ORECX CALL RECORDING BLOG

We hear all the time that small businesses comprise the backbone of the U.S. economy. The truth might be even more staggering than you think: According to the U.S. Census Bureau and the U.S. Small Business Administration, small businesses make up 99.7 percent of U.S. employer firms and are responsible for roughly half of the country’s economic output. What’s more, the SBA’s Office of Advocacy reports that small firms accounted for 63 percent of the net new jobs created between 1993 and mid-2013, with small firms in the 20-499 employee category leading in job creation.

And while small businesses may operate in a variety of different industry segments, what nearly all of them have in common is this: They have customers who call into their business, customers who require service, customers who provide the business with their source of profits. Is there a way to capture these important calls – to ensure that customer service representatives are performing properly, that customers are being provided with the highest level of service, and that the business is operating at its optimal capacity?

The answer is a resounding “yes,” through the power of call recording software.

As a small business owner or manager, it might be intimidating to think about a complex call/screen recording system, one that requires costly installation fees and hours and hours of training. It doesn’t have to be that way. Today, there are solutions that:

• Are economically affordable: Can be purchased for a little as (believe it or not) several hundred dollars.
• Don’t require technical expertise: Anyone can remotely install, operate, or manage the solution, with no special technical expertise or training required.
• Don’t need ongoing maintenance:  There’s no need for costly maintenance or troubleshooting.
• Can be up and running in less than (really!) 30 minutes.

For small businesses, call recording can offer peace of mind – not only that the quality of service you provide is top-notch but also that you are complying with any regulatory (such as PCI and HIPAA) requirements. That’s a vitally important capability, especially because fines for violations of these requirements can be financially crippling for small businesses.

Small businesses aren’t like large enterprises – and the needs they have for a call recording solution vary as well. If you’re ready to look into a call recording solution, make sure you take into account the following questions when selecting a provider for your enterprise:

1. Is the solution designed for a company of my size?
2. Will I have to pay for features really designed for a larger organization?
3. Can the solution scale to support my company’s growth?
4. Does the call recording vendor have experience with businesses in my industry?
5. Can the solution address my specific industry and regulatory requirements?

As a small business there really is no need to wait any longer.  Call recording solutions exist today that won’t break the bank and will provide you with the capabilities you need at a low total cost of ownership.

It is estimated that the UK call recording and quality monitoring market today is worth in the region of £2.0 billion according to industry estimates from two separate analysts Frost and Sullivan and Datamonitor. Frost & Sullivan forecasts that hosted agent performance optimisation (APO), which includes call recording, customer interaction analytics, performance and quality management, and workforce management, will have the strongest growth of any contact centre product segment. 

The industry continues to be fuelled by the ‘claim culture’ and as a result businesses are looking to be more accountable and have more control over the services they are delivering.  Governmental regulations in the UK also contribute to the rise in call recording adoption. The UK’s Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) mandates the recording and archiving of all phone calls dealing with orders, negotiation or arrangement of transactions in its financial services industry. These regulations drive the need for a secure, call recording solution that can capture and store 100 percent of calls.  This would enable brokerages to access specific calls if necessary to prove compliance with the government, upon request.

However, more and more everyday businesses are recognising value far beyond the regulatory protection call recording provides. Demand continues to grow as they discover that the mining of these calls reveals invaluable customer insight.  The widespread adoption of call management solutions has meant they have become more available at more competitive prices. Gone are the days when such systems were deployed solely in large enterprises. This means that these solutions are now accessible to not just large corporates, but to a huge SME market. Cost effective call recording together with innovation in call management solutions with Unified Communications and CRM integration has meant that this market is now taking advantage of powerful solutions that deliver real business intelligence.

Every business can now expect not only to achieve a return on their telecoms investment, but also when using call recording in conjunction with call analytics can expect to achieve excellence in customer service, thus creating a real point of differentiation from competitors.

Organizations of all sizes today employ call recording software to help optimize sales, service and compliance; and when chosen and managed correctly, these solutions can be invaluable in this regard.  However, call recording software is not always selected or utilized properly, and when this happens, its effectiveness can be significantly stifled.

