A GENESYS WHITEPAPER > Genesys Outbound Contact

Genesys Outbound Contact Solution

A software solution integrated into the Genesys suite that enables contact center managers to create, modify, run and report on outbound campaigns for a variety of customer outreach efforts such as collections, telesales, market research and proactive customer contact. A GENESYS WHITEPAPER

Notice Although reasonable effort is made to ensure that the information in this document is complete and accurate, Genesys Telecommunications Laboratories, Inc. cannot assume responsibility for any existing errors. Changes and/or corrections to the information contained in this document may be incorporated in future 1

A GENESYS WHITEPAPER > Genesys Outbound Contact

Executive Summary
The growing strategic value of contact centers can be seen in the rise of outbound interaction traffic over the last few years. Driving this increase are primarily customer retention and customer win-back outbound activities, which complement the traditional outbound customer acquisition efforts. With its open, software-based architecture tightly integrated into a comprehensive contact center suite, Genesys Outbound Contact is an optimum solution delivering maximum customer-care support at the lowest possible costs. This white paper provides an in-depth look into the Genesys Outbound Contact solution to enable contact center managers to develop and deploy a comprehensive customer-care solution that ties together distributed-agent resources, heterogeneous contact center environments, multiple applications and data sources, and agent desktop tools into an efficient contact center with a centralized single point of reporting, monitoring and control.

Genesys Outbound Contact Solution

Outbound Contact solution is one of a broad suite of Genesys contact center solutions that includes powerful voice selfservice, assisted-service for every communication channel, flexible integration options and management insight systemsall linked on the most open platform to deliver exceptional contact center and customer service capabilities.

Outbound Business Objectives

Managers responsible for a companys outbound customercare and marketing tasks face a variety of technical, logistical, and business challenges, including: Meeting the growing demand for customer outreach programs throughout the customer life-cycle including customer acquisition, customer retention and customer win-back Developing and executing outbound campaigns that can be easily adapted to rapidly changing business and market needs Maximizing customer satisfaction by broadcasting personalized, highly relevant notifications such as utility outages using virtual agent applications Maximizing agent productivity while maintaining service levels Integrating third-party customer-care applications such as CRM (Customer Relationship Management) and other business applications (for example, billing) into the contact center system Integrating with heterogeneous Interactive Voice Response (IVR) systems Implementing so-called forklift upgrades systemwide when the existing outbound contact center outgrows the existing hardware-based dialer Managing diverse hardware platforms, software applications, and front-end and back-end office tools to consolidate outbound business objectives and create a dynamic contact center Developing support for distributed call centers (in remote locations) that must individually function within varying organizational structures and under different management styles

Figure 1: Genesys Integrated Contact Center Suite The Genesys Outbound Contact solution provides: A software-based predictive dialer for various dialing modes including progressive, predictive, and preview to meet different business requirements Flexible and customizable campaigns, contact lists (calling list) format, record prioritization, campaign agent-group assignments and agent scripts integration Routing to optimize contact center performance Blending capability allowing inbound calls to overflow to the outbound call center during peak hours to maintain service levels and maximize agent productivity Rich set of treatments, for rescheduling/redialing unsuccessful interactions (calls) Unified platform for inbound and outbound call center monitoring and reporting Comprehensive and customizable real-time and historical reporting in tabular and graphical form Fully open customer interaction database for uploading and downloading calling lists with call results and business data Rich set of APIs for desktop and third-party customer-care (CRM) application integration Centralized management that supports remote starting/stopping of solution, configurable system alarms, and logging requirements Support for a wide variety of PBXs, operating systems, and databases that cater to specific call center needs

A GENESYS WHITEPAPER > Genesys Outbound Contact

Software-Based Predictive Dialer Integrated with Contact Center Suite

With its flexible and open software architecture, Outbound Contact solution can be implemented in contact centers with as few as eight to thirty outbound agents or thousands of agents. It can also support multi-departments and multi-site contact centers. Because of its scalability, contact center managers can invest in Outbound Contact solution knowing that it will grow with their enterprise. Tightly integrated into the Genesys suite, Outbound Contact solution maximizes agent productivity with predictive dialing, eliminating agent dead-time spent dialing. Tight integration into the suite also naturally enables blending, where Outbound Contact automatically adjusts its pacing as inbound calls are redirected to outbound agents. Additionally, the integrated solution with unified reporting provides unparalleled management and control across the entire contact center.

lists that can be weighted differently to optimize business results. Filters can be applied to lists to select the persons to be reached in a particular campaign. Record chaining provides for multiple phone numbers for the same customer, for example, home phone number, work phone number and mobile phone number. Each chained record has its own time zone and can have its own business result. Depending on business volume, a campaign can be assigned to one or multiple outbound/blended agent groups. Contact center managers can assign one agent group for a low-volume campaign or multiple groups for a high-volume campaign. For maximum flexibility, Outbound Contact supports sequencing of running campaigns. Only one campaign per campaign group can be running at a time, but multiple campaigns can be loaded into memory. As soon as a campaign is stopped, the next campaign starts automatically. Once the new campaign has started, the agents working in the group are notified. If new agents log in to the group after an outbound campaign has started, they are informed of the name and status of the currently running outbound campaign.

IP-Ready
Whether the infrastructure is pure IP, hybrid or TDM, the software-based Outbound Contact solution seamlessly integrates with the infrastructure, enabling the contact center manager to focus on tuning the overall contact center strategy, not the transport layer. Outbound Contact solution can be configured to use call progress analysis provided by the switch, by a VoIP Gateway, or by Genesys Call Progress Detection (CPD) server.

