Rising technology spending should be a cause for celebration. Yet, many contact centers are keeping the champagne on ice as concerns for the future grow.
Indeed, while 81 percent of contact centers reveal their annual software budgets have increased, almost half (48 percent) do not feel “very prepared” for the future.
These worries seemingly stem from not having the right technology and/or strategy to improve business results, despite increased budgets and spending.
As such, a paradox emerges in which technology investments rise, but customer and business outcomes fail to lift.
Further findings – as revealed in a recent Observe.AI report, entitled: “State of Contact Center Conversation Intelligence 2022” – pinpoint underperforming agents as another prominent cause for this future pessimism.
Shockingly, as many as 22 percent of contact centers believe that most agents perform far below expectations and the standards set by leading performers.
Such findings underline the increased relevance of conversational intelligence tools, which can enhance agent performance management, according to Swapnil Jain, CEO and Co-Founder of Observe.AI. He stated:
Whether a contact center’s focus is on service, sales, or both, visibility into agent-customer interactions is key to accelerating workflows that drive revenue and growth.
However, contact centers must proceed with caution. Adding spreadsheets and word processing documents to analyze interactions can create confusion, which is already widespread in an industry bogged down by unscientific methods and tool juggling.
Supporting this notion is a statistic suggesting that seven in every ten operations use two or more tools for conversation analysis, forcing operators to switch from solution to solution.
Convoluted processes like this add complexity and inefficiencies, risking human error and often leaving businesses vulnerable to compliance failures.
Once set into stone, these processes also inhibit contact center agility, slowing down technology implementations. If such complex processes are commonplace, they will likely limit future success, unless the contact center can access significant time and resources.
More Intriguing Statistics from The Observe.ai Report
The Observe.AI study uncovers many more thought-provoking findings, examining the future outlook of contact center leaders. Excellent examples include:
- Only 16% of contact centers analyze every agent-customer interaction.
- More than one in every five contact centers (21 percent) rely solely on manual interaction transcription and analysis processes.
- 90% of contact centers with conversation intelligence tools believe they improved agent performance programs. Meanwhile, 94% thought they enhanced agent coaching.
Observe.AI worked with Zogby Analytics to survey 307 North American contact center leaders across various industries to gather these results.
Interested in uncovering more fascinating findings from various contact center studies? If so, check out our article: 12 Contact Center Statistics: CX in 2022
