[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Darren Prine, Darren Prine. Darren Prine said: MANAGED SERVICES: CALL CENTER – PART 2: DEATH OF THE PREDICTIVE DIALER http://shar.es/0aqiB [...]

Previously, Steven gave us a piece of fiction claiming that predictive diallers were being overtaken by progressive diallers, comparable to suggesting rotary dail handsets were overtaking DTMF handsets. Now, in a simple sweeping statement, he's telling us that “buying, owning and managing dialers is neither efficient nor cost effective”. End of story.

Interestingly, while centrex services (hosted telephony) have been with us since the 1950s, the overwhelming majority of enterprises in all markets where the choice exists find buying, owning and managing their own telephony to be a better option. From my research, North American enterprises have a choice of 17 predictive diallers (http://www.occidental.com.au/pdi.html). How many choices of hosted diallers are there? Enterprises also have the choice of a large number of CTI software products, LAN-based telephone system and PC-based telephone systems that offer a predictive dialling module. A greenfield site (common in advertising brochures but rare in the real world) can thus choose from perhaps 50 on-premise diallers. How many can they choose from if they want to go hosted, Steven?

But as I have alluded to above, stand-alone diallers are not the only option for predictive dialling. For a company with one of those products offering dialling as an option, activating the dialling capability may mean just buying a few licences, or just switching on the capability. True, the dialling module of a multi-component product may not be as featured as market leader, but using such can be a darn sight easier than contracting with the provider of a hosted dialling service to work with the enterprises's existing infrastructure.

Steven is correct that diallers must be managed, but implies that a technology, which has been commercially available since the 1970s are beyond the capability of most call centre managers. Suggesting that most diallers overdial and the beginning of a campaign and underdial later on to meet the preset abandonment rate for the campaign as a whole illustrates his very limited knowledge of current dialling technology and would only be the case where the manager has little understanding of the contact base and sets the pace for too low an answer rate at the commencement of the campaign. Yes, the service which you are promoting probably betters the use of a primitive dialler operated by an incompetent manager, but Ernest Hemmingway can write better fiction with his typewriter than I with the latest version of Microsoft Word!

If you are going to post more pieces on this topic in subsequent weeks, can you do so based on competent customers using capable products, not your citations of incompetent managers using very limited products which you falsely imply to be the norm.

Stephen Coates, did you even read the article? You seem like a pretty angry, combative person with way too much time on your hands. Perhaps someone with as much free time as you have will stumble upon something you write online and waste their time responding with argumentative dribble. Take another hit off your bong and relax. Thanks for playing.

Historically, organizational environments were challenged by limited technical options, mostly those options were hosted and supported on premise.
Fortunately those options have changed over the years to include hosted applications. Even site based providers now offer hosted services (Oracle, PeopleSoft, IBM, Microsoft, etc…). Back in the early days of application development, technological limitations necessitated that these products be housed on site, not the case anymore.
These products moved off-site as the technological limitations evaporated. The same can be said of telephony technology. Interesting how the same cultural challenges faced by the transition of application products afflict telephony products. It is interesting how many in the telephony field are unwilling to accept the technological advancements that benefit their client users. Who benefits most is the question, the site telecom tech or the client? Maybe this is the question?
The article is clearly focused on the client user and the impacts to “ownership vs. non-ownership, true productivity, flexible platforms that provide a combination of “focused dialing”, unique functionality, and linkage to incumbent customer or collection databases. Majority of enterprises in all markets where the choice exists find buying, owning and managing their own telephony to be a better option.”
The implication that the number of premised based dialer platforms versus hosted/managed platforms is indicative of performance, quality, or feature engineering, is interesting. I guess I could then assume that Ferrari is an inferior product since few play in the high performance sports car field, Mr. Coates?
Additionally, the approach that organizations should succumb to inferior premised based telephony products since they “can be a darn sight easier than contracting with the provider of a hosted dialling service to work with the enterprises's existing infrastructure” is quite a statement and not Quality, Performance or ROI centric. I thought these were the points Mr. Coates attempting to communicate?
The reality of our business environment reflects the fact that a majority of users are average with average dialer knowledge. The implication that every user should be “competent customers using capable products” and not “citations of incompetent managers using very limited products” is not a reflection of business reality. I haven’t noticed many Dialer Platform Training classes in recent memory.
The true topic surfaced by these articles appears to be the challenge of technical engineers. How does this group understand client users and their expectation of dialer platform features and functions?
Hmmm…seems like a good article topic “Engineering Centric Acumen versus Client Centric Acumen”.

