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Learning The Benefits Of Having Virtual Call Center

Virtual call center refers to those customer support units where the agents primarily function from a geographically dispersed location. Rather than operating from a permanent organization, the employees of a virtual center can be situated in few groups.The virtual call centers offer a range of benefits. This article highlights on these benefits.

The very first advantage of using the solution of a virtual center is that the representatives need not be concentrated to one geographical location only. Rather, it can run diverse facilities functioning from different places or geographical location. It means that though the main center may be located in Philippines or in USA, the virtual call center technology will enable the company to have a center in India or may be in China. As deemed essential by your own company, the centers can be located anywhere in the world.

Virtual customer support proves to be effective for those companies that require having dispersed operations all over the world. The second benefit that these call centers offer you is in the form of software technology. The software as used in these virtual set ups is said to offer excellent return on the investment for a company.

With the use of the software, companies will be able to offer excellent return on investment for a call centre firm. By using such software, companies will be able to heighten the agent productivity. Now the agent productivity will be leading to the thriving contact center functions. In this process, your agents will be able to gain the ability for seamless switching between the inbound call and the outbound calls or vice versa.

The third benefit is the technology used in the virtual software. Such technology used in a virtual center will be enabling the remote call centre agents to operate on the same level as the real time users.

The software used in such customer care units form to be adaptable for the use in any size of a support center. So if you have a unit in Philippine with more than 10 agents working for you and another unit in Malaysia with 100 working agents this software can well be scaled up and scaled down as required by your own enterprise.

The reliability of the software used in a contact center is next in row that forms to be of a great advantage in offering the right virtual contact center solution. They prove to be reliable enough to function as an essential back up in terms to disaster recovery back up systems. It guarantees that the system will remain functional offering the diverse aspects of the contact center system.

Today, the call centre technology has advanced so much that it helps the supervisors to guide and also to monitor the agents even when operating from the remote locations. It means that a supervisor based in India and an agent based in Philippines will be able to get help in the real time.

With a variety of advantages that virtual call center brings forth, companies will be able to improve upon the customer relationship management system. Moreover, agents will be able to meet more and more needs.

Pompano, FL — August 6, 2007

Promero announced today the general release of its hosted customer relationship management software ProStar CRM www.prostarcrm.com upgrade version 1.4. The new release includes enhanced features Auto Lead Distribution, work groups, integrated web form generator, integration with virtual call center software like Oracle’s Contact Center Anywhere, 100+ marketing and sales reports, ChatLive, forecasting, lead-source tracking, and much more.

Promero also announced an aggressive new pricing model which includes setup fees of only 5, per month per user fees and the option for 5 per month for unlimited users.

ProStar CRM was developed on the open source code of the widely deployed SugarCRM and recently converted to .NET language with the cooperation of SplendidCRM, Inc. The product has been greatly improved for speed, scalability and additional features.

“ProStar CRM continues to provide high level customer relationship management tools for business owners and entrepreneurs. When businesses spend money on advertising, owners want to know immediately if leads are generated, if leads are worked by the sales team in a timely manner and if leads convert to sales. With ProStar CRM, the application provides the simple easiest to use web pages and reports to provide owners the information they need to run their enterprise,” said Gregg Troyanowski, president of Promero. “Promero has used many CRM applications from the simplest including Act! and Goldmine to the most sophisticated like Onyx. ProStar CRM is the easiest and most flexible CRM that we’ve use. Now we host it for our customers.”

About Promero, Inc

Founded in 2001, Promero www.promero.com is a member of the Oracle Partner Network and is a leading application service provider of Internet-based call center, CRM www.prostarcrm.com and lead management software. Promero headquarters is located in Pompano, Florida. Telephone: 954-935-8800.

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Manila, Philippines — October 6, 2008

iQor President and CEO Vikas Kapoor demonstrated groundbreaking technology that converts its 21 global call centers into a 100% virtualized environment at a late meeting on Friday, Oct. 3 with Philippine President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.

