InformationWeek
Defining The Business Value Of Technology
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November 27, 2000 |
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New Choices For Small Business
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Some of the technologies also use traditional fat clients on the client company's desktops, connected via a high-speed wide area network to the hosted application server, database server, or other equipment such as phone-routing switches.
With the Web-based systems, such as the E-mail-management application from eGain, contact-center agents only need a Web browser to access the client interface and the back-end application and database. Also, agents can access the app from any computer with an Internet connection, making it possible for companies to have agents work remotely.
Users note, however, that dial-up connections at 56 Kbps or slower, although they may be useable, are certainly not optimal, as the applications can run a little too slowly.
Contact-center ASPs in general are using and refining some of the most advanced contact center technologies. In addition to Web-based client-server architectures, some of the vendors are using voice over IP. For example, Echopass is using voice over IP to completely integrate phone calls and E-mail into one application.
Voice over IP and the universal queue concept have been widely hyped to date, but few if any vendors or companies have been very successful in implementing them. However a couple of the contact-center ASPs have created elegant solutions for universal queues with voice over IP.
Prices vary for the services, and customers of the ASPs typically won't disclose what they pay. EGain, for example, says the base price for its monthly subscription is $6,500, with additional charges based on the number of E-mails managed by the service per month. EGain also charges a onetime implementation fee with a base price of $15,000.
George Zarcilla, director of customer operations Ofoto Inc., an online photo-finishing company in Berkeley, Calif., is using the phone-call-management application service from Ineto for its 10-person customer-service staff.
Ineto has gathered CRM software from vendors such as Brio Technology, eGain, Kana, and Siebel Systems, and integrated them to cover a range of customer-service needs, including E-mail management and call-center operations. With the service, a customer-service representative can handle different tasks from a single interface. Underpinning all this is millions of dollars worth of telephone switching equipment, telephony servers, and databases.
As a beta customer for Ineto, Ofoto found that the application suffered from uptime problems early on because of program bugs and other issues. But during the last 90 days, Zarcilla says, uptime has been 97%. Ofoto also maintains an older, basic call-routing device as backup for when the Ineto service goes down.
Zarcilla estimates his company is saving 20% to 30% by going with Ineto rather than building the in-house infrastructure to handle customer calls.
Such savings have helped other companies, too. For example, Enstar LLC in Irving, Texas, uses the market-leading call-center and contact-management programs from Siebel through ASP Corio.
Enstar CFO Art Salinas says the cost savings inherent in the hosted version of the Siebel applications made it possible for his company to afford the robust products. Being able to use Siebel's applications has made a world of difference for his company, Salinas says, providing both call-center agents and sales representatives with detailed information on all customers and their interactions with the company, as well as sophisticated tools for managing and viewing that data.
"We felt we couldn't afford to buy higher-end applications if we went with an in-house version," Salinas says. "The price would have forced us to buy an inferior product to Siebel."
Salinas estimates his company will save at least 35% on the total cost of ownership by going with the Siebel hosted version instead of a lower-tier application run in-house.
Also, companies report these hosted call centers are typically deployed in weeks, and even days, rather than months, helping small entrepreneurial outfits move fast and not become bogged down in IT matters at the cost of focusing on their primary businesses.
Larger companies, for the most part, have thus far tended to shy away from host call centers and other outsourced application administration because they worry about controlling such crucial applications. According to Forrester, 71% of companies with 1,000 or more employees cited control concerns as a primary reason for not opting for hosted applications.
But smaller companies say the impressive benefits of hosted call-center apps far outweigh any management issues, especially because these companies realize they don't have the in-house expertise to manage these ap-plications very well anyway.
Also, these companies report few if any availability, uptime, or dependability issues. They note that call-center hosts are experts in running and maintaining these applications, since they manage multiple numbers of theapplications and have learned them inside and out.
Many of the companies offering hosted call centers tend to be small, which typically makes for a good match. Customers report good service from ASPs.
Giga's Herrell says the hosted apps also benefit fast-growing smaller companies. As they grow, they can switch out of one call-center application for a more robust call-center package.
But certainly, companies need to consider the potential drawbacks of hosted call centers, such as integration problems with other applications. That's been the case at CellMania. Robb says that having a product hosted does impose limitations because eGain manages the application. Robb's in-house IT staff isn't developing much knowledge about the product or how it could be integrated with other applications run by the company. "Because we're not living with it, we can't customize it easily," Robb says.
For example, CellMania would like to merge transactions logged by its E-commerce software, BroadVision, into eGain to provide customer-service reps more knowledge about customer interactions with the company. With this experience behind him, Robb says he wouldn't choose a hosted version of an application that required high-level integration with other apps.
Despite this concern, Robb says that going with a hosted version of its E-mail contact center has outweighed any drawbacks.
While CellMania has enjoyed all the common benefits of lower costs and easier management, Robb and the staff at CellMania were particularly struck by how big a difference the hosted eGain service made when it was time to upgrade the application. Robb and his cohorts were bracing for the typical upgrade nightmare of work stoppages, bug fixes, and general IT triage. But this wasn't the case with CellMania's hosted contact-center app.
"We were laughing after our recent upgrade because the process was so peaceful," Robb says. "That's not normally not what you expect." Indeed, hosted call-center apps are pleasantly surprising more than a few companies.
Photo of Zarcilla by Robert Houser
Photo of Salinas by Steve McAllister
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