Omnichannel contact centre definition

What is an omnichannel contact centre?

An omnichannel contact centre allows customers to seamlessly switch between the communication channels offered by the organisation. These could include telephone calls, SMS, live chat, video, mobile apps and social media channels.
Several channels may be used for a single transaction. The customer experience should be similar at each touch point and a comprehensive transaction history is required at each stage of the process.

A customer may, for example, have an automated attendant as an initial contact point, to verify their identity or allow them a high-level selection of the area of the organisiation of interest: sales, technical support or accounts. If they are in a text or chat communication in an omnichannel contact centre, the agent may at any stage escalate to a voice call; the chat transcriopt is available to the agent who handles the voice call.

The contact centre agent’s training and skill in handling simultaneous voice and chat communications is critical for smooth, frictionless customer experience.

Executing the move from a traditional office-based contact cenre, where the agents use deskphones, to an omnichannel cloud-based contact centre where agents work from home and use mobile phones as well as laptops requires planning and careful selection of the contract centre partner.

It’s important to find the right contact centre partner

One critical aspect of mapping out the omnichannel contact centre journey is finding a partner who can gauge the organization’s current status and can participate in the design of a path to exploit current technology to meet future needs.
Choosing the right partner alows an enterprise unlock the value of data to enable business transformation.

An ideal partner can offer:
• secure solutions that integrate with existing infrastructure across multiple sites
• solutions that scale as the company grows or requirements fluctuate
• tailored industry-specific solutions