Below is a list of the top 5 mistakes companies make when purchasing, deploying or managing a call recording software system:

1. Neglecting to try the software out first before purchasing it.  You wouldn't buy a car without first test driving it. The same holds true for call recording software.  You must install it in your environment and give it a test run before committing to a full purchase.  Not all call recording software providers offer such a trial, but some do. Demand that you get to trial the software upfront.

2. Ensuring it has the necessary compliance capabilities.  Most firms today fall under some sort of regulations - PCI-DSS, HIPAA, Telemarketing Sales Rule, etc. You want to be sure your new software supports these requirements with call masking/muting, e.g. to eliminate sensitive information from the call recording, or other capabilities.  

3. Not creating and saving specific search queries.  You should be able to develop highly specific search queries for pulling up all calls that meet certain criteria - such as all calls over five minutes that mention the word "cancel", or all calls involving support for a new product, etc. These search parameters need to be able to be saved and running in the background so these interactions are automatically cued for you for quick and easy discovery. Speech analytics software may need to be installed in concert with call recording software to bring these capabilities to life.

4. Not leveraging call recordings for the benefit of the full organization - There is no better way to tie your complete staff directly to the voice of the customer than by letting them hear the actual voice of the customer.  If you have a loud speaker in the office, notify all staff to listen for three minutes - once a week or so - while you play a good service call for them.  If you don't have a broadcasting capability, simply email a select recording to all staff and require them to listen to it, again, once a week or so. Almost no organizations today do this, but it's a fantastic way to tie the customer and all of your employees together.

5. Not ensuring the software has an open API or tested and easy integration to your PBX, CRM system, and so on. The last thing you want is a new solution that is very difficult to integrate with your current environment.  Be sure to ask for testing certifications from switch vendors, proof of a true open API, etc.  This is a very big pitfall that many organizations fall into.  Call recording vendors love to tell you that they can integrate seamlessly with any PBX but when push comes to shove it's a clunky, complicated, arduous and time consuming process.  You want to avoid all of this hassle at all costs.  It slows down your implementation, rings up your cost and creates a whole lot of unnecessary headache. 

Mobile phone recording software is designed to help businesses (particularly financial, insurance, doctors, real estate professionals, lawyers, etc.) capture their employees' work-related telephone calls in order to monitor for customer service, compliance, dispute resolution, order verification and so on. With recent FSA mobile phone recording regulations in the UK, more and more businesses in the U.S. are considering mobile recording software for all company-issued cell phones.

How many times have you taken a business call while out to lunch?  If your salespersons or customer service people or even your stock brokers are taking such calls, wouldn't it be nice to have access to those call recordings if a dispute were to arise, for example?  This is just one example of the tremendous value mobile phone recording software can provide to your business.

Below is a list of criteria to consider when deciding which mobile recording software to purchase:

What am I going to use this software for?

• Assess the performance of my customer service staff?
• Monitor the compliance and customer service of my sales and support people?  
• Ensure medical staff or financial personnel are not accidentally sharing personally identifiable information over the phone, e.g.?
• Capture and store calls for dispute resolution purposes?  If a customer claims he/she never authorized a credit card charge, you can pull the call and play it back for them to show they did in fact provide the necessary verbal approval.

Who do I want to monitor?

• Salespeople?
• Customer service/facing employees?
• Medical staff?
• Insurance agents?
• Financial/mortgage brokers?
• Real estate agents?
• Accounting staff?
• At-home workers? (many mobile workers will use their work cell phone as their primary business line while working remotely - even at home)

How easy is it going to be to implement the mobile recording software solution and get up and running with capturing mobile phone calls?

• Can the software capture both inbound and outbound calls? It better be able to.
• Are mobile call recordings treated the same as landline/VoIP calls? They should be.
• Does the system need to route calls off of the mobile network?  It shouldn't have to.
• Can the recording software handle landline, mobile and VoIP calls all in the same system?  It should be able to.

