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Call Centre related sites

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Links to Call Centre related sites

For example:

Advertising standards in Europe

Call Centre Association

Internet Direct Marketing Bureau

Irish Direct Marketing Association

DMA guidelines

UK Direct Marketing Association

Introduction to the Data Protection Act 1998

Data Protection - how it affects us

Data Protection Act 1998 (full text)

Samples of the Practical Direct Marketing Guide

The Telem@rket

Are you concerned with keeping your customers happy? Actually that’s a loaded question, who isn’t? If you use the phone, whether it be to generate leads and sales, for customer support or help desk applications, or to help manage customer relationships, The Tele-M@rket is your place on the Internet for an exchange of information, call centre, customer relationship management, telemarketing and telephony issues.

Teleplaza

A web site directory of telesales, telemarketing, customer service and call center resource links.

Call Centre Management Review

Call Centre leaders converse and share knowledge and issues at the Call Centre Manament review site

Gateway to call center and customer care community

Call Centre World

You need to sign up to this, but it's worth it. Currently there are at least 66 articles here for your consideration: here are many titles and abstracts:

Retaining and Motivating Call Centre Agents
The trend of high attrition rates in the call centre industry is set to continue unless successful strategies are put in place to change the way agents are selected, trained and motivated.

The True Thin Client Call Centre
Operating virtual or distributed call centres on thin client technology is now a practical reality thanks to the latest Java platforms. Clyde Lennon of Infercor A/S examines the technological, practical and business benefits of such systems.

Interactive Communications Management
Susanna White of Syntellect Europe looks at the future for voice processing and allied technologies within the call centre

Virtuality becomes a reality for the call centre
Over half of those operating within the call centre industry believe that a ‘virtual’ call centre will replace the conventional call centre within three years

Telecoms Bottom, Consumer Goods Top, In Readycall Multiple Enquiry Survey
The objective of the project was to discover how well ‘multi-functional numbers’ were set up to handle a selection of four basic enquiries.

An Emphasis on Fair Play
Automated monitoring to motivate call centre staff

Can Your Hardware Take The Strain?
How the growing sophistication of call centre applications could grind your business to a halt

Seventeen Simple Truths About CTI
The hype of data convergence is being promoted as some sort of white magic when in reality it is typically just a computer/network solution enhancing everyday business communications.

10 Tips To Create A Customer Knowledge Centre
Research shows that customers who have satisfactorily resolved an issue are more loyal than those who have never had a problem. How can you make it easy for customers and employees to quickly resolve problems?

Call Centres Set to Become Cottage Industry
UK call centre managers are ready to embrace a new technology in order to employ home workers to alleviate the current staffing crisis within the industry.

The Customer Contact Centre – The Face of CRM
Leading companies have in fact experienced great success by more effectively managing their relationships with customers and implementing formal customer relationship management (CRM) solutions

Power Lines
When telemarketing was born in the early eighties, there were few who could have imagined what a huge impact it was going to have in the world of business

No Sweat
The explosive growth in call centres has led to jibes in the national press that call centres are the new sweatshops, with hundreds of operators working in huge, hanger-like buildings and under constant pressure to improve their call rates.

Empathy Wins Business: Making Ideas Attractive
Rules of effective communication relating to language, perspective and structure.

Let The Machine Do The Talking - Will Speech Technology Replace Agents?
A recent report by the OTR Group suggest that increasing use of speech technology - in particular IVR and recognition systems - will reduce the number of agents working in call centres.

Skill Set Scheduling
Today’s call centre environments are becoming increasingly complex by handling multi-lingual calls, and supporting diverse clients, products, or services.

"Large Team" Environments Offer Big Benefits
Computer telephone integration, telecommuting, call recognition, and virtual services all are changing the way we live and work.

Empathy Wins Business: The Abominable No Man
The vast majority of customers, or potential customers, will see sales people as long as there is a valid reason for arranging a meeting. (It’s up to the sales person to ensure that of course)

The Process of Customer Satisfaction
The nature of the call centre business entails a fair degree of customer interaction, it is for this purpose that the performance of call centres is judged by standards of customer service delivery.

Searching for the Call Centre Location
It is very important for the organisation to locate the call centre in an area that provides the most benefits and provides a flourishing environment for the call centre to operate in.

Profiting from Customer Dissatisfaction
The article brings together the results of many surveys exploring issues of customer satisfaction, dissatisfaction, defection and loyalty

Contact Centre Optimisation
Not only has the volume of calls handled by call centres risen sharply as organisations have recognised the benefits associated with call centre working, but also the nature of customer contacts has changed.

Help: Our Customer Service Department Is Now A Call Centre!
Kathleen M. Peterson identifies the four key areas you need to develop in order to create a high performance customer service culture within a call centre

The Today and the Tomorrow of the Call Centre
Good customer service is of paramount importance to companies operating in today's competitive markets.

Successful Telephone Interviewing
More companies are turning to the telephone interview as a quick and effective way of screening potential new staff. But as with all interview techniques, you need to avoid the pitfalls and make sure you end up with the best candidates.

Answer The Phone
Calls in queue are a problem; but few organisations invest in solving the problem - they treat the symptoms instead.

