Customer journey mapping isn’t just an exercise in theory—it’s the foundation for driving measurable business results. In this episode of CallTalk, Bruce Belfiore is joined by CX expert Justin Robbins to discuss Value Force Multipliers: the key actions that transform customer insights into tangible improvements for both customer satisfaction and th…

This podcast will focus on how building and nurturing a strong community can empower women in leadership roles. The discussion will highlight the importance of collaboration, support networks, mentorship, and shared experiences in driving success and creating lasting impact. Guest Valerie McSorley Valerie is a seasoned professional with over 25 yea…

The ability of AI to empower, not replace, humans is often lost in the sensational stories about AI’s impact on call centers. In this podcast we explore how conversational and generative AI are being utilized across industries to exponentially scale role-playing, and enable true scenario-based training where you can practice active listening, commu…

Many contact center leaders struggle to get new hires up to speed, and AI will continue forcing human agents to tackle increasingly difficult sales and support scenarios. Adam Levin joins us today to discuss how to empower workers around the globe with new coaching and training tools, rather than replace them. Guest: Adam Levin, Adam is an expert i…

Remote and hybrid work are not new to contact centers, but getting really good at it on scale and for the long haul, is quite new. How are organizations retaining best talent once hired, and how are they bringing people into culture folds quickly, while building excitement about these employment opportunities? How do leaders emit the energy and eth…

Customer service surveys are no longer effective. Response rates are low, customers are tired of endless requests, and it’s becoming more difficult to get actionable data. A new technique called sentiment analysis analyzes the conversations you’re already having with customers so you don’t have to pester them with survey requests. This technique ca…

Chad Tatton brings tremendous experience in using quality assurance to improve customer satisfaction, efficiency, effectiveness, time to proficiency, and sales in the contact center. During this conversation with host Bruce Belfiore, Chad will relay his experiences in helping organizations identify the right blend of people, processes, and automati…

Summary: This episode of CallTalk will focus on explaining the different types of Generative AI, as well as best practices to follow in selecting an LLM (Large Language Model). The discussion will help you understand what you should know, and helpy you identify the right LLM for your business. Important areas will include picking the right use case…

Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Chat GPT are invading the minds of contact center managers around the world. But what will they mean for you and your operation? Join Bruce Belfiore and AI futurist Mark Coudray for a CallTalk episode that confronts AI and its implications for contact centers headon. Mark will share his experience and thoughts in an…

From medical marijuana to recreational marijuana, to when you can test, how you can test and what you can test, the laws vary by jurisdiction, so be extremely careful if you are a multi-state employer who is using a one size fits all drug testing process. I suspect this area will see an increase in litigation as the laws continue to change or are u…

Answering services have been around for 100 years. But times are changing, and today, customers want to text companies. Businesses are text-enabling their business lines every day. But often, they’re too busy to respond to customers themselves. Join Bruce Belfiore as he interviews Gary Pudles about how easy it is to make your business “textable,” a…

Hiring agents has become more difficult and managers are looking for new ideas and approaches to increase success. Join Bruce Belfiore as he interviews Ravin Shah about today's market for contact center agents - and how to win with top candidates using a structured, speedy methodology. Ravin Shah is the Founder & CEO of Hellohire, a software platfo…

Join Bruce Belfiore for the first CallTalk episode of 2023, with the theme "Maximizing the Human in the Call Center". He will be interviewing Nicholas MacDonald, director of Customer Experience at C-Lect Consulting. Nicholas will draw from a career in contact center leadership at Machias Savings Bank in Maine, where he put employee culture first, f…

Join Bruce Belfiore as he interviews industry veteran Mark Brody about getting your center "unstuck" by supporting your front line agents - - and making them stars. Providing the right technology, training and leadership, combined with dedication to data-driven decision making will smooth the path to better performance. You will take away insights …

This episode of CallTalk will have Keith Fiveson talk to Bruce Belfiore about boosting your customer experience and employee engagement using leadership techniques he has developed over a lifetime of experience. Use these techniques to empower greater resilience and create positive experiences using breathwork approaches based on science. CallTalk …

Managing work-at-home agents has moved from pandemic emergency mode to representing a long-term challenge for most contact center managers. This episode of CallTalk will focus on tips and best practices that you can use immediately to improve performance. Bruce Belfiore interviews Marcia Presberry and Shannon Smith of National General for a half ho…

