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The ideas that shape intelligent call routing have been in use for hundreds of years. Long before they were applied to phone calls, routing packets, or physical cargo, was done the old-fashioned way. Have you ever considered how shipping routes around the globe have evolved over the years? In the 18^th Century, the British, Spanish, Dutch, and Chinese already had well-established routes that provided the most efficient journey of goods to and from various ports of call. As you can see in the video below, over a 100-year span, the routes don’t change much. By the mid-19^th Century, the routes seemed to become tighter, more regular and uniform. The reason? Data and analysis.

When we talk about data in this context, each ship’s log contained information about seasonal changes in winds, currents, open and closed ports, hostile areas, and more. Analysis of that data enabled routes to be tweaked and adapted from captain to captain until the fastest, safest route was established.

This same approach to data and analysis that spurred the evolution of the shipping routes applies to the intelligent call routing capabilities available with VoIP/SIP telephony. We recently explored the reasons SIP (Session Initiation Protocol) has exploded in popularity, with cost, scalability, and low overhead often topping the list – like the priorities associated with a tight shipping route. Intelligent call routing, such as GeoRouting, is one reason SIP is a vehicle to improve customer experience and drive revenues. By controlling where your inbound calls go, you increase call quality, reduce customer hold time, and save your customers from the call transfer merry-go-round.

So, as captain of your own SIP, how can you take command of intelligent call routing and ensure that calls are on the most efficient path?

Intelligent Call Routing Variables

Before you create a call routing methodology, you first must identify the variables that affect your business’ calling patterns. The variables that define your methodology put you at risk for dropped calls, busy signals, agent transfers and other challenges to your customer experience.

These could include:

• Campaigns
• Time of day
• Known high traffic times (holidays)
• Agent availability
• Call center and caller location
• Call prioritization
• Compliance

What makes a methodology? Refinement. For that, you need access to your data.

GeoTracking: Intelligent Analysis without Extra Layers

SIP-powered call center operators need richly detailed call tracking capabilities to gather data from billing to regulatory compliance. Unfortunately, many of the call tracking and call reporting solutions are more trouble than they’re worth. They often require you to add another product layer to your network infrastructure. This leads to bloat that can make your systems harder to operate and costlier to support. No one wants a more expensive, more difficult system. It may also constrain you from developing the innovations your business will need tomorrow.

GeoTracking offers full-featured call tracking capabilities that integrate cleanly with your telecom service, based on the unique and changing needs of your business. The custom reporting system lets you look at your call data to determine the effectiveness of campaigns, identify high volume calling periods through historical patterns, track which toll-free number assigned to a marketing campaign is most effective, and more. GeoTracking isn’t a Swiss Army knife of tools. It’s a laser that provides your business with precision through data and analytics.

Custom Routing

A primary goal of any call center is to connect every customer with the agent best equipped to help. What’s important to remember is that you know your customers and your market better than anyone, including your telecom carrier. GeoRouting allows you to marry your business intelligence—and the applications you use to cultivate and extend it—with powerful intelligent call routing logic. A carrier should give access to the call routing logic, providing your organization with the ability to set up the parameters of inbound call routing.

However, sometimes the solutions you seek aren’t off-the-shelf, and you require specialized call routing assistance. For example, if you’re a landscaping company with franchises across the country, you could route calls from area codes 678, 912, 919, and 865 (Atlanta, GA; Savannah, GA; Chapel Hill, NC, and Knoxville, TN) to your Chatanooga, TN call center. Not only will an agent in Chattanooga know more about plants native to the south than one in Seattle, but will be familiar with state and local regulations on pesticides and other issues.

Your business may need simple intelligent call routing rules like this one, or it may require more unique solutions. Finding an experienced provider who can help design and build custom intelligent call routing applications will elevate the quality of service and customized support you provide. For this, you need a provider who is willing and able to work shoulder-to-shoulder with your business to help take innovations from the idea stage to practical, working applications. With Voxtelesys' open APIs, integration and custom routing assistance is within easy reach.

Whether you have crafted a proprietary lead generation application, a per-leg call billing engine, or tools for remote agent accessibility, custom call routing can help ensure that your customers find the best path to your door.

Let Information Set You Free

Take control of your business by transforming ordinary call routing into intelligent call routing. Your customer contact is too important to leave up to chance. Learn more about how to integrate SIP-powered GeoTracking and GeoRouting capabilities into your call center strategy. Talk to us today.

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