Four Features For A Frosty February.

SpeechPearl 2000 From Philips

Philips Speech Processing, a unit of Royal Philips Electronics, recently made available a new version of its speech recognition engine for telephony systems. The SpeechPearl 2000 engine is designed to enable interactive voice response (IVR) systems to understand

people as they speak naturally, without having to use a specific sentence structure. Supporting 20 languages, the SpeechPearl engine is the heart of the company's SpeechMania voice platform. The host-based SpeechPearl engine integrates speech recognition technology into voice and IVR platforms, and is intended for telecom applications (e.g., automated directory assistance, voice access to White and Yellow Pages, messaging systems, voice portals and customer service call centers). It is also designed for use in call centers for a range of vertical markets, particularly ones with high customer service or transaction activity. This version includes support of open and closed grammars, allowing developers and integrators to build applications that either recognize any and all ways a request or statement can be phrased, or that only recognize specific sentence and question constructions.

The SpeechPearl 2000 engine can now interpret the meaning of a caller's request. Called "attribute semantics" by Philips, this capability focuses on associating a meaning with a request or statement, rather than just recognizing the individual words. The product has an ability to "accumulate confidences." Through this technique, words that have the same meaning can be assigned the same attribute, and then the system's confidences for each attribute can be accumulated. The result is that an application is very certain when it recognizes a statement and interprets its meaning. The SpeechPearl 2000 engine also enables systems to use mixed models" (whole-word and phonetic recognition methods employed simultaneously) to better understand complex statements. The technology also incorporates the acoustic patterns of speech samples from both landline and mobile phone environments, mixing the two to enhance recognition and improve accuracy. The use of these technologies is transparent to the application developer and does not require any extra programming. The engine can support vocabulary sizes up to 200,000 words per "lexicon' and can switch among lexicons during calls as needed. The SpeechPearl product family also includes a set of modules geared toward easing and streamlining certain development tasks and applications.

www.speech.philips.com

NewChannel: Hosted B2B Solution

The application service provider (ASP) model for hosted services and solutions holds great appeal for small- to mid-size e-businesses. Often overlooked are operational advantages that larger business-to-business companies could attain by Web-enabling their sales forces. NewChannel Inc. describes its solution as more than a "buy it and use it" sales tool, however. It provides a rapid deployment program designed to enable companies to utilize the solution in just a few days. NewChannel e-sales consultants work with clients, reviewing business models, examining Internet sales strategies and determining how best to utilize NewChannel to increase customer conversion rates. After developing a baseline view of a client's Internet business, it assists clients in developing proactive sales strategies and helps create customized qualification criteria that can help clients' sales forces quickly identify prospects most likely to become customers. During setup of the application, NewChannel provides assistance to ensure smooth integration with clients' existing systems, defines an Internet sales approach and develops associated tactics (phrases, scripts, customizing sales consultation invitations, etc.) based upon the established qualification criteria. Comprehensive training is provided along with regular reviews to ensure that positive results are realized from the customized long-term strategy.

www.newchannel.com

Emvolve Yourself For Managing Performance

Performix Technologies recognizes that, in the fast-paced environments of customer interaction and customer relationship management, one ingredient often absent from many CRM structures and strategies is the focus on improving individual performance, and the lack of linkage of reward to performance at the individual level. Performix believes you should manage people, not statistical averages, and focus on your business' goals, which should be shared across your organization. The company cites ancillary issues affecting contact centers: increasing complexity and skill sets, balancing productivity and quality, performance variations with the staff, the availability of a lot of data but little real (usable) information, etc. Performix addresses these points with Emvolve Performance Manager, its enterprise performance management solution that combines innovative information management techniques with proven performance management processes. Built on a single database architecture, Emvolve Performance Manager pro vides online third-parry system integration, is a single interface for users and a consolidated reporting tool for management. It is a scalable, interactive solution with open interfaces and Web-based distribution (Internet, Intranet and WAP). Using the product's configuration engine, you establish your business architecture: business rules, goals, organizational configuration, etc. The engine sources data from HR, payroll, skills data, e-mail and other business/data systems. Features include automated data capture, online performance review and feedback, pre-set objectives linked to business goals, "balanced scorecard" monitoring, and exception and trend reporting. Emvolve also provides individual development plans, an automated reward system linked to performance and an online review and appraisal mechanism.

Performix also offers a variety of consulting services that address the challenges and issues facing call center management. These services include business-driven programs that deal with service quality, cost and revenue growth; specialized call center services (e.g., resource planning, call deflection, performance management, etc.); and "generic" activities, such as operational reviews and technology evaluations.

www.performixtechnologies.com

TightLink Collaborative Communication Solution

In the view of TightLink Corp., existing e-mail and phone communication methods quickly break down as interactions involve multiple steps and participants. The net effects are decreased efficiency, increased costs and loss of retained customers. TightLink provides a Web-based, hosted solution that enables all participants to maintain interactive dialogs on a single, secure, shared page. The company sees e-mail as a static form of communication that necessitates multiple (and sometimes non-sequential) interactions that cannot be effectively tracked. TightLink leverages the Web's capabilities to provide trackable communications, collaboration, workflow and personalization. Not an e-mail support tool, TightLink was designed to permit your customers to easily define their help needs and questions. A tracking number is immediately assigned and automated business rules classify and route the request to the appropriate parties; e.g., partners, affiliates and customer service representatives (CSR). Customers can ret urn to an e-business' Web site at any time to view the current status of their request, seeing the most recent view of dialogs pertaining to the request as well as additional information that may have been attached to the service request. Web-based interaction management gives e-businesses the means to build relationships with partners and customers. Customers have control over their communications with the company. Similarly, when a request is fulfilled or additional information is needed from a customer, TightLink can notify the customer through e-mail, page or fax, and the customer is referred to his/her-request on the business' Web site. In the contact center, TightLink automates and simplifies many of the support tasks that operators are required to do today. Customer requests are automatically routed to the correct CSR every time, based on your defined business rules in the workflow engine. Operators always receive the highest priority service request based on your prioritization rules. Standardized res ponses, active query forms and software patches can be rapidly attached to a service request and routed to a customer. Operators can also modify and create information themselves to tailor solutions to customers. Should an internal discussion be necessary in resolving a request, TightLink allows a complete internal dialog to be associated with a service request, yet not be visible to the customer. Supervisory features allow for operational tracking.

The subscription-based service solution can tailor to any workflow model, requires no hardware or software to be purchased and can be implemented in one day.

www.tightlink.com