Automating the call scoring process with speech analytics

Speech analytics used to be a big, intimidating, expensive undertaking, offered only by the call recording industry giants.

Now we've seen 8 or more other call recording vendors release their version of speech analytics.

Almost all of them have decided to invest in a technology from the UK rather than developing their own product - including my company, CSI.

It's a good business decision -- why reinvent the wheel when an existing, proven technology is out there with OEM / white label availability. Saves time and resources.

Some of the call recording companies have decided to just go to war with the same out-of-the-box vanilla features which come with the API.

A few, like CSI, have fully integrated the speech engine within their own optimization suite.

Some have taken it a step further and created unique, differentiating features. One such feature is the automated scoring feature from Virtual Observer Call Insight.

As soon as a call is indexed by the phonetic speech engine, Call Insight scores the call based on scoring forms built by the customer.

10,000 calls recorded on tuesday? 10,000 calls are scored.

It's pretty dramatic when compared to a live supervisor, who can score, maybe, 30 calls a day. Of course, you'll still want to use a supervisor to evaluate your most important calls. The speech technology can also help you more efficiently identify which calls are those "most important calls".

The automated scoring process works best in a script adherence format, where questions can be answered with either a true/false or yes/no type of answer. Most existing scripts can be refashioned into workable scripts for Call Insight to do it's thing.

It's extremely powerful for telemarketers, who are typically script-driven to begin with, but as we're seeing with more and more different types of implementations, it can be applied in many different industries across many different types of contact centers.

Leading Publisher Leans on Call Recording System For Training New Reps

HarperCollins Publishers is one of the world’s leading English-language publishers. Headquartered in New York, the company is a subsidiary of News Corporation.

HarperCollins was founded in New York City in 1817, publishing a range of Bibles, atlases, dictionaries, and reissued classics, expanding over the years to include legendary authors, such as H. G. Wells, Agatha Christie, J. R. R. Tolkien, and C. S. Lewis. In 1987, as Harper & Row, it was acquired by News Corporation.

Founded in 1819, William Collins & Sons published a range of Bibles, atlases, dictionaries, and reissued classics, expanding over the years to include legendary authors, such as H. G. Wells, Agatha Christie, J. R. R. Tolkien, and C. S. Lewis. HarperCollins has publishing groups in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia/New Zealand, and India.

Today, HarperCollins is a broad-based publisher with strengths in literary and commercial fiction, business books, children’s books, cookbooks, and mystery, romance, reference, religious, and spiritual books. Consistently at the forefront of innovation and technological advancement, HarperCollins is the first publisher to digitize its content and create a global digital warehouse to protect the rights of its authors, meet consumer demand, and generate additional business opportunities.

"At HarperCollins Publishers, Virtual Observer has become an important means of training our new customer service reps as well as keeping the experienced ones up to par. We use the VO system to demonstrate how a call could have been handled differently, and we share calls that were handled excellently as a training tool. The system is a must for companies that are serious about proper and professional customer service."

- Roberta Clemens, Manager, Customer Service
HarperCollins Publishers

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Call Recording / Monitoring also beneficial to Marketing and Development Teams

For over twenty five years, Baudville has been an integral part of recognition programs and practices in organizations across the country.

Baudville provides recognition products and expertise to businesses, schools, hospitals and non-profit organizations.

Kurt Carlson, Director of Sales for Baudville, recognized Virtual Observer as a key component in the success of their call center operations.

"If you run a call center, you probably already know the value and importance of remote monitoring calls for coaching, development and training. However, as a catalog direct marketer, the impact of Virtual Observer has been immeasurable when we’ve used it to play portions of calls for our Marketing team and Product Development teams."

"This has happened in three major ways: 1) Hearing how customers misinterpret catalog copy that could be written more clearly; 2) Understanding how customers use the product has given insight into new product ideas, upsell opportunities, or different ways to present the product in pictures, and lastly 3) insight into how well the product training is retained and presented to customers by CSRs," Kurt added.