A Practical Guide to Call Center Technology [Paperback]

Andrew Waite (Author), Andrew J. Waite (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 2002

Get the most out of ACDs (automatic call distributors) and other complex systems in order to boost customer satisfaction and increase sales Includes three ready to use RFPs (request for proposals) for buying an ACD, computer telephony system, or recording

'A Practical Guide to Call Center Technology shows how to navigate the business, technical, and financial issues in building and managing a customer contact center. It shows how to get the most out of ACDs (automatic call distributors) and other complex systems in order to boost customer satisfaction and increase sales.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Andrew Waite is a writer, speaker, and consultant on call centers. Andrew founded Inbound/Outbound Magazine, which later became Call Center Magazine. He has over 25 years of call center experience. He lives in Phoenix, Arizona.

Product Details

• Paperback: 497 pages
• Publisher: CMP; 1 edition (January 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1578200946
• ISBN-13: 978-1578200948
• Product Dimensions: 8.7 x 6 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.8 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #931,857 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #51 in Books > Computers & Technology > Computer Science > Software Engineering > Multimedia Information Systems
  • #62 in Books > Business & Investing > Marketing & Sales > Marketing > Telemarketing

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A STRATEGIC CALL TO CALL CENTER TECHNOLOGY, March 6, 2005

By 

John R. Vacca "Tech Write Independent Reviewer" (Pomeroy, Ohio) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: A Practical Guide to Call Center Technology (Paperback)

For most customer communications, the call of the customer contact center is the point of entry. Author Andrew Waite does an excellent job in this book of explaining the strategies, techniques and technologies to ensure that you get the most out of your telephone call portion of your customer contact center investment. Waite first goes on to explain a few parts and principles that affect the customer call center manager. Next, the author touches on staffing and the importance of adequate labor pools in the location you have chosen to operate your customer contact center. Then, Waite focuses on the telephone call component and the management of telephony workflow. Next, the author deals with the hardware, architecture and relationship between the components and subsystems of a switching system, which includes the automatic call distributor (ACD) system (of which the author acknowledges that there is no easy way to catergorize ACD systems). Then, Waite looks at the instruments used in the traditional call center.

So, as customer contact center managers become more sophisticated and mature in their role, according to the author, they grow to trust the machine data and, thus, need fewer comprehensive reports. Nevertheless, Waite points out one inteesting fact out of all this that is coming out of call center operations: Unless it is a pure direct sales respnse, most calls happen for less than positive reasons.

Finally, with the preceding in mind, Waite has done an outstanding job in this book of identifying the major trends within the customer contact center industry center around explosive technology growth. This has led to a growing library of open architectures with industry standard interfaces, more sophisticated tools reisding in smaller centers and more component applications involved in each transaction.

2 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Needed help, March 30, 2004

By A Customer

This review is from: A Practical Guide to Call Center Technology (Paperback)

I was promoted to run the call center in our company. We have two centers with 300 Telephone and Customer sales reps. I have no expernce in computers except for my PC. I bought this book to help me talk to the computer staff. They cannot fool me as much now. They were too busy for the call center. Now they understand we make most of the money. This book help me present this better.

3 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A solid, fact-filled, and highly useful guide, April 11, 2002

By 

Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: A Practical Guide to Call Center Technology (Paperback)

A Practical Guide To Call Center Technology: Select The Right Systems For Total Customer Satisfaction by telecommunications expert Andrew J. Waite is a highly informational book for businesspeople who need to set up a telephone system to handle customer orders, complains, and other important matters. Fielding long-distance calls from any number of people for good business is no small feat, and chapters from this guide address such diverse issues as basic connection and setup, typical switching systems, the value of an ACD (Automatic Call Distributor) system, and much more. A glossary at the back helps readers unfamiliar with the terminology catch up quickly...A solid, fact-filled, and highly useful guide for anyone who needs to launch an effective and efficient call center -- and keep it running smoothly!