“Our new proprietary technology represents a quantum leap for call centers, and will vastly increase both flexibility and security for our clients,” said Mr. Kapoor. “They no longer need to choose a specific location for their work, and can simultaneously access the best workers anywhere in our global footprint, or use qualified workers who do not wish to commute to a call center.”

The new technology is called FeAther?. When a call center agent’s finger touches their keyboard, iQor’s network uses biometric identification to determine who they are, what systems they can access and what calls they can handle. It therefore allows call center services to be securely handled by any worker in any of iQor’s centers worldwide, as well as to people who have high speed Internet access at home.

At the meeting with President Arroyo, Mr. Kapoor demonstrated the ease of access and state-of-the-art security that FeAther brings. Mr. Kapoor used an Internet connection at the Palace to take calls in her office. The demonstration underscored the power of the technology to create new job opportunities for people in remote rural areas.

“We think this technology has the potential to revolutionize our industry and has global applications in many other technology-reliant businesses,” said Mr. Kapoor. “I am honored that President Arroyo, who is a keen supporter of technology innovation, allowed us to launch our new global technology platform from Malacanang Palace.”

iQor is one of the premier global business process outsourcing companies in the world and the Philippines plays a major role in its strategic expansion. Most recently, iQor announced the opening of its third call center in the Philippines that will create 700 new jobs. This growth will bring total jobs created by iQor in the Philippines to 2,500 since opening its first call center in Manila in 2005.

About iQor

iQor (www.iqor.com) provides business process outsourcing to some of the best-known companies in the world from 21 Call Centers of Excellence in five countries and four continents. iQor’s 8,000 employees work with state-of-the-art technology that affords maximum flexibility to iQor customers to tap the best skills of a global workforce. It serves clients from a range of industries including financial services, telecommunications and government. Its services include customer care, customer retention and revenue recovery.

Global Public Relations Contact:

Robert Burke

robert.burke @ iqor.com

1 646 274 3044

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More Virtual Call Center Press Releases

Learn About The Virtual Call Center Jobs

The home-based virtual call center jobs have tremendously gained popularity over the recent years or so. These days, most people look to work from home and in the process aim to earn more money working from within the comforts of the home. Additionally, work from home offers a lot of advantages for both employees and organizations.

Working from home has gradually developed as a happening new trend that has helped in the development of the virtual jobs. There are many companies that tend to offer the virtual call center jobs.  In this respect, most companies often divide the employees into groups scattered in a wide number of smaller centers. However, most often the employees choose to work from homes, saving a lot of expenses of the organizations.

Virtual call center jobs offer you the flexibility to work from home, following the supple working hours. No strict dress code is required and you do not have to follow the strict rules as followed in the usual call centers. Experienced individuals who had already worked as a call center customer care executive will find the job ideal to work from the home and earn easy cash.

Job Requirements for working in a call center

Virtual call centers are gradually becoming a type of work from home. The job of virtual call center is to direct the incoming consumer calls to the phone of the home agent.

Communication in such a job takes place primarily over the VoIP that makes the call rates to be much cheaper.

Virtual call center is just like a home-based call center, which involves no selling of the products. It brings you a legitimate opportunity to people who are physically-challenged, college goers, students, teens, retirees and housewives.

Given below are the main requirements of a good virtual call center job:

1.Telephone line
2.Good headphone including microphone
3.High Speed Internet Connectivity
4.Personal PC
5.Good ability to talk/converse/communicate over the phone
6.Superior communication skills
7.Professional and quiet working environment

Process followed in a virtual customer service center:

Most of the virtual call centers include a three-tier system in order to hire quality home workers for the call center jobs. The three tier system as followed in a virtual set-up include interviewing over the phone, voice audition tests and checking the voice quality and lastly online application and the per-interview selection to compare the agent’s unique skills.

Most of the organizations offer online training and job trainings at their set-ups. There is no such upfront fee to attain trainings for such jobs. Few companies are found to hire the people who are found to be 18 years of age. Furthermore, many companies offer the virtual jobs hiring independent contractors for the same. On the other hand, other companies, which are found to be smaller in size, are found to hire people more directly as their employees, providing perks and benefits as offered in any regular job.

