Multi-Mode Dialing – “creating more Hellos”

Manual dialing takes time and leads to ring-no-answer, busy signals, answering machines, etc.. Simply put, you rarely get through to the person you want. The call center industry, over the last two decades has created several solutions to try to address this issue. First were autodialers, however the lack of sophistication and control led minimal use; typically used for broadcasting messages only. Consumers became so frustrated with autodialers, they in turn embraced technologies and government regulation to combat abuse: caller ID, do not call lists, TSR regulations and zapper devices (that recognized the autodialer generated tones and responded as a network disconnect).

More advanced predictive dialers were created to fine-tune the call center capabilities by using computer based statistical control to govern the call process and comply with TSR regulations regarding outbound calling programs. These solutions improved the call center productivity and minimized agent costs and solved some of the basic abuse issues. However, what did we do to the real customer, the person answering the phone? What is their perspective of the predictive dialer/call center/outbound program? Did we address any of the other issues?

Have you ever received a call, said “hello” and then gotten the long pause? Why? The typical predictive dialer switches the call after receiving a short utterance, “hello” for example. The call center agent never heard you say “hello”. The agent is not sure what to say, so they usually mumble something to try to create a conversation flow. This does not create a powerful first impression. In addition, customers regularly screen their calls using caller ID or they use zapper technology to stop the predictive dialer calls. Multi-mode dialing addresses these issues and provides TSR compliance. Reduce call screening, eliminate zappers, eliminate the long pause!

DialTek outbound services include the multi-mode specialized algorithms and dialing capabilities; features that address all of these issues and increase your “hit rate” by magnitudes!

Five types of automated outbound dialing are available on the DialTek platform:

1) Preview: the client information is presented to the Agent and they decide when to process the call. This mode allows the Agent to prepare himself prior to the call.

2) Search: Primarily used to manage clients portfolios, this mode lets the Agent use specific search criteria to find applicable information prior to placing the call.

3) Progressive: Typically used for business to business campaigns, the dialing engine automatically dials the calls one at a time and sends them to the Agents as soon as the call is connected. The engine sends productive calls to the Agents and filters absent, busy and wrong numbers.

4) Predictive: The predictive dialer engine controls the dialing using an advanced algorithm, taking into consideration: response time, average communication time and the current state of the Agents. The predictive dialer software only sends productive calls to the Agents, greatly increasing their hourly talk time. The DialTek predictive dialer requires no minimum number of Agents or minimum number of leads in your call list for this dialing mode to operate efficiently and produce results. Predictive dialers are particularly valued for B2B prospecting telemarketing, telesales, appointment making or collections campaigns.

5) Broadcast: This mode allows you to automatically contact your clients or prospects by broadcasting a pre recorded message or an SMS; can be used for promotional offers, invitations or important information alerts.

Answering Machine Detection
The DialTek dialing engine can detect answering machines. The dialing engine allows you to automatically leave messages when an answering machine is detected and the system optimizes your telecom costs by scheduling answering machines callbacks in the most productive time slots.