying which members of your team have the skills and traits that characterize effective at-home agents.
Register here.
Thursday, October 11th, 2007 at 9 AM Pacific time / Noon Eastern time
Think coaching agents has an impact on your operation?
At this Webcast, we'll demonstrate the powerful impact quality has not only on the performance of your call center, but also on the performance of your entire company.
In addition to presenting the latest research on best practices in coaching, we'll share a case study about how a holistic approach to performance management enabled American Express International to establish a consistent coaching and development program for more than 3,000 agents worldwide to drive continued improvements in customer experience.
Register here.
Tuesday, October 2nd, 2007 at 12 noon eastern.
ICMI's own Debbie Harne will host industry experts Bob Furniss and Wanda Sitzer (who both began their careers as agents). Your reps will be inspired and will gain tips on how to share their Spirit of Service with every customer they encounter. Plus, we'll announce the three winners of ICMI's Spirit of Service Award – given to frontline representatives who go the extra mile for their customers, company and co-workers!
Join us October 2 at Noon Eastern time. There is no cost to attend.
Enroll your team today!
Thursday, September 27th, 2007 at 9 AM Pacific time / Noon Eastern time
Why is it that so many companies, despite their best efforts, perpetuate a wide gap between how they evaluate the quality of their service and how their customers actually perceive it?
At this Webcast, we'll reveal some of the underlying causes of this gap, and we'll outline a customer-centric workforce optimization plan you can use to help bridge the gap within your organization.
This Webcast offers a rare opportunity to gain actionable insights into how you can balance your company's goals with your customers' expectations.
Register here.
Thursday, September 20th, 2007 at 11 AM Pacific time / 2 PM Eastern time
Do you have the power to resolve technical issues with one contact – every time?
While many support organizations primarily focus on conventional performance metrics such as service level and cost per call, SSPA research has shown that increasing first contact resolution by 5 percent can save over $2 million a year.
Join us for a live Webinar on September 20 to hear SSPA analyst John Ragsdale make a business case for improving first contact resolution and explain how it links to significantly reduced operating costs and increased customer loyalty.
During this Webinar you will learn how:
- Remote-support technology is a key contributor to increased first contact resolution,
- Quality-monitoring tools ensure that representatives are properly following prescribed support procedures and
- Using Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) can improve your support center's efficiency.
Register here.
Tuesday, August 28th, 2007 at 11 AM Pacific time / 2 PM Eastern time
Phone-based automated customer service applications are a part of our everyday lives, and voice automation is becoming a more popular offering than ever.
But many questions can and will come up when your company considers adding voice automation to its customer service strategy. What's your return on an investment in speech? Where can you benefit the most? And the most basic questions of all are: Does it work and will my customers use it?
During this Webcast you will learn about:
- The best applications for speech,
- The evolution of speech applications, and
- When and how to add speech to your customer service.
Register here.
Thursday, August 23rd, 2007 at 12 noon Eastern time
This Webcast will outline the latest advances in real-time speech analytics and reveal how this technology can help fulfill two key goals: to retain customers and to enable agents to communicate better with them.
You'll learn how real-time speech analytics can empower agents to resolve issues correctly the first time and help you discover previously hidden best practices that distinguish top performers on your customer care team. You'll also find out how real-time speech analytics can enable you to identify immediate opportunities for your overall organization to assure customers' long-term loyalty.
Key speaker: Donna Fluss, Founder and President, DMG Consulting.
Register here.
Thursday, August 16th, 2007 at 12 noon Eastern time
Do you assume customers hate interactive voice response (IVR) systems and always want to press "zero" to speak to live agents? Think again.
What customers really care about is whether you can offer the right balance between live service and automated service.
At this Webcast, we'll show you how to achieve this balance. You'll learn how to establish a deployment strategy – combining IVR, speech recognition and automated notifications – to ensure customers use their time communicating with your company as productively as possible.
As we'll demonstrate, the more you can help customers be productive in their interactions with your company, the more productive agents – and your entire company – become as well.
Featured speakers include Robert Cate, Director of Contact Center Operations with Vegas.com, and Ken Landoline, Program Manager with Yankee Group.
Register here.
Thursday, April 12th, 2007 at 9 AM Pacific time / 12 Noon Eastern time
Ten years ago, the decision to consolidate call centers meant bringing agents into one brick-and-mortar structure. That was Call Center Consolidation 1.0.
Today, you don't need to have agents under the same roof to get the benefits of consolidation. In fact, your operation can be globally distributed, can combine in-house and outsourced agents, and still reside on one unified platform hosted within your enterprise or by a service provider. Consolidating the technology that agents use is the best way to give your organization the flexibility to rapidly deploy agents and applications wherever and whenever you need them. That's Call Center Consolidation 2.0.
At this Webcast, we'll show you how to apply the strategy of Call Center Consolidation 2.0 within your organization – whether you maintain multiple sites, employ at-home agents, deploy agents offshore or collaborate with outsourcers. We'll outline the bottom-line business benefits of Call Center Consolidation 2.0, including reduced total cost of ownership and greater customer satisfaction.
Plus, we'll share examples of how Call Center Consolidation 2.0 works in real-world companies. This Webcast is interactive, and we invite you to come with questions for our expert panelists about how you can prepare your organization for the next wave in customer care.
Register here.
How to Build a Superstar Workforce and Still Be Selective
Wednesday, April 4th, 2007 at 9 AM Pacific time / 12 Noon Eastern time
Hiring a superstar workforce of agents requires a one-two punch.
First, you need effective recruiting practices to build a pool of quality applicants. Second, you need effective assessment techniques, such as objective testing and structured interviews, to identify superstar talent.
At this Webcast, you'll gain insights and you'll hear practical examples from call centers that use proven methods to attract top-performing agents. You'll learn how to:
- meet challenges of recruiting agents in geographic areas that are saturated with call centers,
- put together a successful employee referral program and
- select the best agents for your call center.
During this Webcast, we'll provide a complimentary white paper to all attendees. We'll also dedicate plenty of time to Q&A, and we invite you to come with your questions for our panelists. Remember – free advice from the experts is hard to find.
Register here.
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