Agent Training and Scripts

With the Genesys Agent Scripting tool, contact center managers can design call flows and text to the agent desktop to guide agents through the interactions. Scripts are associated with lists and campaigns in the Configuration Management Environment (CME) and process flows can be launched automatically when running an outbound campaign. Campaigns and lists can be associated with agent scripts built using the Genesys Agent Scripting tool. When scripts are assigned to the calling list or campaign, as soon as Outbound Contact solution connects to a live person, the attached data and the appropriate agent script are delivered to the agent desktop. The agent scripts support suspension and resumption of process flows to allow for call transfers between agents, interruption of calls and callbacks.

Flexible and Customizable Campaign Design

Outbound Contact solution provides flexible campaign configuration and management tools that are easily adapted to contact centers with different business needs.

Campaign Optimization with List and Record Prioritization

Outbound Contact solution provides several levels of controls to prioritize lists and records for dialing. At the campaign level, priorities can be set by record type. Outbound Contact solution uses General, Campaign Callback and Campaign Rescheduled record types for prioritization. Prioritization among multiple lists of a campaign is done by weights. Each list is assigned a weight, typically ranging from 10 to 100. Lists with higher weights have higher priority than lists with lower weights. Outbound Contact neglects lists with 0 (zero) weights. Alternatively, lists can also be deactivated by unchecking the Active checkbox.

Figure 2: Genesys Outbound Contact campaigns With Outbound Contact solution, a campaign is a flexible master plan that organizes calling lists for dialing calls and handling the call results. The campaign consists of multiple

A GENESYS WHITEPAPER > Genesys Outbound Contact In addition to record type priorities and list weights, Outbound Contact solution also provides control on filtering and prioritization within the list by flexible, user-defined filters. Filters are defined as Structured Query Language (SQL) clauses and leverage full power of the underlying DBMS to define ordering and criteria. This provides very flexible way of prioritizing records within the calling list for campaign optimization. It is possible to use stored procedures and database queries for additional data to define the filtering criteria and the order within a list. For example, a single filter can prioritize business numbers over home numbers depending on the weekday and time. Create chained records in a list Move records among calling lists that have the same table format and exist in the same database Browse calling lists, campaign groups, and their components: o Use dialing and viewing filters to select records by a particular criteria OCM can automatically save a viewing filter when the user leaves the current calling list. When the user reopens the list, OCM retrieves and displays the filter View the relationships among campaigns, agent groups, and calling lists Start and stop campaigns Genesys Outbound Contact solution enables continuous operation of the Outbound Contact Server (OCS) even if OCM stops. As soon as OCM restarts, OCS updates it with current campaign status Manage campaign sequences Monitor current status of outbound campaigns Update Do Not Call (DNC) lists with data from external sources Prioritize records for dialing by record types o o

Campaign Operation and Management

Campaign operation and management involves loading, starting, unloading, and stopping campaigns and changing dialing modes. Outbound Contact Manager (OCM) provides the contact center supervisor with a Graphical User Interface (GUI) to conduct such operations. OCM enables call center managers to perform following tasks: Manage calling lists: o Import/export calling lists o Add, modify, and delete records in a list

Figure 3: User-defined filters for calling lists showing selection and ordering of records 4

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Dialing Modes
Outbound Contact solution supports three dialing modes: preview, progressive, and predictive. All three are applicable for blended contact centers. In progressive and predictive mode, Outbound Contact Server (OCS) actively dials outbound calls, engages call progress detection for all calls, and transfers successfully connected calls to available agents. The difference between the progressive and predictive dialing mode is the pacing algorithm, that is, the speed with which calls are dialed out depending on agent availability. In preview mode, neither the predictive algorithm nor call progress detection is engaged. The Outbound Contact Server acts as a list management server and distributes call records to an agents desktop application on agent request. Using the desktop application, the agent previews customer information about the purpose of the call and initiates an outbound call from the application. The application that is enabled or popped to the agents screen with CTI capability tells the PBX to initiate the outbound call from the phone set belonging to the agent. After the call is completed, the agent can use the desktop application to notify Outbound Contact Server to update call results.

In progressive mode, the number is not dialed unless there is an agent available and no calls are in the queue. Progressive dialing ensures that an agent is available for every live customer reached and therefore typically results in lower overall agent utilization compared to the predictive mode. In predictive mode, Outbound Contact Server (OCS) continuously monitors agent activities, collects statistics, and predicts future call traffic in the contact center. Then the server paces outbound calls accordingly as call traffic rises and falls in the contact center. The dialing algorithm utilizes a group-pacing approach based on the assumptions that outbound calls are dialed for a group of agents and that distribution of connected calls between agents depends only on agent availability (that is, all agents in the same group are assumed to have the same skill set). In predictive dialing mode OCS typically dials more calls than there are agents available in the group at the moment. The predictive dialing algorithm closely monitors agents behavior and does pacing calculations based on the many parameters measured in real time, such as: Talk Time (for both outbound and inbound calls) Not Ready Time Wrap-Up Time Hit rate per campaign (percentage of live answered calls over total dialed calls)

Figure 4: Outbound Contact Manager showing Campaign list view with dialing filter, viewing filter and records with dialing results 5

A GENESYS WHITEPAPER > Genesys Outbound Contact detection. These ports are freed up immediately on transfer and can be used for other calls. In the Active Switching Matrix (ASM) mode, calls are placed in 2 directions:: an internal call from the Dialogic board to the agent desktop (an engaging call), and an outbound call from the Dialogic board to the PSTN.