We have dedicated courses and CallTalk episodes on coaching for agents - an important topic indeed. However, contact center managers need coaching as well - - coaching that may go beyond the training curricula that are in the market. Tune in to this episode of CallTalk for some real insights on how you, as a manager, can benefit from coaching. Gues…

A place For Professionals Who Want to Be Seen as Credible The keys to success and happiness in the global village are credibility and relationships. Since technology has enabled us to connect with more people, how we live and do business can easily be seen. Thus, presenting ourselves as credibly as we can allows others to want to get to know, like,…

An experience guarantee goes beyond merely warrantying a product against defects. It encompasses the entire customer journey to promise an experience that never falls short of expectations. Customer loyalty skyrockets when people trust your brand, product, or service. That trust is earned not by the occasionally wow moment, but by being remarkably …

The pandemic has intensified many of the challenges facing contact center managers. Join Bruce Belfiore as he interviews Bob Kobek of Mobius SVP for a lively episode of CallTalk centered on issues of worker recruitment and attrition and other remote management challenges in this new age of at-home workforces. Guest: Robert Kobek | CustomerCount Pri…

Customer service allows for limited face-to-face or physical interaction, making it challenging to provide genuine support and lead generation. Instead, people are focusing on virtual interactions to continue driving growth. On this episode, Bruce will talk with Todd Fisher, CEO and co-founder of CallTrackingMetrics about how companies can leverage…

Join us for a conversation with industry practitioner Patrick Ebrahimian on the processes that impact access and availability of contact center agents. He shares proven ways to improve service levels and the customer experience using creative lean methodologies. You will love his football-themed playbook that transformed his center's performance. G…

We had a great conversation. With so much going on across all industries with regard to post-COVID operations, changing laws affecting marijuana and criminal justice reform, and employer lawsuits, Ms. Lipnic offered a refreshing perspective on the issues that affect us all.We had a great conversation. With so much going on across all industries wit…

Efficient agents not only make the contact center run smoother, but they create a better experience for your customers. We sat down with Matt Duncan from CommunityWFM to discuss how leveraging some of the best practices in workforce management improves agent efficiency and impacts the bottom line. In this session we plan to cover four major areas o…

Operating a contact center efficiently and profitably is not an easy task due to balancing so many challenges—high employee turnover usually being at the top of that list. Not only is it expensive to hire, but it is also not cheap to train and onboard. The average contact center turnover rate is between 30-45%, which means they hire for the same se…

Covid-19 has had a terrible impact on people and economies around the globe. But it has facilitated accomodation of at-home work for the disability community. Guest Kate Brouse of nonprofit NTI helps disabled Americans and veterans open employment doors. She outlines how today's environment has allowed NTI's services to disabled Americans to double…

Knowledge management is foundational the effectiveness of the modern contact center. Metrics from cost per contact and handle time require agents to rapidly find the information they need, and customer satisfaction demands that agents have complete and accurate answers in every situation. Even agent satisfaction is impacted by how a center manages …

The contact center world has been pushed ahead 4 to 5 years in 1 year in terms of technology, because of COVID. The rate of adoption of existing tech just exploded. What’s next? What does 2021 bring? Guest: Steve Bederman | President and CEO | NobelBiz Steve Bederman is a published author, accomplished leader, and a highly regarded Contact Center i…

Digital CX is meant to provide a more effortless customer experience across multiple engagement channels. As the channels customers can use to interact with us multiply, customers demand a personalized, consistently positive customer experience as they navigate their engagement. Companies subsequently have developed increasingly complex CX strategi…

If you are measuring your customer experience and not measuring your employee experience you are missing a great opportunity to discover the gaps in critical issues like customer loyalty and employee loyalty. As the saying goes, if you don’t measure, you cant manage.By BenchmarkPortal

Recruitment, Hiring and Training techniques during the Pandemic- the traditional models of in person recruitment and training are not feasible during COVID pandemic how can you successfully hire and train CSR in a street to seat mannerBy BenchmarkPortal

…And that’s why we wanted to talk more about the shift to remote contact centers, and we have brought in an expert on the topic for you, Fabrice Martin, CPO at Clarabridge. Welcome to the show Fabrice. Guest: Fabrice Martin, CPO at Clarabridge Fabrice is responsible for the vision, roadmap and go-to-market strategy for the Clarabridge CX Suite of p…