It has been a truism throughout the history of IT (and probably so in other fields) that any person involved with the development, provision, marketing or sales of a product or service will claim that there is an unstoppable and inevitable trend towards to their product or service category or specific product but rarely back this up with any evidence. A new business will gain customers but lose few. An established business will win some and lose some. You see new customers replacing older and no longer satisfactory products with your service and thus claim that all premise-based products are inferior, less cost-effective and impossible to manage compared to your service. You turn your observations to claim a trend and proclaim its universality.

Next, you attack the “non-believers”. This approach, to insult those who don’t adopt what they claim to be “the trend” or even those who acknowledge some growth in a service or technology but don’t echo the claims that it is universal and inevitable, is less common, but not rare. I have managed many procurement projects for telephony and contact centre infrastructure and I have carefully constructed the RFT documents to not bias them towards or against premise-based TDM and IP-based systems, hosted systems and combinations thereof, but to date, the hosted systems have been functionally inferior and less cost effective. Perhaps subsequent projects will be different. But their functional capability and cost effectiveness is not a result on a supposed “unwillingness to accept advancements” on the part of participants in these projects.

You then make a generalisation about product functionality, citing a Ferrari. Claiming to be “the best” also has a long history in IT marketing and failing to provide a shred of evidence, excepting citing a research company (don’t mention the millions in consulting fees paid to them) who said your product was “leading” or put its dot in a favourable position in its magic triangle or whatever. Do you use some platform that cannot be premise-based? And what is the basis of your assertion that your platform JUST IS superior to anything that is premise based? And one thing you should know is that no matter how much vendors tell us that their products are “best of breed” or whatever and that enterprises just “should want them”, enterprises actually want best fit for their requirements that is most cost effective.

We then move on to the issue of integration with existing applications which is always a line on a diagram in an advertising brochure but is often the most challenging aspect of an implementation. For a company with a multi-functional CTI platform that is already integrated with their CRM and other enterprise applications, enabling the predictive dialling module of that CTI platform may well be a lot easier, quicker and more cost effective than using a bureau service or buying a separate dialler, even if dialler modules of such a product may not match the best on the market. Application integration is not trivial.

Finally, we come to the issue of the dialling application. As anyone working in IT will be aware, there is a clear distinction between operation of infrastructure and selection and management of applications. Whether a dialling product is premise-based or hosted is one matter and how the product is managed (backups, software upgrades) is a second. How the dialling application is managed is quite another matter and the dialling application can be well managed or poorly managed whether the product is hosted or premise-based. Campaign managers I have dealt with in many clients manage their campaigns competently and the challenges they have faced, usually organisational, would be unchanged by having the dialling platform hosted. And every dialling product or dialling-capable product bid to an RFT I have managed has come with dialling-specific training.

If you read my comment it would be blatently clear that I read the article. If you want to refute my points, that's what this forum is for. You claim I have “too much time on my hands” because I have replied to two of Steven Cramer's posts! Perhaps you are a clairvoyant at the local fair as a sideline. But take your person attacks somewhere else.

Interesting note on this conversation, feedback related to the Hosted/Managed vs. Purchased/Site discussion varies based on regional location globally, excess to bandwidth, and familiarity with bandwidth management.
It seems that the respondents outside the US have very different views and experiences with broadband traffic then domestic US operations.
This is a good opportunity to explore both aspects from the technical side and the “tech cultural”. We do find this position within the US domestic market focused within government and monopolistic organizations, little reflection in For Profit organizations.
Anyone willing to address this topic?

Interesting note on this conversation, feedback related to the Hosted/Managed vs. Purchased/Site discussion varies based on regional location globally, excess to bandwidth, and familiarity with bandwidth management.
It seems that the respondents outside the US have very different views and experiences with broadband traffic then domestic US operations.
This is a good opportunity to explore both aspects from the technical side and the “tech cultural”. We do find this position within the US domestic market focused within government and monopolistic organizations, little reflection in For Profit organizations.
Anyone willing to address this topic?

It would seem the point being made is that a Predictive Dialer is no longer the standard solution for call centers. I can’t disagree more. I mean really… the question should be posed as “quality vs. quantity” but even that point can be argued because of the diversity in offerings by the centers. The only viable answer is that it’s totally relative to the project, business model, offerings, processes etc. Here’s an example: If I’m a large mortgage brokerage buying $50.00 ea leads from an expensive source that has a proven amazing conversion rate, I wouldn’t upload such leads into a predictive dialer with a goal of making as many connects as possible. My strategy would be much different and geared toward the quality aspect of the call instead of quantity. A progressive system typically does the same thing a predictive can do with one exception, reviewing the lead prior to contact being made. So, I would set my dial limits to 1:1 ratio and have the benefits of a predictive dialer with nearly the same delicate handling of a progressive system. If it was absolutely necessary for me to review the lead prior, then of course a predictive solution is not the way to go.