Number of currently queued calls (both inbound and out bound) Inbound traffic volume for the last minute Number of available agents logged in the group Number of available call classifiers (Intel Dialogic ports) or internal PBX call-classification devices Hardware configuration limitations (for example, maximum number of dials per second) Optimization parameter (Overdial Rate, Busy Factor or Average Wait Time In Queue) Goal value of the chosen optimization parameter

Outbound Contact Server (OCS) can support an unlimited number of agent groups, each of which has its own independent dialing engine; that is, each group can run its own outbound campaign with its own pacing based on real-time campaign-specific statistics. OCS, by default, considers all agent groups it works with as blended groups, immediately adjusting pacing when Genesys Routing or switch ACD/CDN software routes inbound and outbound calls to a group assigned for a campaign.

CPD Server connects these two calls when it is time to establish a call between an agent and a dialed number. The Active Switching Matrix (ASM) mode typically provides the following: Eliminates unacceptable delays in the time between when a customer picks up the phone and the call is connected to an agent Avoids lack of support for call transfers Eliminates force-tone problems that allow a customer to hear a signal intended only for an agent, such as when a signal alerts the agent that a call is transferred

Call Progress Detection

Accurate and fast call progress detection is vital to the performance of any outbound solution. Genesys Outbound Contact can leverage existing switch capabilities for call progress detection. Optionally, Genesys Outbound Contact solution can be configured with the Genesys Call Progress Detection (CPD) server. This server uses the Intel Dialogic hardware to perform call progress detection for outbound calls. CPD Server, as the dialer, interfaces with Outbound Contact Server and the Intel Dialogic hardware. Call progress detection typically detects live person answer, busy, answering machines, fax machine and various tones. Intel Dialogic hardwares default setting is designed to detect 74 out of 76 unique busy/congestion tones used in 97 countries as specified by CCITT Rec. E., Supplement #2. The Intel Dialogic hardware default uses both frequency and cadence detection; however, frequency only can be selected for faster detection in specific environments. Transfer Mode or Active Switching Matrix Mode CPD Server can operate in Transfer mode or in Active Switching Matrix (ASM) mode. In the Transfer mode of CPD Server, the Dialogic board connects to the switch through an analog connection or a digital lineside connection. CPD Server instructs the Intel Dialogic board to dial outbound calls, perform call progress detection, and transfer calls to an Automatic Call Distribution (ACD) queue or routing point, which eventually distributes the calls to an available agent. The primary benefit of the Transfer mode is that dialer ports are used only for placing the call and performing call progress

Routing
Genesys Universal Routing can route outbound, inbound and all other interactions. When setting routing strategies for outbound, the only constraint is that outbound calls should be routed immediately and cannot wait for the agent. Routing is supported in progressive and predictive dialing modes. Routing to the best available agent can improve contact center effectiveness. Defining multiple routing targets with zero wait time can ensure that the called live person is connected to an agent immediately, while ensuring that the call is routed to the best among the available agents. To achieve optimum agent utilization, a routing strategy based on inbound service levels can be applied. As soon as service levels fall below a certain threshold, inbound calls could be redirected to outbound agent resources. Also, routing can be used to meet the FTC requirement that calls not connected to an agent in two seconds must be redirected to an IVR announcement to play a recorded message.

Blending
Contact center performance can be optimized by balancing inbound and outbound calls into and from the contact center. This balancing process is called "Blending." With its ability to monitor all agent resources in real-time, Outbound Contact solution can automatically adjust the dialing pace according to the agent availability to achieve optimum agent utilization.

A GENESYS WHITEPAPER > Genesys Outbound Contact The simplest blending is when all inbound and outbound calls are directed into one ACD queue; more sophisticated and optimized blending will typically involve setting up routing strategies. For an agent operating in a blended contact center, it is vital to immediately identify whether the delivered interaction is an inbound or an outbound interaction. Genesys Customer Interaction Management (CIM) platform identifies the interaction in real-time and this information can be easily displayed to the agent desktop. While blending can optimize overall contact center performance, it requires a higher level of skills from the agent. Therefore, a best-practice approach is to split agents into three groups: Inbound to handle inbound calls only Outbound to handle outbound calls only Blended to typically handle outbound, but switch to inbound when required OCS sees the inbound traffic to the Blended queue and adjusts its pacing for the Blended group accordingly. In the limiting case, OCS will completely stop dialing for the Blended group when this group shows waiting inbound calls. The OCS will then only dial for the Outbound group until such time when inbound traffic decreases and service levels are met again.

Handling Outbound Interactions

Agents interacting with a live person in a campaign will typically need the following functionality to complete the interaction: Mark a call record as Do Not Call Retrieve a call record Cancel a call record from a campaign Reschedule calls as "personal callback" or "group callback" Add a new call record to a calling list Submit a wrap-up code and update business data in call record Preview record handling

When service levels for inbound traffic are met, the router only distributes inbound calls to the Inbound group. Both Blended and Outbound groups are then focused on outbound calls. As soon as inbound traffic increases and service levels drop, the router overflows inbound calls to the Blended queue.

The Genesys Agent Desktop and Gplus adapters provide the agent functionality for handling the interaction. Additionally, Outbound Contact solution also provides a rich set of APIs for desktop programming and for integrating third-party desktops.