2020 has created an intense focus for companies to reconsider their relationship with customers and how they serve them. The vision and promise of good Customer Experience often talks about creating“wows” with customers at scale. Yet many of the tech stack tools and operating metrics that dominate the industry discussion can detract from the fundam…

Are you implementing new contact center technology? Join us as we discuss tips and benefits on how to embrace the technology to transform the customer, employee and business experience by leveraging it within and beyond your department while promoting the benefits, results and successes throughout your organization.…

Are you struggling with scaling cll capacity in this time of pandemic? Could you leverage artificial intelligence to make your calls smarter? This episode of CallTalk will provide tips and insights on how to properly assess AI for your center's needs, keep the call flows going, and make you a hero to your CFO by reducing costs. This will include de…

Agents complain they can’t find customer data because the software is out of date. Managers take too much time to finish weekly reports. BI software is out of date and not capturing the right analytics. If these things sound familiar, you will want to join our discussion on the next CallTalk podcast. Our guest Nancy Munro, CEO of Verbal Transaction…

Join us for a free, fact-filled session on what you can do to manage your center through the Coronavirus pandemic. Information you can really usePanelists representing large, medium and small contact centersFocus on new insights, not same old platitudes Forty-five minutes of meaty discussion and storytelling from managers who are on the front lines…

Join Christine Cunneen, CEO of Hire Image, a nationally accredited background screening company, as she shares helpful information about the latest drug testing and background screening trends facing call centers. Learn what is happening with marijuana legislation across the country, the latest drug testing developments, and other state and local u…

By BenchmarkPortal

By BenchmarkPortal

Are you endlessly trying to get agents to improve their customer service? There might be a culprit you’ve never considered. Discover hidden and counterintuitive obstacles that hurt agent performance. You’ll learn: Why rewards and games often makes service quality worseHow wall boards can increase your queuesWhat secret your agents know that can imm…

Ever have a bad experience with a contact center agent? Why do you think this happened? One answer may be poor training or poor coaching – either way these situations can be avoided. Join us for our next discussion to hear Nancy Munro share tips and advice on how contact centers can build better and more effective training programs. Guest: Nancy Mu…

Gamification and Engagement have been used in contact centers for some time now and so far, the results have been… mixed. Why do some Gamification and Engagement programs work so well for some organizations, and fall flat for others? Fresh out of the military and religious service, Elijah stumbled upon Snowfly, a leading gamification-based incentiv…

Contact center industry associations can contribute a lot to the success of your center and your career. However, many managers don't consider joining or, if they do, fail to make the most of their investment. We have brought in an expert who has seen this from both sides, and can tell you how to make the most of the opportunities that associations…

"Conversational Virtual Agent (sometimes known as chatbots) are all the rage. There has been an explosion, with easily accessed and low-priced conversational frameworks from the likes of Amazon and Google. However, while it’s easy to put together a bad conversational application, developing and deploying one that actually provides a useful service …

Technology is impacting every aspect of our lives from home shopping, home deliveries, video streaming, voice activated home hubs, to kids paying to watch their favorite gamers … well play Video Games. Technology developments in Customer Care world are also developing at a dizzying pace and the increased use of live chat, SMS, Social Channels and C…

The Call Center industry can be full of drama that can be a poison to the customer experience, employee satisfaction, agent retention and your overall center performance. In this episode, we will learn how to identify different types of drama and discuss things you can do right now to overcome the negativity associated with drama.…

Has the collections industry taken a few black eyes through the years? Yet, your specific company was not at fault? Does your company get “stereotyped” unfairly Our guest today, owns a collection agency that is intent on changing the way collection agencies are viewed - - by being ridiculously nice. Not just nice, ridiculously nice. Today, we are g…

Contact centers are under increasing pressure to become profit centers and leverage new channels of engaging customers. Live chat is growing in use--especially among millennial customers--and chat communications can be optimized using machine learning in order to improve engagement, reduce cost and grow sales.…

Workforce Management is both science and art. Hear the voice of experience as Rick Lee, Workforce Manager for Convergys, is interviewed by host Bruce Belfiore on his WFM best practices tips. Practitioners who are looking for a deeper level of WFM insight should join this episode.By BenchmarkPortal