Keep getting the full benefits of your Zylinc solution

When we talk with customers, we sometimes find that they use their Zylinc solution in the way that they learned to use it, when it was installed.

That can be fine, but you may also miss out on useful features if you keep using your solution the same way. If you learned how to use your Zylinc solution several years ago, some of this has probably happened since then:

  • Your audiences' preferred communication methods have changed
  • Your organization's ways of working have changed
  • Zylinc has introduced new features that could be really useful for you

Time—lack of it—is the main reason why people keep working like they always have. However, if you take just a little time to adjust to today's environment, you might save yourself hundreds of hours per year, and you might also be able to offer even better customer service.

Example: You're an agent

When you got your Zylinc solution three years ago, calls accounted for 99% of inquiries, so you learned how to use phone queues.

Today, 25% of your inquires come in through e-mail, and 15% come in through chat, but has your organization set up e-mail and chat queues, so that you can handle all inquiries in your Zylinc solution?

If you handle e-mail and chat inquiries in separate applications, you don't get the full benefits of unified communications.

Example: You're a customer service center team lead

A few years ago, sending reports about your team's performance to management required manual work.

Today, you can schedule automatic generation and distribution of reports. You can also schedule the same report to automatically go out to different people at different intervals.

If you're still compiling and sending out reports manually, you're missing out on new features that could really save you time.

Let's look at three scenarios where customers got more out of their Zylinc solutions by looking at their current needs versus their original needs.

If you can recognize your own organization in the scenarios, you can easily adjust your Zylinc solution to do something about it.

“In 2014, our Zylinc solution was specifically tailored to our needs. Now it also matches our current needs.”

A retail chain had numerous features set up to suit their particular needs when their Zylinc solution was installed in 2014. The solution has really helped them work efficiently, but is there an even better way for them to work today?

When we sat down with people from the retail chain and looked at their current needs, we quickly found that today they weren't using features that would make their solution match their current needs even better.

A few weeks after our talk, the chain began using these additional features:

  • Mobile apps: When the retail chain got its Zylinc solution, there weren't any Zylinc mobile clients. Now the chain has begun using Zylinc Mobile, which works perfectly for an organization with many branches and outlets, where employees don't sit behind desktop computers.
  • Historical routing: “It would be really smart if a call could go to the agent that served the caller the last time they called,” the retail chain's customer service manager said. That had been a dream of hers for a long time. Now they use the historical routing feature from Zylinc to automatically route calls to the relevant agent, if the agent is available. As a result, the caller now hears a familiar voice and gets to speak with someone who knows about their needs.
  • Spell check on e-mail queues: This was a small thing that had annoyed agents for a while. When they got their Zylinc solution, they weren't able to spell check their answers to inquiries from e-mail queues. They hadn't realized that spell checking has since then become a standard Zylinc feature.
  • Estimated waiting time announcements: Another small thing that the retail chain hadn't realized was possible in newer Zylinc versions. Now, when callers have waited in a queue for more than one minute, they automatically get information about how long they can expect to wait, based on the load on the queue.
  • GDPR: The retail chain needed to comply with the European GDPR requirements that were introduced in 2018, but they were unsure about how to handle data from their Zylinc solution. They needn't worry: Newer Zylinc versions have GDPR features for audit logging, and for finding, exporting, and deleting personal data.

The result: A more efficient organization, better workflows for mobile employees, and even better customer service.

Related: Zylinc Mobile, Set up Zylinc Mobile, Handle e-mail inquiries in Zylinc Contact Center, Handle e-mail inquiries in Zylinc Service Center, Set up estimated waiting time announcements, Comply with GDPR (administrator's view), Comply with GDPR (agent's/receptionist's view)

Stock photo; city hall in photo is not connected with example

“We got Zylinc three years ago. We've been really happy with it, but we hadn't realized that new features could help us work even smarter.”

Being happy with one's Zylinc solution is great, but a local government became even happier when they took a little time to look at how things have changed since they got their Zylinc solution installed three years ago.

When we met with local government stakeholders at the city hall, and looked at their current needs, we quickly found that today they weren't using features that could make their lives even easier.

Just over a month after our meeting, the local government began using these additional features:

  • GDPR: Like other organizations, the local government also needed to comply with the European GDPR requirements that were introduced in 2018. Now they use the Zylinc GDPR features for audit logging, and for finding, exporting, and deleting personal data.

  • Recording: Sadly, agents are occasionally met with threats or abuse from callers, and the local government wanted to be able to record such calls and export evidence for use in court cases.

    With Zylinc, they can do that with third-party recording solutions from Apresa, BroadWorks, or RECORDIT as well as with calls handled through the Zylinc softphone solution.

    – And yes, the Zylinc solution can of course inform callers of the possibility that calls may be recorded.