Figure 5: Handling outbound interactions with Genesys Agent Desktop

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Treatment Methods for Rescheduling and Redialing

Outbound Contact provides a rich set of tools, or treatments for rescheduling/redialing unsuccessful calls. Treatments can be based on any call result such as Busy, No Answer, SIT tones, Answering Machine Detected and many more. A Treatment object tells Outbound Contact Server (OCS) how to respond to an unsuccessful call result (a call that does not reach the intended party). For example, if the first dialing attempt has a Busy call result, a treatment can tell OCS to redial the same telephone number once after 10 minutes, then two more times at 30-minute increments. If this is the only treatment set up for the Busy call result, OCS redials three times before dropping the call unless another call result is received or the number of maximum dialing attempts is reached. A treatment sequence (sometimes called a linked sequence) is a general term describing a series of treatment actions, each assigned a unique sequence number and applied to the same unsuccessful call result. For example, if a record receives consecutive Busy call results, you may want to use a different treatment action each time. Outbound Contact supports the following treatments: In N cycles each cycle N minutes apart Retry In retry once in N minutes RetryAtDate retry on a specific date and time Next In Chain cycle through the alternative phone number list for the contact

Figure 6: CCPulse+ real-time Campaign View report

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Next In Chain After cycle through the alternative phone number list for the contact after N minutes Next In Chain At Date cycle through the alternative phone number list for the contact on a specific date Transfer to alternative DN for calls that reach fax and answering machines

Standard CCPulse+ reports include: Campaign Report Hit ratio and dialing statistics on call results in a campaign Campaign Calling List Report Hit ratio and dialing statistics on call results in a calling list handled by a campaign Calling List Report Hit ratio and dialing statistics on call results in a calling list Campaign Group Report Campaign run-time status, dialing mode, waiting for agent/dial port time.

The following actions require the desktop to send requests to the server using the APIs OCS/Desktop Comm. Protocol: Schedule personal call back Schedule campaign call back (also known as group call back) Mark a call record as DoNotCall Cancel/Reject a call record

Historical Reporting
CC Analyzer collects information about agents, queues, places, calling lists and campaigns in the contact center. Custom statistics can be created for the Stat Server and used for data collection in CC Analyzer. As Stat Server gathers statistics from the contact center and outbound campaigns, it aggregates the statistics in specific time intervals and saves them to the historical reporting databases. The historical reporting system further manipulates data, allowing speedy processing of reporting requests. In the context of Outbound Contact, contact center managers can request contact center and campaign statistics reports from CC Analyzer.

Reporting
Real-time Reporting
CCPulse+ monitors campaigns, calling lists, groups and other outbound resources. CCPulse+ provides real-time dialing statistics and agent status such as the agent groups they are logged into and the campaigns they are associated with. These include dial attempts categorized by call results, campaign state and status, total number of records completed since campaign start, total number of records left untouched and estimated time to complete campaign and calling list. Data can be presented in various graphical as well as tabular forms. Reports are flexibly created using templates applied to objects to get a view.

A GENESYS WHITEPAPER > Genesys Outbound Contact Outbound Contact is tightly integrated with key CRM solutions (Microsoft, PeopleSoft, SAP, Siebel). Outbound Contact can utilize customer insight from these CRM applications to better target customers. Additionally, the Gplus adapter for Siebel uniquely integrates the Siebel Communications Server and Outbound Contact to allow campaigns/calling lists to be configured once in the Siebel environment and then automatically synchronized such that an object updated in Outbound Contact is also updated in the Siebel environment and vice versa.

Figure 7: CC Analyzer report CC Analyzer combines statistical information about interactions with specific agent and customer information to help contact center managers evaluate the effectiveness of the contact center. For example, CC Analyzer can help compare the number of interactions processed with the amount of revenue generated by agent. Pre-designed (canned) reports include reports by many objects, including agent, agent group, queue, queue group, place, place group, route point, calling list, campaign calling list, campaign and campaign group. CC Analyzer reports can be easily customized to report on specific KPIs and metrics. Figure 8: Genesys integrated with Siebel CRM Outbound Contact solution can also utilize data from other corporate databases to help managers conduct effective outbound programs to deliver optimum customer care.

Centralized Management
Managing distributed contact center locations or multiple divisions within the same contact center can be challenging. Many contact centers within the same company incorporate autonomous outbound dialing systems (that is, self-contained multiple silos) that have proprietary hardware and databases. The system administrator needs to access each separate system for maintenance. However, Outbound Contact provides a centralized management layer allowing the system administrator to remotely control the starting/stopping of components, configure alarms for system exceptions, and control logging level when needed, no matter where these components are located-centrally, distributed, or even across different operating systems. This management layer is also open to the rest of the Genesys product suite. As the contact center grows, and new solutions are added, the complexity of managing applications across platform and location increases. The Genesys unified management layer helps the administrator manage applications effectively and simply. A flexible configuration management tool is essential because of the varying business needs of contact centers. Distributed or large contact centers may choose to have a main control center that centrally configures contact center resources (agents and PBX resources) and outbound campaign needs. Other contact centers might choose relative autonomy so that individual business units can determine and configure agent resources and corresponding campaign requirements as needed. Outbound Contact solution utilizes a configuration management layer that supports tenancy and hierarchical 10

Integration
Outbound Contact solutions open architecture provides for easy integration with other applications. Typical integrations include desktops, scripts, virtual agents and Customer Relationship Management (CRM) applications.

Virtual Agents (Genesys Voice Platform, IVRs, fax servers)

Providing highly relevant and useful information at the right time significantly increases customer satisfaction and reduces inbound calls. Healthcare appointment and pill reminders, utility outage notices, flight status information updates are examples of highly valued outbound messages which can be automated using a virtual agent application. Interactive Voice Response (IVR) ports can be easily configured as virtual agents and assigned to a campaign to deliver such messages. Just as with live agents, IVR ports can be either dedicated for outbound calls or used in the blended mode to serve both inbound and outbound traffic.