The amount you earn in the virtual call center job solely depends on the total numbers of calls that you handle or attend. Many companies also happen to pay on the per minute basis. On average, you get to earn between to per hour.

Alexandria, Va — September 23, 2009

The Telework Coalition (TelCoa) and VIPdesk will co-present a Webinar titled “Implementation of a Virtual Customer Care Program: How to Guarantee Success” on Wednesday September 30, 2009 at 2:00 p.m. ET. This free, live Webinar will discuss the growth of virtual customer care and its ability to help organizations improve customer interactions while reducing overhead and increasing employee retention rates.

Presenters Jack Heacock, Senior Vice President and Co-Founder of the Telework Coalition and Sally Hurley, President of VIPdesk will review steps to guarantee success when implementing a virtual call center, including the following:

Virtual customer care: in-house or outsource?
Hiring, training, retaining, coaching and supervising a virtual workforce
Workforce management
Industries best suited for virtual customer care
Best practices and case studies
And more!

All attendees will receive a copy of TelCoa’s “Top 10 Reasons for Virtual Work.”

Space in this Webinar is limited to the first 100 registrants. Registration information is available online at http://vipdesk.wufoo.com/forms/implementation-of-vcc-how-to-guarantee-success/. For more information, call 703-837-3507.

About the Telework Coalition

Based in Washington, D.C., The Telework Coalition, (TelCoa), (www.TelCoa.org) is a not-for-profit organization that brings together a diverse array of organizations and individuals with the common interest of promoting awareness and adoption of existing and emerging telework and telecommuting applications. TelCoa’s mission is to “Enable and Support the Advancement of Virtual, Mobile, and Distributed Work through Research, Education, Technology, and Legislation”.

About VIPdesk

VIPdesk specializes in delivering virtual contact center solutions to premium brand leaders in several industries including retail, travel, auto and financial services. We serve more than 40 blue-chip clients with over 10 million customers and are continually recognized through numerous awards, including the Inc. 500, Inc. 5000, NCBEA Business Ethics Award, Stevie Awards for Women in Business and Smart CEO Future 50. To find out more about VIPdesk, visit www.vipdesk.com.

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More Virtual Call Center Press Releases

Virtual Call Center Jobs: How Can You Become An At-home Customer Service Agent?

There’s been a lot of buzz in the call center industry regarding the use of home-based call center agents. While a relatively new phenomenon, the use of US-based workers in geographically dispersed locations has allowed call centers to grow, and manage growth, while maintaining higher levels of customer satisfaction.

In fact, the use of at-home customer service agents has been hailed by many teleservices industry experts as the call center of the future. Virtual call centers now exist as a centralized location that simply hosts the call center phone lines, software, and equipment. Through technology, these “bases” connect home-based agents across the country to their employers and clients.

Virtual call centers are set for explosive growth, and they hire home-based workers for a variety of industries and clientele.

Finding Virtual Call Center Jobs

Companies such as JetBlue and Uhaul regularly hire reservation agents for their virtual call centers, however, there are also a large number of Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) firm that now take up the slack for companies such as Drugstore.com. Alpine Access, Arise, West, and LiveOps are just a few of the companies that regularly hire home-based workers to outsource their client calls. The easiest way to find a virtual call center job is a strenuous search on Google, using the keywords “home based agents” or “At home agent.”

Because legitimate work-from-home employment is highly competitive, employers often automate the initial application process to weed out ill-matched candidates.

The Virtual Call Center Application Process

Most virtual call center jobs have a three-tiered application process. First, there is an online application and skill assessment. Second, there is a “voice test”. Third, there is an over-the-phone interview. These three essential components often include other not-as-obvious skill assessments, such as the use on online learning tools, chat communication, and email follow-ups.

The Virtual Call Center’s Online Application

Since much of the online application screening automated, you will want to be as thorough and descriptive as possible when you apply. Many BPO firms call on new customer service agents when they need a worker with experience in a specific industry. If you have retail experience in more than one area, then it’s important to mention which areas you have experience in. For example, if you have worked for both Wal-Mart and the Macy’s perfume desk, you’ll want to mention both of those areas on your application. There’s a big difference between mentioning retail experience and mentioning big-box retail experience and upscale boutique experience.

