call center digital signage

Call CenterDigital Signage

White PaPerNovember 2008

Spectrum corporation10048 Easthaven Blvd • Houston, Texas 77075

Phone: [email protected] • www.specorp.com

Timely informaTion is our Business!

m124CCDS1208

C a l l C e N t e r D i g i t a l S i g N a g e

Timely informaTion is our Business! 1

Business decisions made without real time information may not be accurate or may not reflect current business conditions. Call Cen-ter Digital Signage (CCDS) is used to improve customer satisfaction levels and to meet stated service level agreements (SLA’s). Without using a CCDS, meeting SLA’s becomes more challeng-ing. Since CCDS updates automatically, reports do not need to be requested, the information is always there ready to be used and constantly updating.

CCDS’s make people more effective. Busi-ness stakeholders automatically receive use-ful real information that provides for decision making that is proactive and can lead to better customer satisfaction. For example, in a call center CCDS’s allow an agent to be aware that there are no calls holding and they can spend more time up-selling and cross selling products and services with a customer. In a produc-tion environment the production manager is able to adjust production schedules based on real sales, inventory and production rates. The instant feedback provided by CCDS’s gives everyone exposed to the data immediate results from their decisions so they can make adjust-ments accordingly. Any business that provides

real time information to managers and agents improves the chances of them to respond with timely and accurate information which reduces operating costs and increases revenue.

The information provided in this white paper is the general rule for most businesses. Every business is unique and requirements for the business may be different from those listed here. That does not mean this white is inaccu-rate or that the business is doing things right or wrong. Every business must evaluate their own Real Time Reporting needs and determine what is best for the business and its stakeholders.

A CCDS for this white paper includes large format displays (LCD/Plasma screens), LED Wallboards, Screen Pops, Dashboards, Email, Web pages, IP Phones, and PDA’s. A printed report is not considered to be a CCDS because while the information when the report was printed might have been real time when the actual report is used the information is no lon-ger real time. Defining real time information is beyond the scope of this white paper, however, for the purpose of this paper, real time infor-mation is considered pertinent operating data presented to the company stakeholders within the last 5 – 10 seconds.

Call Center Digital Signage

Call Center Digital Signage is hardware or software that is used to present key critical business information to the business stakeholders so that they are able to make decisions based on immediate and accurate information. The type of dis-play device used is a customer choice/decision based upon business specific issues. There is no right or wrong display device, but there can be a better choice display depending on the type of business, layout and location of the agents and business stakeholders, real estate available for a display device, the physical setting of the business and the goals of the business. To determine which display device is best for your business contact a Call Center Digital Signage vendor and ask them to do a discovery and consultation meeting with you.


2 Spectrum corporation

Presenting new information in less than 5 •seconds is not practical because the average person cannot read a screen or pick out a thresholded Key Performance Indicator (KPI) in less than 6 seconds;Data source vendors may not approve down-•loading data faster than every 5 seconds;Data that is over 10 seconds may be consid-•ered to be historical by some customers such as the financial industry;

Calls abandoned within 30 seconds are typi-•cally caller related reasons; Wrong number•Another immediate task has come up•Calls abandoned after 30 seconds are typi-•cally business related reasons

Long wait time –Inaccurate or confusing IVR –



LCD screens have been around for quite some time but only in the last few years have they made an impact on the CCDS market due to cost efficiencies and quality improvements. Today with the cost of the screens coming down and the life expectancy increasing many customers are turning to these types of screens to provide real time information to their stakeholders.

Sizes:A.) These devices range in size from 17inches (43cm) diagonal to 68inches (173cm) diagonal for Monitors and LCD/Plas-ma screens to over 10 feet (3.5M) diagonal for projection screens. The correct size and type of CCDS for a business is determined by some of the following factors:

Viewing distance – A 2” (5cm) character •can be read from a distance of approxi-mately 50 ft. (16M)Viewing Angle•Quantity of data per screen•Price•Value to the business•Real estate available•

Image Quality:B.) While this can be disputed (especially by the CCDS manufacturers) Spectrum ranks the image quality of the dis-plays in the following order:

LCD is the best quality – Note: HD is not 1. worth the additional money for CCDS. Plasma is second best quality2. Television monitors of any size 3. Projection screens (too dim, grainy, colors 4. not as vivid)

Life ExpectancyC.) Projection screens – bulb replacement is 1. not included in the life expectancyMonitors2. LCD / Plasma screens: See below for 3. more information on life expectancy and extended the life of the screen

Real Estate/Room Layout:D.) In all cases these devices will take up wall space or desk top space of varying amounts. A projection screen will take up the most space and a monitor, depending on the size and type will take up the least amount of space. It is not just the physical space the screens take up but also the line-of-site viewing angle the devices provide. To increase the effective-ness of the display the more people that can see the display(s) the more effective it can be. A typical command center is usu-ally designed with this in mind so finding a good location for the CCDS is not a problem.