Customer Relationship Management (CRM) applications

A GENESYS WHITEPAPER > Genesys Outbound Contact access groups with varying access rights to these resources, whether they're centrally located or distributed. Interaction Management (CIM) Platform, the software infrastructure common to all Genesys solutions. Outbound Contact Server (OCS) is the pacing engine that monitors agent group activities and queue traffic and determines the speed at which outbound calls are placed for predictive or progressive campaigns. For predictive campaigns, the collected statistics for agent activities and queue traffic are combined with the hit ratio (the ratio of calls that are answered successfully versus total dialed) of the calling list and fed into a patterned pacing algorithm that predicts call traffic and dials outbound calls accordingly. For progressive campaigns, OCS dials according to the immediate availability of agents and calls in queue-no predictive method is used. For preview dialing, OCS acts as a list management server that responds to an agent's Preview Record request by distributing the Preview Record to the agent. This allows the agent to update the final call result and business data to the contact databases. In any of these dialing modes, OCS tracks calls that do not reach the party and applies treatments accordingly. OCS updates the list records in the contact database with the total number of dial attempts and final call results of each contact. OCS also feeds dialing statistics, campaign states, and status to Genesys CIM Platform Stat Server via T-Server. Stat Server feeds these statistics to Contact Center Pulse (CCPulse+) for real-time report monitoring. It also aggregates and saves statistics to a historical report database via Contact Center Analyzer (CC Analyzer) reporting servers. CPD Server is an optional server for the Outbound Contact solution where PBXs do not have internal call- classifier capability. CPD Server uses Intel Dialogic board technology to perform call progress detection. The Intel Dialogic board is connected to the PBX via a line-side T1 or an analog connection. CPD Server receives a dialing request from OCS, dials the call, performs call progress detection, and sends call results back to OCS. If a call result is "answer," the call is automatically transferred to the agent group(s) handling the campaign via ACD or CDN on the PBX. When a call result is negative (for example, an answering machine is reached or Ring No Answer message occurs), then based upon the treatments set in Outbound Contact Server, CPD Server either drops or transfers the call. For dropped calls, OCS automatically reschedules calls according to the defined treatments. For PBXs that have call classification, the mechanism is very similar except that the call results are returned by the PBX call classifier and T-Server passes the call results to OCS. In addition, instead of CPD Server dialing the outbound call, T-Server instructs the PBX to make the call via the CTI Link.

Open and Scalable

Outbound Contact solution uses nonproprietary hardware which means no forklift effort is required to upgrade the contact center as demand increases. Rather than requiring proprietary hardware, Outbound Contact solution leverages the existing contact center hardware (PBX, Call Classifiers, and trunking) for its outbound dialing needs. PBX - Outbound Contact solution utilizes PBX ACD or CDN (Control Directory Number) software to deliver outbound calls to agents. Outbound agents log in to PBX as they normally would in any contact center environment. Call Classifier - Outbound Contact solution utilizes PBX's call classifier capability for call progress detection. For switches not having this capability, Genesys utilizes industry-standard Intel Dialogic cards for call progress detection. Trunking - Outbound Contact solution does not necessarily require dedicated trunks for outbound dialing. Shared trunks for both inbound and outbound calls help maximize the trunk usage of the contact center. As inbound volume peaks, trunks will be predominantly used for inbound traffic. As outbound dialing peaks, trunks will be used primarily for outbound traffic.

Outbound Contact can directly process list records residing in existing back-office DBMS. List records can be dynamically added or modified directly into the back-office database during the execution of the campaign and lists can be defined on top of existing customer data using database views. Outbound Contact solution adapts to various sizing of server platforms according to contact center demands. Users can deploy the solution on any major Unix-based or Windows NTbased server platform. Outbound Contact solution scales from a single-site contact center to distributed contact centers (i.e. contact centers in multiple locations with multiple switches.) With proper sizing of computer resources, a single server can serve the requirements of one or dozens of contact centers during a campaign or multiple instances of servers on different machines can achieve load balancing of system resources.

Outbound Contact Solution Architecture

Outbound Contact solution's core components are Outbound Contact Server (OCS), Outbound Contact Manager (OCM), and the optional CPD Server (performs call progress detection). These components are built on Genesys Customer

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A GENESYS WHITEPAPER > Genesys Outbound Contact Outbound Contact Manager (OCM) is a GUI client to OCS allowing contact center managers or administrators to start and stop campaigns and adjust the pace at which the Outbound Contact solution dials numbers from the calling list. It also allows managers to view the relationships in a campaign, between associated calling lists and the corresponding agent groups handling the campaign. It also allows supervisors to browse records in calling lists assigned to the campaign and apply viewing and dialing filters. Stat Server utilizes messaging from T-Server associated with each switch to gather agent states (for example, Ready, Not Ready), and to handle various call types, e-mail, chat, and queue traffic (ACD, CDN, and Genesys Virtual Queue) Stat Server feeds these statistics to CCPulse+ for real-time monitoring. It also aggregates and saves statistics to a historical report database via CC Analyzer reporting servers. In the context of Outbound Contact solution, OCS retrieves call records from and updates call results and business data to

Figure 9: Outbound Contact solution architecture CIM Platform is the software infrastructure that allows users to integrate switches, databases, desktop applications, and communications media (e-mail and Web) within an open, scalable architecture. Outbound Contact solution rests on top of CIM Platform. Since CIM Platform is common to all Genesys solutions, it provides a centralized environment for configuration, monitoring, reporting, and control of all Genesys applications, which may be distributed among many contact center locations on different workstation and server machines. CIM Platform consists of service layers including Reporting, Service, Media, Management, and Configuration. Service Layer includes DB Server and Stat Server. DB Server provides connections to various databases. It allows the solution layer to operate independently of database types (for example, Oracle, MS SQL Server, Informix, Sybase). 12 the contact database where calling lists tables are stored via DB Server. OCS also feeds dialing statistics, campaign states, and status to Stat Server via T-Server.

Reporting Layer
Outbound Contact solution includes CCPulse+ and CC Analyzer for reporting and analyzing real-time and historical data.