On the flip side, if I was a large market research firm tasked with a project that requires me to pole one question to 100k people in Los Angeles with only seven days to complete it, I wouldn’t even consider the progressive dialer. That same project can take substantially longer to complete with a progressive system in place of predictive. Obviously I would need brute force to accomplish the task, not delicate handling of the call.

I'd also like to inject some added thoughts here for perspective on “Premise vs. Hosted”. I don't offer premise based solutions so my views are mostly from the negative results found with premise based solutions. Many can argue the costs of Premise vs. Hosted is more/less. The cost is again… relative in my opinion. Some centers have the necessary technology and management resources that overlap, thus lowering their initial and overall cost of a premise based solution. There are circumstances that would allow a company to leveraged down costs to just a software license, that’s it. Or the opposite, where there are insufficient resources immediately available and the costs to implement a premise based solution is substantially more than going hosted for more than a year. Throw in the potential deployment nightmares and loss of revenue when things do go so smooth. Who wants to buy when you can lease for a fraction up front? Again, it's relative.

In my opinion there is no such thing as “Premise is better” or “Hosted is better”. Just like there’s no standard “Predictive is better” or “Progressive is better”. The word “Better” is relative. I've seen company after company pay enormous amounts of cash only to find that the solution they pulled the trigger on was not right for their business model. They could have experimented with a few hosted solutions to see which is the most effective but they decided to go with their gut instead of testing, gathering results, and making an informed decision.

In the SaaS world that I live in, the honest approach of “My solution is not right for you” is the best approach. I’m honest with all my customers if I believe the goals they have are simply not achievable with the solution I can offer them. That’s true service. I am the professional providing unbiased facts based on experience. They are the customer who should be making the decision based on a collection of data provided by all of us in the industry.

Because of the flexibility, easy deployment, and the level of support typically provided with the SaaS model, I am more inclined to recommend Hosted over Premise. But it would not be wise for me to make a statement or take a position that anyone looking for a solution is better off with a Hosted-Predictive solution, because that cannot and will not always be true.

Really?

To be completely open I own a “dialing company” that provides both premised and hosted dialing services. Perhaps my insights are tainted because of this real world experience, but I don’t think so. Personally, I found the comments responding to Steve Cramer’s article to be more insightful and informative than the “information” in the actual piece.

The article makes several claims that seem to me to be ill-informed and truly biased. One such ill-informed claim is “it seems that buying, owning and managing dialers is neither efficient nor cost effective.” Really? I can think of numerous situations where this would not be true: large vs. small call centers, level of internal competence and experience of IT personnel, and the experience managing a dialer. We have several clients (as do our competitors) that have tried hosted services and then for various reasons moved back to a premised solution. The reverse is true as well.

The next ill-informed comment: “companies are finding that Hosted/Managed Dialer solutions can do more and provide better features than premise based dialers, without the cost and maintenance.” Really? In the history of auto dialers hosted/managed dialer solutions are still a relatively new service. Each year these services are improving upon their product offerings, but there are still many features inherent in premise solutions that hosted services don’t offer (the gap in features is narrowing). In fact, one of our clients recently moved from a hosted to a premise solution so they could improve their campaign and list management. They also made the move back to a premise solution so they could better manage data that was controlled under HIPAA regulations.

The writer of the article completely lost me when he stated “predictive algorithms can be helpful, in many cases these features hinder the ability to properly manage effective floor activities.” Really? I don’t understand this statement. Certainly he isn’t implying that manually dialing is more efficient? It is true that strict predictive dialing might not work in all situations. For example, an agent might need to read numerous notes before placing the call, and would most likely benefit from employing a power or preview dialing mode, which wouldn’t dial until the agent indicated he/she was ready to receive a call. This is a specific unique situation and certainly not the norm. The dialer solutions I’m familiar with offer very good algorithms and specialized set-up features that would handle most of the work that Stephen Cramer insists a person needs to do manually.

I do agree with one statement that the author made, “dialing is more than just dialing for contacts, it requires a focused effort that has a defined plan of action.” This is absolutely true. No one should install a premise solution or sign up for a hosted dialing service without a plan of action. How are they going to handle the flow of calls? Should they dial more fervently during specific hours of the day? Concentrate dialing to time zones according to past results, hours of operation, etc.?

Predictive Dialers are not dead, contrary to what the author implies. It is true that many regulations have been put in place to control predictive dialing activities, BUT industries and technologies adapt. Business owners learn new ways of implementing dialer features in accordance with current regulations. Our company has been providing dialer solutions since 1986. We’ve been around long enough to have experienced vigorous regulations and watched as the market adapted to these new rules. Predictive dialing in both premise based and hosted services will be with us for many many years to come.