LCD/Plasma Screens:

This section of the paper includes the following types of CCDS’s: LCD, Plasma screen, Monitor and Projection screens. Furthermore, the term LCD or Plasma screen is being used as a generic term and unless specifically stated it includes all of the products listed above.



A contact center may or may not be laid out in an efficient manner so locating CCDS’s for maximum viewing can become an issue. Consequently, the more CCDS’s required in a room layout will affect the ROI. Not includ-ing all CCDS’s for maximum viewing in your ROI calculation can be a critical mistake in justifying the investment. As a guideline, a 52” LCD screen will take up approximately the same amount of real estate as a 6 foot x 6 foot cubicle when you include line-of-site viewing. Line-of-site viewing is important because electrical structures, support col-umns, cabinets, tall cubicles, etc. have to be considered prior to installing an CCDS. For example, a projection screen that is 10 foot square will take up the real estate of a little more than five 6 foot x 6 foot cubicles.

Due to the weight of an LCD or Plasma screen they are usually mounted to a wall. There is a tradeoff since this wall space could be used for a cubicle, filing cabinets, office equipment, etc. Sometimes, a screen can be suspended from a ceiling but this creates line-of-site issues so other arrange-ments must be considered for these people. Also, installation to a ceiling or through a false ceiling is usually more costly. Provid-ing electrical power and data cables is also a consideration in locating the CCDS.

Content:E.) One of the biggest advantages of an LCD screen is the content that can be displayed. By far an LCD screen will be the most dynamic CCDS available. Graphs, charts, live media, web, flash files, Office documents, RSS feeds, Messages and DVD type input can all be displayed on a LCD screen provided the software that is used to drive the screen is capable of pushing that type of content out. At the same time con-tent is one of the biggest challenges of an LCD screen. To garner as much attention as possible the screen content must be excit-

ing, colorful, changing, and must be sized right to be seen from a distance. What looks good on a screen during content creation, 12 inches from the viewer, will not look the same when presented on a screen to be viewed from 50 feet. Other content challeng-es include images that compete for visibility, colors used side by side that are difficult to read (Yellow next to white, blue next to green, silver and gray) and too much content on one screen.

The most important content should be in the upper left hand corner and the least important content in the lower right hand corner. Most people read in a “Z” pattern starting in the upper left and working to the lower right. So, having important content in the upper right hand corner would be most appropriate. Of all CCDS’s the LCD requires the most intensive knowledge of laying the screens out and coordinating files, graphics, animations, text and colors. Too many times layouts that are created during the original installation are used for years because no one in-house is knowledgeable enough to change them. This is an important consider-ation in choosing a vendor to work with who will provide training or professional services to create new screen presentations. Some companies resort to using PowerPoint as the method of displaying content on a screen. However, PPT is not able to support the various file types required, cannot schedule the information to display at different times and cannot provide proof of being displayed which are all basic functions of any good CCDS software. While LCD’s offer the most powerful potential of any of the CCDS’s it is only realized when fresh content is created on a regular basis and this needs to be pro-vided by someone in-house who has been properly trained or through the vendor’s professional services group.



Total Cost of Ownership (TCO):F.) There is debate among CCDS suppliers as to which CCDS has the longest TCO. However, when you consider the life expectancy and real estate required the LCD screen still has a high TCO.

Adding to the TCO are the following:Cost of the screens•Life expectancy•PC’s/Controllers to drive the screens•Cabling and additional hardware for •the screens (splitters, extenders, sound media, etc.)Real Estate•Content Creation•

TCO does not take into consideration some soft issues of LCD’s:

How the display adds color and excite-•ment to the businessHow the business appears to be more •cutting edgeHow the display can be used for other •things How customers view the business•

These soft issues are difficult to measure and each business must weigh these is-sues when deciding on the display device of choice for the business.

Refresh Rates on a LCD Screen:G.) There are two parts to this statement.