A GENESYS WHITEPAPER > Genesys Outbound Contact T-Server converts the proprietary data-messaging format of the switch's CTI link into a common language that all Genesys-enabled applications understand. T-Server not only tracks the location of each call as it travels through various contact center resources (IVR port, ACD/CDN, agents), it also holds the data that describes each interaction in the contact center (sometimes referred to as "attached data"). This data includes both telephony information, such as ANI, DNIS, and time stamps; and business data, such as a caller's account number, service selection, and account data. As the PBX delivers a call to an agent, T-Server simultaneously delivers the attached data to the agent desktop application enabled with a Genesys API. This simultaneous delivery of a call and attached data is commonly known as Screen Pop. In the context of Outbound Contact, the phone number together with business data defined in a contact record is attached to the call thus allowing Screen Pop for an outbound call on the agent's desktop.

CCPulse +
Real -Time Data

Historical Data

Interaction Management Solutions

Stat Server

Data Collection Service

Data Mart Service

CCPulse + GUI Data Mart

Historical Data

Contact Center Analyzer

Brio Performance Suite

Figure 10: Genesys reporting architecture CCPulse+ is a desktop-level reporting application that provides both real-time and historical views of contact center operations via a Win32 graphical user interface. Designed to facilitate daily resource management tasks, CCPulse+ is an ideal tool for at-a-glance evaluation of present and past contact center performance and efficient operational decision-making. CCPulse+ reports contact center statistics such as agent talk time, average talk time for inbound/outbound calls, queue traffic such as average wait time in queue, number of calls currently in queue and many others. CC Analyzer is an enterprise-class historical reporting solution featuring powerful report development tools, on-demand and scheduled report generation functions, and means of report delivery across the enterprise intranet. These advanced reporting capabilities are enabled by a set of business intelligence applications developed by Hyperion Solutions Corporation. Most of the statistical data presented via Solution Reporting is initially produced by the central informational component of the Genesys Suite, namely, Stat Server. This component processes contact center events into statistics and delivers them in real time to Solution Reporting as well as other Genesys applications. CCPulse+ uses a direct communication link to Stat Server to obtain and display statistics in real time. For historical reporting, the same statistics are collected from Stat Server by the Data Collection Service and after aggregation into desired reporting intervals become permanently stored in a database controlled by the Data Mart Service. Together, these two services form the common historical backend of Solution Reporting. Both CCPulse+ and CC Analyzer get historical data from the same Reporting Data Mart, which simplifies deployment and maintenance, and ensures seamless operation of both products within the same installation. The Data Mart itself serves as yet another data delivery interface providing direct data access to SQL-based report generation applications of the users choice.

Management Layer and Configuration Layer

Management Layer: The Management Layer includes the Local Control Agent, Message Server, Log Database, Solution Control Server, and Solution Control Interface (SCI). Local Control Agent is used to start and stop applications. Message Server provides centralized processing and storage of every applications maintenance events. Log Database stores events as log records where they are available for further centralized processing. Solution Control Server is the central processing center of the Management Layer. Solution Control Interface displays the status of all installed Genesys solutions and provides information about each active alarm condition. Configuration Layer: This layer consists of Configuration Server and a GUI, Configuration Manager. Depending on their hierarchical access permissions, contact center managers and system administrators can use the same interface to configure Genesys contact center resources such as agent, agent logins, queues (ACD,CDN, Genesys Virtual Queues), and so on. In the context of Outbound Contact, Management Layer allows system administrators to manage the solution from a workstation running SCI from anywhere in the contact center or virtual contact center. The contact center manager configures campaign requirements and contact center resources including agent groups and queues using Configuration Manager.

Media Layer
T-Server: T-Server comprises the Media Layer. T-Server interfaces with the contact center PBXs through a CTI Link. In a multi-site contact center, each site with a PBX requires a TServer. 13

A GENESYS WHITEPAPER > Genesys Outbound Contact 4. When inbound contact center traffic peaks, service-level objectives can be jeopardized. With Outbound Contact, inbound calls can be overflowed into agent groups in the outbound contact center through various overflow queues to minimize or eliminate the risks. These overflow queues can be either ACD or Genesys Virtual Queues. This routing can be automated by defining thresholds in Interaction Routing Designer. 5. By specifying the necessary queues including inbound overflow queues and the ACD/CDN that is to deliver outbound calls to be monitored while configuring the outbound campaign, OCS can monitor and collect statistics on the queue traffic that delivers calls to agent groups handling the campaign. OCS then paces outbound campaign calls according to defined objectives. As the inbound call traffic increases, OCS slows down the pace of outbound calls, allowing outbound agents to blend and take inbound call volume. It increases the pace as the inbound call traffic decreases allowing outbound objectives to continue.

Outbound Call Flow Blended Contact Center

Blending can be used to achieve maximum agent productivity and maintain high service-level objectives. This scenario illustrates a contact center blending inbound calls with existing outbound contact center agents to maintain servicelevel objectives during peak inbound traffic. 1. IVR Application 1 and IVR Application 2 answer inbound calls from different 800 or 888 numbers respectively. After requesting some basic information, a caller requests agent assistance by zero out of IVR application. 2-3 The call is transferred to a CDN where a script determines which agent group(s) in the inbound contact center should handle the call based upon the DNIS and the maintenance of service-level objectives. Alternatively, a routing strategy controlling the CDN can deliver calls according to customer information and business data collected in IVR and deliver inbound calls according to agent profile (for example, routing the call to the agent with the right skill set required to handle the call).