The online application will also have a checklist for the equipment and technology you will need to use and acquire. Make sure that your computer and phone systems meet their needs (or that you have the money and/or resources to acquire these.)

The Virtual Call Center Voice Audition

Most virtual call centers require applicants to audition or the job by calling in to leave a message. Usually they will give you a few scripts to practice and then randomly select one for your voice test.

What are they looking for? It’s a mixture of personality, voice tone, and friendliness. If you’re nervous about a voice audition, it’s helpful to actually call a friend or two and actually practice the script with them on the phone. When you call for your audition, make sure that there is absolutely no background noise or interference with your call. (Make sure you disable your call waiting when you call…) Speak slowly and clearly, and make sure you have an actual smile on your face – that’s something your callers will always hear on the phone.

The Virtual Call Center Telephone Interview

When doing your interview, it’s best to be alone in a very quiet part of your house – preferably the home office you plan to work out of. Background noise is one of the main reasons why many potential home workers do not get hired.

Most virtual call centers use telephone interviews that are either live or recorded and last between 10 and 20 minutes. It’s natural to be nervous during this part of the process. This is where your personality should shine – and the best thing to remember your research, speak calmly and slowly, and be prepared for creative interview questions.

If a company is recruiting for an online drug store, they may ask you how you feel about weight loss products. If a client is a retail catalog, they may ask you specific questions about styles or brands. Make sure you’ve looked at their client list if available. Brush up on any industry experience that you may have highlighted in your resume, just in case they are screening for a similar client.

Once You’ve Been Screened: Sit Back, and Wait Patiently

The backlog for virtual call centers is tremendous – and it can usually take anywhere from a week to several months for them to call on you to work for a specific project. Don’t fret – if you made it this far in the application process, they will be in touch when they need you. A few virtual call centers actually purposefully schedule their call backs a few weeks later to give you time to decide if the job is really for you. The next step will be making it through their training and certification. Just be professional, get back to them in a timely manner if they contact you, and prepare your home office for your new virtual call center career.

Virtual Call Center And Its All Round Benefits

It is not an unknown fact that a virtual call center basically functions using internet as its main infrastructure. If you’re not aware of the fact then you should know that now a virtual call center is known to offer a great variety of benefits for both customers and its clients. This article will take you across some of the most common benefits of having the virtual service center solution.

1.Technology:

Yes, the first and the most important benefit of having virtual call centre technology is that the virtual service center software will be allowing the remote contact centre agents to work on the same level as the real time users.

2.Good Return on Investment:

It is a known fact that the virtual call centre software will be allowing excellent ROI or return on investment for a company so as to heighten the agent productivity to a great extent. As per the BPO experts, agent productivity will be able to heighten the business operations. Moreover, the agents will be able to gain the ability for seamless switching between the inbound call and the outbound call.

3.Technology edge to function

It’s the call centre technology that allow all the remote contact center representatives to work on the same level operating as the real time users.

4.Geographically dispersed:

Another advantage and one of the most significant of the other advantages is that the virtual contact center solution does not necessitate the agents to concentrate from any one geographical location. Rather, the virtual service provider will be able to function from a range of other small virtual call center facilities scattered in diverse places. Take for example, your main center is situated in India but with the help of the virtual software technology you will able to have you virtual center in United States or in Philippines as required by your organization. This is something that makes the virtual software to offer the ideal solutions to the companies which need to include all types f disperse operations all across the globe.

5.Adaptability

Adaptability is one more feature of a virtual contact centre technology. This helps a virtual center based in US including 20 agents and a center in Philippines with 100 agents to scale down and scale up as required for the enterprise.

6.Reliability:

The virtual customer service center solution is found to be reliable enough so as to serve as the essential back up in terms of offering disaster recovery network. Additionally, it is guaranteed that this system will remain functional all throughout the different features of the service center system.