Refresh rate of the numbers in the charts 1. and graphs displayed ;Changing of screens2.

The refresh rates of the numbers within the graphs and charts should be changing every 6 – 10 seconds. The more content on the screen the longer the refresh can and should be. Changing the data faster does not gain any advantage as the aver-age person is not going to be able to see the change is too fast. If there are 4 -6 elements on the screen the refresh rate of the num-

bers should be about 6 seconds. If there are more than 6 elements on the screen the refresh rate can increase to 10 seconds. Any faster refresh rates puts undue pressure on the data source to run another query or build another report faster than it needs to.

Changing of the screens should not hap-pen any faster than 30 seconds. If there is a lot of content on the screen then the screen can and should stay up longer. The best way to test this is to put some content in the lower right hand corner and after 30 seconds ask a viewer what was in the right hand cor-ner. Increase the refresh rate until they can tell you what was in the right hand corner.

CCDS vendors should give you the op-H.) tion of providing your own PC to drive the screens or providing a display controller for your screens. By providing a display controller for the screens, this should gain the advantage of having the vendor’s soft-ware power on / off the LCD Screen. This is an advantage as it can extend the life of your LCD screen. Most controllers will also pro-vide for volume adjustment, brightness and contrast adjustments. If your vendor does not provide a display controller, at the end of the work day each LCD should be powered down to extend the life of the display.

Other advantages of getting the display controller from the vendor include:

It will not require an OS license from the •customer;It may not have to fall under the corpo-•rate policy and procedures for all PC’s since it has no OS;All software required is already installed •and operational; The display controller can be covered by •the vendors maintenance program

The implementation of a LCD system may I.) require specialized skills not found in most organizations. If there is no AV experience



in-house it is recommended that you work with an outside vendor that can install a complete LCD solution for you. Running cables, installing extenders, splitters, sound cabling and devices, installation of the screens, controllers, etc. all take a certain level of knowledge that is typically not in-house. Hiring an outside contractor special-izing in AV may be money well spent.

When is an LCD system a better option J.) than other CCDS’s? There are some factors that must be weighed.

Is the content going to be more than 1. alpha-numeric’s such as graphs, charts, live media, web pages, etc? If so then a LCD system is ideal. Is the content going to be numeric only 2. and desk top displays are not an option then possibly LED wallboards are a bet-ter solution. There are a lot of factors to weigh, there-3.

fore the best option is to consult with your CCDS vendor and ask them for options.

Extend the life of your LCD/Plasma Screen:K.) Turn the contrast down to 50%. Or at a 1. minimum turn it down. When you re-ceive the display it will be turned up to 100%. This will cause faster burn out of the display. Leave it at 50% for about 500 hours and then slowly increase the contrast ever 6 months by 10%.Turn the brightness down to 50%. Or 2. at a minimum turn it down. When you receive the display it will be turned up to 100%. This will cause faster burn out of the display. Leave it at 50% for about 500 hours and then slowly increase the contrast ever 6 months by 10%.Ensure that the vendor of the CCDS soft-3. ware has automatic shut off of the screen built into the software. This will shut down the screens during off hours.



Sizes:A.) LED wallboards range in size from a single line display to a display that can fill an entire wall. However, most often used are 2, 3, 4, and 5 line wallboards. These boards are the most cost effective, are the easiest to install and take up the least amount of real estate in a customer’s office. A typical wallboard can be about 10 inches tall by 65 inches long. This is large enough to provide more than 65 characters on the screen at one time.

The real estate taken up by a wallboard is minimum or about 1/10th of a cubicle. They can be mounted to a wall or suspended from the ceiling as they are much lighter than a LCD screen.

Image Quality:B.) Not applicable, although it is interesting to note that many times a LCD screen is purchased and after some experi-mentation it is discovered that in order to present data in characters that are large enough to be useful, the presentation ends up using the same alpha-numeric characters that an LED wallboard would provide.

Life Expectancy:C.) The Mean Time Between Failure for a wallboard is over 100,000 hours or over 11 years of continuous operation. Unless something such as a power spike occurs a LED wallboard probably will not fail. For this reason the TCO of a wallboard is always one of the lowest of all CCDS’s. However, many customers feel like there is something better available and opt out of using the LED displays, while in reality to get the most out of existing LED wallboards, they should be blended with other CCDS technologies instead of being replaced. LED wallboards can still be a very cost effective CCDS.