Figure 11: Outbound call flow in a blended contact center 14

A GENESYS WHITEPAPER > Genesys Outbound Contact 6. Based upon the collected statistics, OCS starts making calls according to the pacing algorithm. OCS sends dialing requests together with business data on the contact records to CPD Server, which makes outbound calls. 7 - 8. Once a connection is made, call progress detection takes place. The CPD Server notifies T-Server to associate business contact-record data with the call (that is, to attach data) and transfers successfully completed calls to available agents via ACD/CDN on the PBX. 9. As the call reaches the agent, business data also reaches the agent desktop application simultaneously and triggers Screen Pop. 10 - 13.Throughout the dialing and call detection process, call transfer to available agent process, and agent answer call process, T-Server continuously monitors the call's location (from dialing port to ACD to agent's DN), and relays call results returned by CPD Server to OCS for statistical collection. T-Server also passes agent status and queue statistics to Stat Server. OCS passes campaign statistics to Stat Server for the reporting functions. 14. Contact center manager uses CCPulse+ to monitor campaign progress and contact center statistics in real time. Historical reports of campaign statistics and contact center statistics can be requested through CCAnalyzer.

Outbound Call Flow - Predictive Dialing

In this scenario, a contact center is handling outsourced credit collections for various companies. The contact center manager has used the Configuration Management Environment to define an outbound campaign that simultaneously processes two collection lists for different credit cards and an agent group to handle these campaign calls in the predictive dialing mode. 1. Through Configuration Manager, the contact center manager configures a campaign by assigning to it an agent group and the calling lists "Visa Card" and "Sunoco Card". 2. In Outbound Contact Manager, a contact center manager starts the campaign and occasionally browses the calling list record status as the campaign progresses. 3 - 5. Based on the trigger of a campaign start, the Outbound Contact Server (OCS) accesses the defined outbound campaign, its calling lists, and the agent groups assigned to it in the Configuration Database. OCS starts retrieving call records from the calling lists. It also starts collecting contact center statistics by monitoring the agent group status and activities associated with the campaign, as well as traffic on the ACD/CDN (Control DN) queues, which deliver calls to the group by monitoring messages provided by T-Server.

Figure 12: Outbound call flow in predictive dialing mode

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A GENESYS WHITEPAPER > Genesys Outbound Contact 1. The system administrator with the highest access permission can centrally manage Outbound Contact through the Solution Control Interface (SCI) located anywhere in the network. The administrator can also configure the basic structure of campaigns and requirements for both contact centers using the Configuration Management Environment interface. 2. A single Outbound Contact Server and Contact Database can service both contact centers. 3. Based on their access privileges, call managers at each site have the autonomy to fine-tune the campaign configuration. They can use Outbound Contact Manager to start/stop campaigns and request real-time or historical reports from CCPulse+ and CC Analyzer.

Multiple Sites, Multiple Tenants

Multiple Sites
Managing distributed contact center locations or multiple divisions within the same contact center with multiple users can be challenging. Outbound Contact solution provides a centralized software management layer that allows a system administrator to remotely administer and configure system and campaign requirements, while providing the autonomy contact center managers need at each site to fine-tune campaign configuration, run individual campaigns, and generate corresponding reports. Outbound Contact solution facilitates multiple agent groups to share one campaign. The agent groups can be located in one central location on the same PBX or distributed in multiple contact centers on different PBXs in different locations. Whatever the array, available agents must answer outbound calls immediately to minimize the callabandon rate. In multi-site contact center environments where more than one PBX is involved, OCS treats calls in each site independently. Outbound calls dialed from a PBX for a campaign are answered by agent groups belonging to the same switch. The Multi-Site Outbound Contact Center (with locations in San Francisco and Boston) illustrates:

Multiple Tenants
Outbound Contact solution supports multiple tenants. In a multi-tenant site, the administrator can grant permissions to other users, enabling them to view their own tenant and run their own campaigns.

Figure 13: Multiple-site Outbound Contact solution

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A GENESYS WHITEPAPER > Genesys Outbound Contact DMS-100, Alcatel OmniPCX, and Ericsson MD 110 TServers3 Improved availability of solution components is also provided using advanced disconnection detection. The Outbound Contact solution leverages a proprietary connection protocol to quickly detect disconnection between components, then activate reconnect procedures immediatelyrather than relying on the disconnect detection provided by TCP/IP. For further information on the availability provided by Genesys components, please refer to the technical white paper Genesys High Availability Solutions.

FTC Telemarketing Rules Compliance

In December 2002, Federal Trade Commission (FTC) added several new provisions to the Telemarketing Sales Rules. CT Labs, an independent full service testing and analysis laboratory verified that Genesys Outbound Contact solution is in conformance with the FTCs amendments 2. CT Labs separately tested call progress detection by the switch as well as the CPD server to arrive at their conclusions.

Figure 14: FTC compliance checklist

High Availability
The software components in Outbound Contact solution including T-Servers, DBServer, and Outbound Contact Server can operate in a redundant mode with multiple instances to run as primary and backup processes. If a primary server fails, the secondary server automatically takes over and the interaction between primary and backup Outbound Contact Servers is synchronized with a warm-standby enhanced capability. This means that the backup server is not only initialized with up-todate configuration information but takes over the role of primary server using current information about all campaigns and campaign sequences. Additionally, Genesys provides a hot-standby option for the Nortel Meridian 1, Lucent G3,

FTC Conformance is based on proper deployment and operation of Genesys Outbound Contact solution.