In this episode of Asterisk Live (by Asterisk), Bruce Kaskey, COO of OrecX joins the call to discuss voice recording with Asterisk. Bruce notes, "OrecX, which stands for 'Open Recording Systems', provides both open source and commercial versions of call recording and voice data software. OrecX solutions work in tandem with Asterisk to do passive, SPAN-based calling recording. This offloads the CPU of your Asterisk PBX allowing it to be able to handle more simultaneous call load. Additionally, OrecX provides data solutions that allow for screen capture recording. SMB Contact Centers can use screen capture in tandem with voice recording to train contact center agents.

Click below to view the entire webcast.

Call recording software can bring substantial value to any organization in the form of improved customer service, regulatory/industry compliance, order verification and dispute resolution capabilities.  In this piece we are going to focus only on the customer service and dispute resolution value of call recording.

When you capture customer calls (and agent screen activity), you have a goldmine of data to help you dramatically enhance your entire customer service operation. The reason is that these interactions are precisely where your company delivers its service.  These customer conversations with your agents are at the very center of your organization's ability to deliver a stellar customer experience. So not only do you want to record these interactions, but you also want to listen to what the recordings are telling you.

Here are the top 3 things you can learn from your recorded calls:

1. Which customers might defect and why - why not have each agent ask callers at the end of the conversation to rate the service given on a scale of 1-5.  With this information, your supervisors can review the calls of anyone who gave a score of 1-2 (possibly 3) and call them back if necessary to keep them from defecting.  You can also use these recordings to ascertain where the problem lies - was it due to poor agent performance, a correctable workflow issue, etc.

2. Which workflow processes need fixing - A dissatisfied customer might be the result of faulty workflow processes.  When supervisors listen to a sampling of calls (and view the screen recording) from each agent, they may discover workflow issues.  For instance, you might find that certain data (like purchase history) isn't populating properly on the agent's screen.  Perhaps there is an on-screen glitch in order processing and certain orders won't take and need to be resubmitted.  With the recordings, you will be able to identify such root causes of customer service disruption so you can work to correct them right away.

3. Who is at fault in a customer dispute (agent or customer?) - Customers often times say one thing and recall saying something else.  When this happens, disputes can occur.  With the specific recorded call at your disposal, you and the agent can listen to the interaction and determine precisely what was said.  If a customer did in fact provide authorization to charge his/her credit card, for example, you will hear it.  If he/she did not offer such approval, you will learn that too.

Before you purchase a call recording solution you need to be sure you receive adequate answers to a number of very important questions.  The right answers to these questions will ensure the system will fit your specific needs, will scale with you as you grow and will  interoperate with your existing environment. 

These are the questions:

1. Do I pay upfront as a capital expenditure or is there a subscription fee?

2. Do I have to sign a long term contract or simply pay as I go?

3. What does the implementation process entail? How long? How much involvement is required on my end? Do I need to have specific technical expertise?

4. Do I have to pay for all features and capabilities or can I select what I want? In other words, is it a single integrated solution or modular and I can pick and choose call recording, quality monitoring, screen recording, live monitoring, mobile recording, etc.?

5. Is there an open API so I can integrate with my other existing applications?

6. What PBXs does the system support?

7. What are the ongoing maintenance requirements?

8. What is involved in customizing the software to my specific look and feel, requirements, etc.?  Does it require your professional services support?

9. How many current users/customers do you have?  What countries are they in?

10. How do I know you will be around in three to five years?

11. Can I review some customer success stories?

12. Do you offer a free trial so I can test the software out in my environment before I purchase?

13. What type of training do you offer and how long does it take to become proficient with the software? Is it easy to learn?

14. How many channels/seats can your software support?

15. Can I use my own server(s)?

16. Does your software support multi-site? How about multi-tenant?

17. Can I speak with some satisfied customers?

18. Is your software PCI Compliant? HIPAA Compliant?

19. Are recorded calls portable in an open-file format?

20. Do you support TDM and VoIP?

21. What if I need to add more users? Do I need more hardware? What is involved?

22. Do you offer mobile phone recording?

While call recording software can add significant value to your customer service, compliance and risk mitigation efforts, there are certain rules an organization must live by with regard to its use.