Content:D.) The single largest disadvantage to the LED wallboard is the content that can be displayed. The boards only display alphanu-meric characters, therefore only messages with text and numbers may be presented to the business. This limits the use of the board in many businesses, however, on the positive side, since there is limited room; it encourages only important data to be dis-played, which can be more effective in many

LED Wallboards / Wallboards

LED Wallboards have been used for displaying real time data in businesses for over 25 years. About 15 years ago they gained rapid popularity in the Call Center Digital Signage arena. Today many people feel that wallboards are old technology and do not belong in their business. Unfortunately many times these people are misinformed. There remains a tremendous need for LED wallboards. When a cus-tomer wants to display nothing more than numeric stats with a limited amount of alpha characters then an LED wallboard can be the perfect fit. With possibly the lowest TCO of all CCDS’s, wallboards can dramatically improve decision making, increase revenue and customer satisfaction within a business today.



cases. Sometimes other CCDS presentations are too busy and become ineffective.

Colors:E.) The traditional wallboard is avail-able in Red-only and Tricolor (Red, Green and Yellow). Some vendors provide addition-al colors such as shades of Red, Green, and Yellow allowing up to 16 different colors. Some vendors provide blue as well.

The Red-only displays are becoming the black and white TV. In fact some vendors no longer offer red-only displays. The multiple shade wallboards sounds good in theory but in practice customers have a difficult time distinguishing the difference between light red, red and dark red or between orange, tan and brown. Most customers that have tried the multiple shade wallboards report that they are disappointed with the outcome of the shading. The colors are typically associ-ated with a threshold level (ie green is good, yellow is warning and red is trouble) which is controlled by the software controlling the displays. Normally the three colors provide adequate thresholding, but in the last few years, some LED wallboards also provide a fourth blue color. Now customers have another threshold option when viewing the boards. Some customers have stated that rather than pay extra for the fourth color op-tion they would rather buy a LCD screen.

Total Cost of Ownership:F.) The LED wall-board typically has the lowest TCO of any CCDS. This is based on the cost of the wall-boards, installation, the software to drive them, the average life expectancy of a wall-board and the repair and replacement costs.

Refresh rates of LED wallboards can be as G.) often as the refresh of the data from the data sources. However, it is recommended that the refresh rate not exceed 5 seconds. There are two reasons for this:

Depending on the size of the wallboard it 1. will take the average person 6 seconds to

read the content on a two line wallboard, 10 seconds on a 3 line board, 20 seconds on a 4 line board and up to 30 seconds on a 5 line board. Using thresholds such as changing colors, running messages, and “flashing” content will improve the visibility of critical data but will not im-prove the “read” time. If the wallboard is larger (3, 4 or 5 lines) more time will be required to read the content on the wallboard. Therefore since it takes a minimum of 6 seconds to read the con-tent there is no reason to refresh faster than that. The data source that is supplying the 2. data may be adversely affected by a refresh rate faster than 6 – 10 seconds. Some data source vendors recommend a refresh rate no faster than 30 seconds and anything faster than that will affect the integrity of the data source. Some data sources will actually fail over time if the data source is tapped to often and too fast.

All wallboards need software to drive them. H.) The software typically is provided by the wallboard vendor. This software will take ad-vantage of all of the features of the wallboards such as colors, sound, messages, character sizes, refresh rates, addressing, IP Connectiv-ity and maximum amount of content allowed on the board. The wallboard vendor will have certain PC or server requirements for the soft-ware to reside on and drive the wallboards. However, especially in the Telecom industry, some switch and ACD vendors have written their own drivers to communicate to the wall-boards. In these cases a PC or server is not re-quired to drive the boards since it is included with the vendor’s software server. Compare the switch vendors wallboard software to the wallboard vendors software prior to deciding which is best.



Implementation of a wallboard system is I.) dependent on a number of factors includ-ing available power and IP connectivity drops at the location where the wallboard is to be mounted. If power and an IP drop exist then the installation of the wallboard is only as difficult as mounting it to the wall or ceiling. Most wallboard software is straight forward in connecting to the wallboards and is much less complicated than installing LCD CCDS’s.

Notes:

Be sure to follow fire codes when install-1. ing the wallboards. Most codes do not allow for power supplies to be mounted in a false ceiling. PoE wallboards will require the network 2. connection to be flawless, any “hiccups” and the board will not receive the trans-missions. PoE typically requires special cabling and additional hardware, check with the vendor for cabling and hard-ware specifications. Wallboards should not be mounted to a 3. false ceiling as they weigh too much and will fall. Like all CCDS products, power must be 4. properly grounded or communications to the wallboards may not work properly.