7.Easy Monitoring:

The virtual call center technology has developed so much that nowadays the supervisors will be able to guide and then monitor the agents even when connecting from the remote locations.

8.Compatibility:

Today’s virtual service center software makes use of the technology that stands compatible with each and every phone type.

9.Hardware configuration:

Virtual software solution stands compatible with each type of the hardware configuration. However, it will be advisable to check out more features.

Last but not the least, it is also said that customer relationship management program will be improved if the agents will be able to meet up with the needs bringing about the effective solution and the virtual service center will be the right way to reach the aim.

Chris Carrington talks with CMIQ about the training and hiring process for home-based agents, as well as the difficulties in conveying a sense of realistic culture in order to find a common dialect with your customers. He also touches on the future of call centers and why he sees a shift on its way into onshoring. Carrington is the CEO at Alpine Access, a home-based call center company that just recently won the top ranking in Datamonitor Group’s 2010 Black Book of Outsourcing Report. View this and other IQPC podcasts at www.customermanagementiq.com

Denver, CO — June 20, 2009

Alpine Access, a provider of contact center solutions for brand-conscious companies, today announced that the company will be presenting a free Webinar on five common myths about virtual call centers. During this 60 minute session on Wednesday, June 24, 2009 at 11 a.m. MST participants will learn the truth about the benefits of the work-at-home business model including:

There are a variety of ways to successfully manage a remote workforce.
The technology needed to enable a virtual model is affordable and accessible.
A virtual model can be applied effectively to any type of business.
Customers’ private information can be safely secured in an at-home environment.
Work-from-home employees can be integral and interactive members of a company’s culture.

The presenters for this informative event will be writer Kate Lister and Alpine Access managing partner, Jim Ball.

Lister is a well-known telework researcher and author of the recently released book, Undress For Success–The Naked Truth About Making Money at Home. Her company’s web-based Telework Savings Calculator has been used by organizations, legislators, and advocates throughout the U.S. and Canada to quantify the environmental, financial, and work-life benefits of telecommuting.

Ball is a pioneer in the use of home-based workers in the call center industry. He co-founded Alpine Access in 1998 after realizing the biggest challenge for call centers was finding and retaining good people at affordable wages. By bringing the work to the people, rather than the people to the work, Ball helped create a call center model that delivers efficient operations and high quality customer service at an affordable cost.

Register today at www.alpineaccess.com for this free live event on Wednesday, June 24, 2009 at 11:30 AM MST/ 10:30 AM PT/ 1:30 PM ET.

About Alpine Access

Alpine Access pioneered the home-based employee contact center model in 1998 to deliver high quality customer service at a lower cost for brand-conscious companies. By matching customer care professionals to client needs, Alpine Access’ services are proven to strengthen customer loyalty, improve operational efficiencies and increase financial success for Fortune 500 customers in a variety of industries. With employees in 1,000 cities, Alpine Access offers assistance across the entire spectrum of services – from outsourcing to consulting to training – to help clients benefit from a home-based operation. For more information, visit the Alpine Access website at www.alpineaccess.com or call 1-866-279-0585.

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10 Benefits of Having a Virtual Call Center

A virtual call center is a call center that can function using the Internet as their infrastructure. A call center is a business that works by absorbing certain business functions of a corporation so that the client organization is free to concentrate on other business functions to stay competitive in its industry. Hence, all call centers need a call center solution that can help make the call center more productive and more profitable. One such virtual call center solution is the Oracle Contact Center Anywhere call center software which is now being offered by Promero (a Certified Partner of the software manufacturer Oracle.)

The first benefit of using this virtual call center solution is that the call center agents need not be concentrated within just one geographical location. Rather, the call center company can become a virtual call center running different smaller virtual call center facilities in different places. This means that though your main contact center may be located in the US, the virtual call center technology allows the company to also have a virtual call center in the Philippines, a virtual call center in Indonesia, and maybe a virtual call center in India (as deemed necessary by your company.) This makes the Oracle Contact Center Anywhere call center solution a boon to companies that need to have dispersed operations throughout the world.