Call Recording Do's:

1. Set-up pre-defined search queries for the specific types of calls you are looking for (e.g. all calls that result in a cancelled order).  The availability of this intelligence will help you make important decisions.
2. Notify all customer-facing staff and customers that their calls are being recorded.
3. Record your sales calls too.  It helps to have recorded sales calls on hand to share with others that are brought in on the deal and also they are invaluable for training new salespersons.
4. Keep a repository of best and worst calls to help train new agents or to improve the skills of existing ones. Store calls that span all different types of interactions, including calls that resulted in a closed sale, up-sell, cancelled order, dispute, unhappy customer, etc. 
5. Be sure the call recording system you choose can integrate with most leading PBXs.  You may choose to replace your PBX one day or you might merge with/acquire another company that has a different PBX and you'll want to be able to integrate with that switch as well.

Call Recording Don'ts:

1. Don't purchase a call recording solution that doesn't also offer quality monitoring/selective recording because you may need/want it later on and you'd hate to have to migrate all of your recorded data to a new platform that can offer it.
2. Don't purchase a call recording solution without first trying it out.  Like anything else, you want to be sure it works in your environment, provides you with the functionality you require and is easy to navigate and utilize. 
3. Don't purchase call recording software that doesn't offer an open API so you are assured it will interoperate with your existing and future applications.
4. Don't under-utilize the system.  Ensure all staff that can benefit directly from the system are successfully trained on its use and have access to recordings.  This includes staff from Sales, Marketing, your Executive team and so on.  They can all realize significant value from hearing the actual voice of the customer.
5. Don't dump recordings before a year if possible.  You will see as times goes by how valuable these past calls can be for training, dispute resolution, agent incentivization and so on and you'll want to have them accessible for these reasons up to 12 months down the road.

How do you know when it's time to shelve the old call recording software and purchase a new call recording solution?

There are several signs to look out for, some of which may seem obvious while others may not:

1. The product's end of life is coming up and will no longer be supported.

2. The product can no longer scale up to support your growing needs (channels, sites, etc.).

3. It cannot easily integrate with other software you are installing. 

4. It requires too many IT support resources to maintain the system.

5. You are heavy into M&A activity and the current system cannot support the multiple PBXs of the various merging entities.

6. It does not have the added capabilities you need, such as quality monitoring, screen capture, live monitoring or even mobile recording.

7. It costs a lot of money to bring on new users, sites and/or capabilities, and it requires expensive professional services support to do these things.

8. The software does not support all of the compliance requirements you have to deal with, such as PCI-DSS, HIPAA, Do Not Call, etc.

9. It is complicated to use and learn and takes too long to get new users up to speed.

2014 is right around the corner and now is the time to start thinking about your overall customer service capabilities, strategy and resource allocation. Do you have the right call recording and quality monitoring technology in place, for example?  Are you focused on the right metrics?

Below are several important statistics from this year to help you focus your efforts for next year so you can increase your overall customer satisfaction.

42% of service agents are unable to efficiently resolve customer issues due to disconnected systems, archaic user interfaces, and multiple applications. (Forrester)

89% of consumers have stopped doing business with a company after experiencing poor customer service. (RightNow Customer Experience Impact Report)

Consumers are 2 times more likely to share their bad customer service experiences than they are to talk about positive experiences. (2012 Global Customer Service Barometer)

Consumers still prefer telephone assistance the most - Phone (61%), email (60%), Live Chat (57%), online knowledge base (51%), “click-to-call” support automation (34%). (eConsultancy)

70% of buying experiences are based on how the customer feels they are being treated. (McKinsey)

Almost 10% of consumers have experienced being transferred from agent to agent without any resolution of their problem. (American Express)

A 10% increase in customer retention levels result in a 30% increase in the value of the company. (Bain & Co)

The probability of selling to a new prospect is 5-20%. The probability of selling to an existing customer is 60 – 70%.  (Marketing Metrics)

For every customer complaint there are 26 other unhappy customers who have remained silent. (Lee Resource)

On average, agents spend 11% of their time looking for information needed to manage customer interactions. (Aberdeen Group)

46% of contact centers identify improving agent productivity and utilization as a main objective. (Aberdeen Group)

Only 26% of companies have a well-developed strategy in place for improving the customer experience. (Econsultancy MultiChannel Customer Experience Report)

A good, inexpensive and easy to install call recording and quality monitoring system can help you address these and many more customer service needs.