When is an LED wallboard system better J.) than a LCD system?

If the content to be displayed is always 1. going to be text and numbers and never any type of media, graphs, charts, or documents to be displayed. If the purpose is to reach a large audi-2. ence with the fewest devices possible. When real estate on the desk top is limited 3. and stakeholders need to see real time data throughout the day to do their jobs. Typically LED wallboard systems are 4. more cost effective than comparable LCD systems.

What Size wallboard is best?K.) Topics that need to be discussed with your CCDS ven-dor are real estate availability, how much data you want to display, how many groups will be displayed, what is the refresh rate, distance to read, and how many boards will be installed. Some additional information about how much information a wallboard can display:

One line board: Small business use. The 1. customer needs to see 1 or 2 KPI’s at a time. Two line board: Small to large business 2. use. The customer needs to see 4 – 6 KPI’s at a time.Three line board: Medium to enterprise 3. business use. The customer needs to see 8 – 10 KPI’s at a time. Four line board: Large to enterprise busi-4. ness use. The customer needs to see 12 – 14 KPI’s at a time.Five line board: Large to enterprise busi-5. ness use. The customer needs to see 16 – 20 KPI’s at a time.

Character Height and Viewing Distance.L.) Over 20 years ago 3M Corporation de-termined that for every inch of character height the visibility is approximately 50 feet. Therefore a 2” (5cm) character can be viewed from approximately 100’ (30m). Most wallboards use a 2” tall character to display the content to the call center. A 3”or 4” tall character can also be used on a wall-board to increase viewing distance, but this also reduces the amount of text that can be displayed. When using an LCD/Plasma screen most customers try to put more information on the screen only to find they are unable to read the content. Once they increase the size of the character to a read-able height (usually about 2 inches) they are limited to what can be displayed and the LCD/Plasma screen resembles a wallboard.



Sizes:A.) A screen pop should have the ability to be resized. This should include larger or smaller depending on the real estate avail-able on the desk top. When the screen pop is resized it should remain this size until it is resized again. The software driving the pops should have user permission settings that either allow or not allow the resizing of the screen pop.

Image Quality:B.) Not applicable

Life Expectancy: C.) Screen pops will last as long as the software remains intact, licensed and the OS does not change. Other factors that will determine the life of a screen pop: usefulness to the agent, screen real estate demands, licensing costs and annual sup-port costs.

Content:D.) The content that is displayed on the screen pop should be text, graphs, charts, and/or messages. A pop should have all of these abilities at a minimum to provide the type of information to a desk top as re-quired. Messages should be one way or two way depending on the user permissions. The pop layout should be determined by the customer and dependent on real estate on the screen and not by the software limita-tions, content, or licensing.

Screen Pop Options:E.) There should be op-tions included with the pops such as mini-mizing to the system tray and show content when minimized, pop up on threshold or messages, resizing, Active Directory inter-face, concurrent licensing, messaging, al-

Screen Pops / Desk Tops

Screen pops have been around for a long time providing content about the caller, trouble ticket information, system health, ACD information, and many other types of content. An advantage to screen pops is they only appear when an event has occurred such as a new call coming to an agent’s phone, the systems health has changed, there is a new trouble ticket to resolve or any other event positive or nega-tive that has caused a small window to appear or pop up on the desk top. When there is no event occurring there should be an option to have the screen pop down in the system tray.



ways on top, pop up frequency settings and message history.

Colors:F.) Not applicable

Total Cost of Ownership:G.) The TCO is depen-dent on many things including how long the pops will be used, annual maintenance and licensing costs, PC upgrades, OS Upgrades, re-installation labor for PC, and moves/changes. When all of these things are added in screen pops are just behind a wallboard with the low-est TCO. Some may argue they have the best TCO and in some cases they will be correct es-pecially when the OS and PC are not changed out often, there are a large number of pops and annual maintenance and licensing is not required. However, administration changes, reloads because of OS and PC changes all add to the TCO.

Refresh Rates can and should be no faster H.) than 5 seconds. Refresh rates faster than this can cause the screen pops to “pop up” too often if frequency settings are not in-voked or available. When an agent must respond to a screen pop it takes away from their efficiency and effectiveness with the customer or task at hand. The refresh rates can be set to 5 seconds and the frequency at which the software pops up is set lower so as not to disturb the agent every 5 seconds. The exception is when a screen pop con-tains caller information or when it is used with a dialer. Fast refresh rates can cause unnecessary pressure on the data source – see wallboard refresh rates.