  • Keep queue time when transferred: Agents at the local government's call center and internal helpdesk often transfer callers from one queue to another. However, agents often felt bad about transferring callers to another queue, because it meant that the callers would often need to wait a long time, because they'd be last in the new queue.

    They didn't know that in newer Zylinc versions callers are automatically credited on the new queue for the time that they’ve waited in the old queue. After the local government upgraded their system and began using this feature, they can treat callers much more fairly.

  • Click-to-transfer: The local government has an online reference resource in which employees can look up information about how to handle cases. They'd been using that online resource in isolation, but now they've integrated it with Zylinc.

    Now, with one click on a number in the online resource itself, they can transfer an ongoing call from Zylinc to another queue, another agent, or another department, with optional comments plus a complete history that shows which topics in the online resource the first agent has already covered with the caller.

    The feature's called click to transfer. It greatly helps agents as well as caseworkers save time and provide more efficient and targeted service, and callers get their inquiries solved much quicker than before.

The result: A local government organization that's now able to provide even better service to its users, because it has implemented new features and smarter workflows.

Related: Comply with GDPR (administrator's view), Comply with GDPR (agent's/receptionist's view), Set up call recording, Set up click to dial and click to transfer, Set up queues for phone inquiries (voice queues)

“Customer behavior has changed over time. Thanks to regular needs audits, our Zylinc solution has easily been able to adapt.”

When a bank got their Zylinc solution a couple of years ago, they sensed that the way customers engage with the bank would change in the years to come, and that the bank's employees would need to adapt their workflows as a consequence.

That's why they scheduled regular needs audits with Zylinc, to ensure that their solution would adapt and scale as workflows gradually changed.

As a result of the audits, the bank has introduced these new features and ways of working since they got their original solution:

  • IVR prompt-and-collect with lookup: From the start, the bank used Interactive Voice Response menus to collect callers' account numbers in order to automatically display the account numbers on agents' screens when they received calls.

    Later, however, the bank implemented a smarter solution based on input from the agents: They began to use the collected account numbers to look up account information in their customer database. Now, when agents receive a call, they automatically get not only the customer's account number, but also the customer's name and detailed information about the customer's account, transactions, investment portfolio, etc.

  • Lookup for chat and e-mail inquiries: The bank found the Zylinc lookup feature for looking up details about inquirers in their customer database so useful that they've now extended the feature to their chat and e-mail queues.

  • VIP routing & Caller-rated queueing: The bank originally used the A-numbers of important customers to give those customers a high priority on the bank's general queues. That worked fine, and VIP customers felt that they had access to a “fast lane.”

    Over time, however, the bank found that VIP customers often have more advanced customer service needs, so they've later changed their approach: Now calls from VIP customers are automatically routed to special queues with short waiting times and highly specialized agents—but still based on callers' A-numbers.

  • VQM (clientless agents): Some of the bank's experts often work from remote offices or from home. With the VQM (Voice Queue Member) feature, those experts can call in to the Zylinc solution from any phone, and use IVR menus to log in to queues and work as agents on those queues. They can even use advanced agent features, like callback, even though they don't use a normal client application.

  • Advanced Statistics: Customer service is hugely important to the bank, and managers on all levels of the organization want to know about KPIs and service goals. The bank started out with Zylinc Statistics Portal, which is the entry-level statistics monitoring solution from Zylinc.

    Now they've upgraded to the much more powerful Zylinc Advanced Statistics, which automates reporting and lets managers analyze everything from high-level trends for strategic planning to individual inquiries in connection with training or complaints.

    They can work with data from their Zylinc systems as well as from other PBX sources, like Cisco CUCM or Skype for Business, in a single solution. “Now we can easily turn data into actionable information,” they say.

The result: A highly efficient customer service organization that's able to adapt and scale to the market's needs. The bank gets extremely high scores when customers evaluate the bank's level of service.

But doesn't the fact that agents can view so much information about customers' accounts represent a risk, if impostors call the bank and pretend to be customers? No, don't worry. The agents are trained to ask control questions before they reveal any such information to callers.

Related: Set up IVR menus, How Zylinc distributes inquiries to agents, Automatically show information about inquirers, Set up agents as clientless voice queue members (VQM), Zylinc Advanced Statistics

If you want an assessment of your current needs, and how your Zylinc solution can be adjusted to suit them, simply get in touch with Zylinc for a no-obligation consultation.

There's no reason to hesitate: Either you'll get confirmation that your current way of working is just fine, or you'll get useful suggestions for optimizing your workflows and service.

We can have a short talk, or we can arrange to visit your organization to look at how you work. We can also arrange regular needs audits.

Will new features cost us lots of money?Closed If it turns out that you need new features, some of the new features will probably require new licenses that will cost you money. However, the benefits that you—and your users—get from the new features will nearly always outweigh the expenses. We'll gladly help you set up a business case and calculate your likely return of investment (ROI).