Does Not Compute!
To get the best out of our investment in Information Technology we must retain (or regain) control of the costs of the technology, and control of the management of the information.

Measure For Measure A Play On William’s Words Worth
What You Will Measure for Service. Measure yourself by the yardstick used by your customer to measure you.

Freedom
If mail-order customers from all over the country got together to hold a rally to demand their rights, they would be led by Mr and Mrs Average chanting the question "What do we want?" with the crowd shouting back," FREEDOM!"

Squeezing The Tube Harder – Speech Recognition
Discussion regarding the recognition of the specific skills needed to make speech and language technology a success.

Customer Relationship Management: More Than Customer Service
Organisations need an intimate understanding of their customers and partners.

Empathy Wins Business: Get It Right
by Ben E. Fit The benefits of your product will mean different things to different people

Call Centre Location: History versus Mobility
Location selection for call centres

Customer Service: the Net Benefits
The Web is a cost effective way to provide information to customers

Business Planning :The Stairway to Call Centre Heaven
Details of the ideal business plan for call centres.

Freemantle's World
T the Swedish approach to customer service

PRACTICE your customer service
Practice your customer services - Would you want to buy a parachute that was produced to 99 percent of the designers specification?

Empathy wins business: To buy, or not to buy?
This article reveals how empathy may increase sales.

Going To Work Can Damage Your Hearing
Working in a call centre, as a motorcycle courier or as a sound engineer may be a hazard to your hearing, according to a new report, released today.

Wake Up To IP Telephony - The Enabling Technology
Alan Cohen, Director of IP telephony Sales, Inter-Tel Europe, explains what IP Telephony is all about, and how IP Telephony should be recognised as a business opportunity, not just a technological advance

Who Develops Innovative Ideas? Everybody!
In call centres our people are our greatest asset! - is this really true or is it just one of those management clichés? - read on!

How To Improve The Performance Of Your Inbound Sales Call Centre
In this short article, the author gives you a few tips on how to sell more and annoy less in today's crazy world of call centres

When thinking technology think people
Some organisations undervalue their most valuable assett - the people who work there! In this article, Robert Conlon shares some personal experiences and gives you 10 practical tips!

7 Steps To Telephone Interviewing
This article gives practical advise on recruiting call centre agents

What Do You Mean "Loyalty"?
A review of loyalty schemes; their value, practicalities and mistakes some companies make!

Direct Response TV
A review of DRTV and practical ideas to help you be more successful

Getting More From Telesales
An insight to the experiences of a telesales manager

IP Telephony - The Bottom Line
Much has been made of the potential of Internet Protocol (IP) telephony world wide. Alan Cohen, explains what all the fuss is about

The Mystery Of CTI - Present Facts and Future Trends
An article which argues the case for computer telephony integration (CTI) by shedding light on the mystery that is CTI, and by identifying the future for call centre applications

Call Centre Technology: Headsets
A short discussion of the benefits of headsets.

Who Killed The Customer? Part 1
A practical insight into how and why some companies win, and some companies lose, at keeping customers happy and therefore loyal.

Outsourcing Telebusiness Survey
An intersting insight into why companies use outsourcing services. The pro's and con's and some startling facts on what some clients say about their agencies.

Smaller Call Centres Open Up For Business
A new option for the smaller call centre.

Report on the State of European Call Centres
The results and analysis of a research project into European call centres.

Feature Article! Are you satisfied with your call centre?
An enlightening investigation into why some call centres work better than others.

Budding Authors
A message from the Editor inviting you to give in to your creative urges!

Call centre management practices clash with HR
Group personnel departments are being told to learn to love call centres’ unorthodox ways of managing people.

Predictive Dialing - Rules That Matter
The article was written in response to an almost complete absence of dialer codes of practice in the main outbound countries. Since then, there has been major change, especially in the US.

Measuring Your Performance Through Benchmarking
Do you benchmark your performance? In this article David Price, Sales Development & Management Consultant for ICL presents the case for benchmarking.

IVR in Call Centers – The German view
IVR represents one of the biggest reserves for increased efficiency in calL centres. This article focuses on the view in Germany where IVR has not had the same initial success as in the UK and US

Total Customer Focus Through Technology
A review of call centre technology and its uses

Listening and Learning
Research indicates that call-centres business operators will become increasingly sophisticated, bringing in automated voice-response systems and even opting to locate offshore. Paul Strohm reports.

European Call Centre Market Growth
The European call centre market employs over half a million people as call centre agents and it is currently growing at the rate of 25% per year.

Cracking the Area Code
Call-centre operators can choose between freehold or leasehold in industrial or office space and in established or uncharted areas.

The Internet-enabled Call Centre - What does it mean?
Everyone is talking about internet-enabled call centres. It is hardly surprising that discussion is focusing on the new medium.

Benefiting from Ergonomics in the Call Centre
Badly organised workplaces or workstations, particularly if matched with a poor way of working are at the root of the production and health problems associated with call centre work. This article highlights the probems.

Your online connection for converging communication solutions

Computer telephony, call centre, teleconnect, events. Research material, magazines etc: good all-round resource.



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