Screen Pops are part of an overall Automat-I.) ed Real Time Reporting solution and re-quire some type of software and software engine to drive them. There should not be a limitation to the number of screen pops that a business can have in use. Screen pops should take advantage of Active Direc-tory and concurrent licensing.

Implementation of a screen pop system is J.) rather easy. The client software is pushed to the desk top and configured per agent. If the business is using Active Directory (Ads) then this function is considerably easier as groups can be created rather than individual desk tops. Permissions are set, layouts cre-ated and saved and settings set and saved. Again if ADS is used much of this work is considerably easy to accomplish.

When is a screen pop system the right K.) choice for a business?

When individual information per agent is 1. required. When there is real estate on the agent’s 2. desk top allowing for a screen pop to be used.When the physical layout of the business 3. or tall cubicles does not allow for LCD screens and wallboards to be used. When communications between agent 4. and manager are critical and the busi-ness parameters do not allow for the phone, whisper mode, or texting to be used for communications.



Sizes:A.) The dashboard must be able to be sized to the demands of the user. However, the dashboard most likely will not be re-duced down in size to a screen pop although it should allow for this option.

Image Quality should be equal to the qual-B.) ity you see on a LCD screen but limited to the quality of the monitor being used by the customer.

Life Expectancy is similar to a screen pop C.) and is only limited by the usefulness of the software, licensing and PC and OS support.

Content:D.) The type of content should be up to the customer. Typical customers will want to see more private domain type in-formation rather than public consumption information. Typically financial information, daily revenue, daily inventory, daily sales, customer or client history, daily task lists, oc-cupancy, daily calendars, production sched-ules, installation schedules, trouble ticketing information and any other information an executive needs to have to understand the

dynamics of running the business on a daily basis with real time information.

Colors:E.) Not applicable.

Total Cost of Ownership:F.) The TCO is de-pendent on many things including how long the dashboards will be used, annual main-tenance and licensing costs, PC upgrades, OS Upgrades, reinstallation labor for PC and OS upgrades, and changes. Dashboards can have the same TCO as a screen pop, but higher than wallboards and LCD Displays. The biggest reason for the difference is the smaller number of people that benefit from the Dashboard CCDS.

Refresh Rates:G.) The refresh rates should be set to 6 seconds and if your system supports it 5 seconds. The only factor that should af-fect the refresh rate is if the data source can support a faster refresh rate. The dashboard setting should be set so that thresholds do not have a high frequency setting and they alert the user to often because of the fast refresh rate.

Dashboards

A dashboard is a cross between a desktop or screen pop and a LCD screen dis-play and is set up to display critical information for an individual such as a manager, supervisor or executive. The content that is displayed is typically more confidential or business critical in nature. The dashboard should display content from internal business systems as well as general business systems. Dashboards should provide for drill down to extract more detailed information from the data source(s).



Dashboards require a software engine to H.) capture the data and to drive the dashboard. Then the content needs to be created and the data sources tapped into. Once they are set up they will continue to run as required. However, most customers realize the benefit of a dashboard and request many additions to their dashboards. For this reason, having someone trained on how to do this or having a contract with the vendor to provide this as a service will ensure the dashboard has what the customer is looking for.

When is a dashboard the right choice for I.) the business?

When confidential but real time informa-1. tion is required by a busy executive.When printed reports are of little value 2. because of the lack of the real time infor-mation.When critical daily decisions are based 3. on real information and not supposition.



Email for this whitepaper includes emails to a PDA, Desktop or a Mobile Phone.

Sizes:A.) Not applicable

Image Quality:B.) Not Applicable

Life Expectancy:C.) As long as the application continues to be useful to the organization it will continue to operate. Changes to the OS, Email systems, licensing or server programs could have an effect on the life of this appli-cation.

Content:D.) There are two parts of the content for an email alert system: the subject line and the email body.

Subject Line:1. In a good email alert sys-tem the subject line should contain the real time information that is critical so that the entire email does not have to be opened to determine the problem. De-tails of the problem with a potential fix could be in the body of the email. Email Body:2. Within the body of the email the full details of the problem can be laid out for the reader to determine the best course of action. Another option is to include the problem as well as the course of action to take if it is not clear. Contact names and numbers can also be provided to the email recipient.