Second, this call center software is said to provide excellent return-on-investment for the call center company using it because it can heighten agent productivity. Agent productivity leads to successful contact center operations. Your contact center agents gain the capacity for seamless switching between an outbound to an inbound call and vice versa because of this call center solution agent interface.

Third, the call center technology behind this Oracle call center software allow remote contact center agents to function on the same level as real-time users.

Fourth, it is adaptable for use by a virtual call center of any size. So whether you have one virtual call center in Manila, Philippines which is manned by just 10 agents while another virtual call center of yours based in Calcutta, India has 100 agents, this virtual call center software can be scaled up or scaled down as needed for your enterprise.

Fifth, this virtual call center solution is reliable enough to serve as a back-up disaster recovery system for the contact center, guaranteeing that the system will always be functional throughout all aspects of the call center system.

Sixth, call center technology has progressed so much with this virtual call center solution that supervisors can monitor and guide agents even from remote locations. This means that if you are a contact center supervisor based in the US and you have an agent in the Philippines who needs help during a call, the Oracle call center software will permit that in real time.

Seventh, the Call Recording function of this call center technology permits the call center virtual transactions to be recorded appropriately so that the call center staff can review the details of the transactions as needed.

Eight, the virtual call center software uses call center technology that is compatible with every phone type.

Ninth, this virtual cal center solution from Oracle is compatible with nearly every type of hardware configuration.

Lastly, customer relationship management improves because agents are able to meet more needs even for the same prospect or customer with a more effective call center solution.

So if you are planning to put up a call center of your own, no matter how small or large, you may want to consider using the Oracle Contact Center Anywhere product instead.

— March 10, 2005

New York, NY — March 10, 2005 Â? Digisoft Computers Inc. today announced its first international client site, Evresis, utilizing their innovative web-based call center software application, eTelescript. eTelescript maintains central call center management control while providing the capability to maximize the potential of home agents or virtual call centers. The solution features a browser-based, interactive agent interface and campaign management application. Evresis Loyalty Management is a Cyprus based call center that focuses on utilities, government services, retailing, banking and card issuing.

Evresis deploys eTelescript as a call center solution to relay private reports of power outages to remote agents stationed in the Electricity Authority of Cyprus. Upon an electric failure, remote agents record the information using eTelescript and then transfer information to proprietary web applications and reporting tools for follow-up.

eTelescript provides an ideal call center management solution for businesses with multi-site call centers, remote agents/management or global corporations. Unlimited scalability, minimal hardware requirements and an open system design provide advantages in these operating environments. Evresis utilizes remote agents and takes advantage of the VOIP capability.

Â?With eTelescript, Evresis has achieved the goals we initially established and have been very impressed with the response from Digisoft personnel Â? both engineers and techniciansÂ?, remarked Aristotelis Joannou, IT Manager at Evresis. Â?Furthermore, because of its open design, we have been able to seamlessly integrate eTelescript into other applications necessary to the campaign – from the most simplified call center operations to the most complexÂ?, continued Joannou.

Housed on a Web server in the Evresis call center, eTelescript provides users unrestricted secure access to view and manipulate their data. Remote Evresis agents receive inbound calls via their PBX using IP phones over a VOIP connection. Additionally, the remote administration module provides integrated telephony features that synchronize with the agent module to provide telephony and screen pops to remote agents.

About Digisoft Computers, Inc.

Digisoft Computers, Inc. manufactures a leading PC-based call center, predictive dialer and CRM software solution. DigisoftÂ?s product suite of call center software management solutions currently supports call centers in twenty-three countries on four continents. With 17 industry-bestowed awards, DigisoftÂ?s products are widely known as a flexible, robust system designed to immediately increase call center productivity. For additional information, please contact Andrew Davidson at 212-687-1810 x 105 or visit www.digisoft.com.

About Evresis:

Evresis is a leading provider of CRM and loyalty marketing solutions. They provide a full range of services through consulting and multiple communication channels to help clients identify, acquire, retain, service, measure and maximize the lifetime value of their customer relationships. Visit them at http://www.evresis.com.cy.

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