In hot-standby mode, the primary and secondary T-Servers have synchronized interaction information. In this case, Outbound Contact Server reconnects to the secondary TServer during fail over without requiring the user to restart any running campaigns. 17

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Glossary of Terms
Term Definition Agents are individuals set up as Person objects in CME to handle customer contacts. An Agent Group is a logical grouping of agents. Agents can be grouped by skill (for example, language or marketing knowledge) or time (for example, shifts). An example of an Agent Group is a group of agents working together during the day shift. The Agent Group must be assigned to a campaign in a Campaign object. This grouping is referred to as a campaign group. An optimization technique used to maintain service-level objectives and/or maximize agent utilization. When inbound interaction traffic is unacceptably high, outbound agents can be temporarily routed inbound calls and similarly when inbound interaction traffic is low, inbound agents can make outbound calls. Genesys Outbound Contact solution supports blending in all dialing modes. An optimization parameter. This parameter sets the default dialing-optimization method for the Campaign Group and only applies to Predictive dialing mode. You can change the value in Outbound Contact Manager when launching a campaign. A system capability that listens in on a call and classifies the calls into "busy," "answering machine detected," "fax", etc. A campaign is a collection of callings lists and agent or place groups. Agent groups may be configured by agent skills that may be considered during processing of customer interactions, such as language or marketing knowledge. A part of the Reporting layer that provides historical reporting A part of the Reporting layer that provides real-time reporting Configuration Management Environment A method of redundancy in which the secondary (i.e., backup) system is only called upon when the primary system fails. The system on cold standby receives scheduled data backups, but less frequently than a warm standby. Call Progress Detection server - Genesys solution for call progress detection Database Management System The ability to detect disconnection between software components. The Outbound Contact solution leverages a proprietary connection protocol to quickly detect disconnection between components, then activate reconnect procedures immediatelyrather than relying on the disconnect detection provided by TCP/IP. Contact center locations geographically spread widely, typically connected over the Public Switched Telephony Network Do Not Call (lists). An FTC administered list of telephone numbers that cannot be called to by direct marketers Federal Trade Commission (sets telemarketing rules) A tool that enables contact center managers to design call flows and text to the agent desktop to guide agents through the interactions. Genesys Voice Platform is an advanced software-only product that brings Internet technologies to the world of voice enabling a new breed of voice self-service applications. In information technology, high availability refers to a system or component that is continuously operational for a desirably long length of time. availability can be measured relative to "100% operational" or "never failing." A widely-held but difficult-to-achieve standard of availability for a system or product is known as "five 9s" (99.999 percent) availability. A method of redundancy in which the primary and secondary (i.e., backup) systems run simultaneously. The data is mirrored to the secondary server in real time so that both systems contain identical information Premises telephony infrastructure including a mix of IP and TDM technologies Internet Protocol - A communication protocol. IP is a connectionless protocol, which means that there is no continuing connection between the end points that are communicating. Each packet that travels through the Internet is treated as an independent unit of data without any relation to any other unit of data. Interactive Voice Response Interactive Voice Response (IVR) is a software application that accepts a combination of voice telephone input and touch-tone keypad selection and provides appropriate responses in the form of voice, fax, callback, e-mail and perhaps other media. IVR is usually part of a larger application that includes database access. The national list of all Do-Not-Call telephone numbers used by telemarketers to filter out numbers that cannot be called.

Agent group

Blending

Busy factor Call classifier/ Call progress detection Campaign CC Analyzer CCPulse+ CME Cold standby CPD server DBMS Disconnect detection Distributed contact center locations DNC FTC Genesys Agent Scripting GVP

High availability

Hot standby Hybrid IP IVR List National DNC registry

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A GENESYS WHITEPAPER > Genesys Outbound Contact

Term Not-ready time OCM OCS Overdial rate Pacing Predictive Idle time - The time that the agent is not available.

Definition Outbound Contact Manager. A Graphical User Interface (GUI) client to Outbound Contact Server allowing contact center managers or administrators to manage campaigns. Outbound Contact Server is the pacing engine that monitors agent group activities and queue traffic and determines the speed at which outbound calls are placed for predictive or progressive campaigns. The overdial rate is obtained as the total ratio of Dropped/Abandoned Calls to the total number of Answered Calls. OCS monitors the overdial rate when in the predictive dialing mode. If the overdial value exceeds the overdial rate limit which was set in the predictive_max_overdial_rate option, then OCS switches the dialing mode to progressive. Rate at which the OCS makes outbound calls. OCS monitors agent/group activities and queue traffic to determine the dialing speed. Predictive dialing mode. In this case, Outbound Contact Server continuously monitors agent activities, collects statistics, and predicts future call traffic in the contact center.Then the server paces outbound calls accordingly as call traffic rises and falls in the contact center. Preview dialing mode. The Outbound Contact Server acts as a list management server and distributes call records to an agents desktop application on agent request. Using the desktop application, the agent previews customer information about the purpose of the outbound interaction and initiates an outbound call from the application. Progressive dialing mode. In progressive mode, the number is not dialed unless there is an agent available and no calls are in the queue. Reporting Layer includes CCPulse+ and CCAnalyzer. A call center metric. Service level: (calls answered in less than X seconds) divided by (offered calls) times 100. The best practice service level goal is to answer 80% of the calls within 20 seconds. Stat Server utilizes messaging from T-Server associated with each switch to gather agent states (for example, Ready, Not Ready), and to handle various call types, e-mail, chat, and queue traffic (ACD,CDN, and Genesys Virtual Queue) Time-division multiplexing (TDM) is a method of putting multiple data streams in a single signal by separating the signal into many segments, each having a very short duration. Each individual data stream is reassembled at the receiving end based on the timing. (Since TDM requires connections, it is also referred to as a circuit-switched network vs. the packet-switched network) A tool for rescheduling/redialing unsuccessful calls. A circuit between switchboards or other switching equipment, as distinguished from circuits which extend between central office switching equipment and information origination/termination equipment. Genesys software that connects to the telephony infrastructure (PBX) As opposed to a live person, a virtual agent is usually an IVR port. Voice Response Unit (same as IVR) A method of redundancy in which the secondary (i.e., backup) system runs in the background of the primary system. Data is mirrored to the secondary server at regular intervals, which means that there are times when both servers do not contain the exact same data.

Preview Progressive Reporting layer Service-level objectives Stat server

TDM Treatment Trunking T-Server Virtual agents VRU Warm standby

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