Email

Combining email and real time reporting can have a tremendous impact on the success of the business. By taking the “pager” concept a step further and having an email sent to a PDA or Cell phone customers can be immediately aware of the status of a situation, threshold, group, trouble ticket, etc literally anywhere in the world they have connectivity. Customer determined threshold levels are preset and when a violation occurs an email is automatically sent out with details of the situa-tion. Other uses include when settings are changed to the operating software notify administration of the change, the server goes down and notification is instantly sent, production is too low so the appropriate people are notified, and so on. This type of notification has allowed for the continued staff reduction without the loss of criti-cal system maintenance, contact center reporting, or reduced customer satisfaction. One advantage email has over other CCDS systems is that it is traceable so someone cannot say they did not get the message. The “no one told me” excuse is a little harder to use with this system.



The email alert system should have controls on it to prevent unneces-sary and too frequent emails be sent out. If the conditions continue to deteriorate then repeated emails can go and possibly should go out. But a condition that re-mains the same for an extended period of time possibly should not receive multiple email alerts.

Colors: E.) Not Applicable

Total Cost of Ownership:F.) The TCO is de-pendent on many things including how long the email will be used, annual maintenance and licensing costs, PC upgrades, OS Up-grades, reinstallation labor for PC and OS upgrades, and moves/changes. Ownership cost should also include the value received from the product. If little value is received the out of pocket cost that could have gone to another product should also be consid-ered. Taking into consideration all of these things Email remains behind dashboards/screen pops, wallboards and LCD Displays with the lowest TCO.

Refresh Rates:G.) There are a couple of points to make here.

The refresh rate on the KPI needs to be 1. set at the 5-6 second time frame because it is this refresh that will trigger the email to be sent when a KPI goes into threshold. A frequency setting must be in place that 2. prevents duplicate emails from being sent out on the same threshold violation. The frequency setting is up to the customer

but a setting no less than time it normally takes to clear this threshold violation. For example, if the service level has dropped below 70% and it normally takes 15 min-utes to get the service level back above 70% then set the frequency for the email to be sent again at 15 minutes.

The email client requires software to send H.) out an email. True the email will be sent us-ing the in-house email server, however, soft-ware is required to create the email, create the email recipient list, and send it to the email server. Some companies rely solely on the email option as the only method of notification of a threshold violation. If this is the case then the email server and email client software must be managed by the same department so changes to the either software do not “take down” the ability to do these notifications.

When is email notification right for a I.) company?

If the company has standardized on this 1. type of communications for threshold violations.If the company has remote management 2. and support of the business and relies on the remote management and support to drive the business. If the company is looking for another 3. level of notification for threshold viola-tions. If the company is serious about setting, 4. reaching and modifying goals for the business to improve customer satisfac-tion levels.



Size:A.) Not applicable.

Image Quality: B.) This is determined by the web page created. Web pages can be pure text, graphs and charts or a combination of both. It is up to the user to determine what is best for web page.

C.) Life Expectancy: As long as the application continues to be useful to the organization it will continue to operate. Changes to the OS, Corporate Goals, licensing or server pro-grams could have an effect on the life of this application.

Content:D.) The content that is displayed on a web page is up to the customer and the designer of the web page. The content should be a minimum amount to meet the goals for the department/company and the page should be something that is easy to

follow, read, and view. A page that is bor-ing and hard to follow will not be viewed or used by the customer. The extra effort it takes to create a style sheet that will be used is worth the effort. The vendor of the Automated Real Time Reporting software will have staff that can create these style sheets and in a manner that is pleasing to those reading them. The customer must work with the vendor to come up with ideas of what the page should look like. The cus-tomer must not leave the web page design solely up to the vendor as that is unfair and will result in a page that is probably not the most useful to the customer. Making chang-es to these web pages can be time consum-ing and potentially costly so a good up front plan will save the customer money in the long run.

Webpage

An Automated Real Time Webpage is a product that sends data to a web page that can be viewed and refreshed in real time using just about third party browser. The data that is viewed is determined by the customer and can be changed as re-quired. Then anyone with the correct URL is able to see the data on this webpage. Because it is a URL there are security concerns that arise and a company must de-termine if the value of remote viewing of a webpage is worth the potential of public viewing. While firewalls and authentication removes much of these fears they are still not 100% secure that the information will not be seen by unauthorized eyes. Re-stricting the webpage to internal used only can help alleviate this concerns but then the ability of true remote management may be lost.



Colors:E.) The use of colors on a web page is just as valuable as they are on a Plasma Screen. Colors can be used to show a threshold violation or for creating a higher level of awareness of a particular topic. The colors or the use of colors needs to be decid-ed with the web page designer at the begin-ning of the process because it is part of the style sheet that is created.

Total Cost of Ownership: F.) TCO will depend on how often the web page is changed, the OS, licensing and hardware changes. Typi-cally the up-front cost of a web page option is a bit higher because it includes a web page from the vendor. However, future web page changes, OS changes and hardware changes can drive the TCO up. If the web page is not changed then the value of hav-ing a page is lost to the customer.

Refresh Rate:G.) When a web page refreshes the old page disappears and a new page appears. How fast this happens depends on the customers bandwidth and the users dis-play device and bandwidth. How often the page SHOULD refresh is a function of how much data is displayed and how quickly a new page appears. If the page is a full docu-ment in size with a lot of data refreshing the page often is not helpful as the user cannot read all of the content that quickly. Even using colors to show thresholds of important content is not good enough if the refresh rate is set so low that the user cannot read

the information. A web page refresh rate of 15 – 30 seconds is adequate for most cus-tomers. However, review what content will be displayed as well as the bandwidth that is available to the users.

A webpage requires software to send this H.) page out to users. However a second piece of the software is the XSLT style sheet that is required as a layout of the actual page. For this reason the webpage software cost can be more costly up front than originally thought. Prior to purchasing this option the customer should understand what is included and not included in the web page software. Future changes to the web page design will require some professional servic-es charges by the vendor or in house devel-opment time by the customer. In either case additional costs will be required anytime changes are made.

When is a webpage right for a company?I.) If the company has in house develop-1. ment capabilities to create new pages or at least make changes to the web page. If the company has a need for remote 2. management of the business AND the management actually occurs from the remote managers. If the management never happens then the webpage is a costly tool. Other remote management tools (email, 3. PDA, screen pops) are not an option.



Any business interested in an Automated Real Time Reporting device should work with a vendor to determine which device and software is right for the business. To help make the right decision about the type of device that is best the company must be able to define what it is they are trying to achieve and in what type of time frame.

The Total Cost of Ownership can be ar-gued because each business has its own poli-cies regarding software upgrades, hardware upgrades and ongoing maintenance support plans. All things being equal the winner in the TCO statistic is probably the traditional Wall-board. However, when you add in the value to the business and the ability to do more with a single tool the plasma/ LCD screens win.

Automated Real Time Reporting systems work because they are automated and they re-port on carefully selected KPI’s and they provide this information when and where the customer needs it. If a customer were to try and create these reports throughout the day they lose a valuable resource to the process of capturing and generating the reports. {Editor note: A busi-ness unit that I walked through recently was posting sales information on a plasma screens. They were showing real time sales revenue, comparisons against forecasts, top sales reps,

and sales per region. All of this was being done throughout the day and on average this manag-er spent 2 hours per day creating these reports. The manager spent more time at the end of the month and quarter as these reports became more critical. This manager was spending 520 hours per year creating these reports on a Pow-er Point presentation. At a salary of $50K per year this manager was spending $12,500 on cre-ating these reports. A real time system would be able to create these reports and display them automatically throughout the day and allow this manager to work with the reps on closing busi-ness and not on generating reports. }

“Executive buy-in” is critically important to implementing a successful CCDS program. Without this element, the system has little chance of ever becoming an integral element in providing the edge a business needs to contin-ue to grow and be successful.

Work with a vendor to decide which Real Time reporting system components are best for your organization. Realize that you can walk before you run with these types of systems and you will always be able to add on to an existing system as your business needs change and you learn more about what an CCDS system can do for you business. •

SummaryWhich device has the greatest value to an organization is impossible to say with-

out discovery and consultation with the organization. Any of them might be best or worst depending on the company and its goals, policies, and culture. What is clear is that using an Automated Real Time reporting device will improve customer sat-isfaction, improve effectiveness within the company, improve efficiencies, help the business achieve realistic goals, reduce call center operating costs and be something more than a PR piece for new potential customers walking through the business.

Spectrum corporation10048 Easthaven Blvd • Houston, Texas 77075

Phone: [email protected] • www.specorp.com

Timely informaTion is our Business!

m124CCDS1208

call center digital signage

Documents