Customer service technology
Customer service strategy drives customer service technology purchasing. Learn how customer service and support team leaders create customer experiences that drive loyalty and retention, serving their customers on a variety of platforms and channels.
Top Stories
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Feature
28 Feb 2023
Customer success vs. customer support: What's the difference?
Customer support and customer success sound similar, but they're distinct business practices. Differences include approach, metrics, maturity and skills. Continue Reading
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Tip
19 Jan 2023
Field service management software vendors to know in 2023
The COVID-19 pandemic turned nice-to-have field service features -- like remote project management and automation -- into vital capabilities. Find out which features vendors offer. Continue Reading
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Tip
14 Nov 2022
Business benefits of a customer self-service strategy
Self-service channels can save organizations money while improving CX -- if done right. Explore these benefits and tips to keep in mind when building a self-service strategy. Continue Reading
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Tip
01 Jun 2022
Compare pros and cons of live chat vs. phone support
Phone support offers personalized experiences, but live chat agents can answer simple inquiries more quickly. See how these service channels stack up against each other. Continue Reading
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Guide
24 Mar 2022
Contact center of the future is now
AI, machine learning, NLP, advanced analytics, cloud-based tools and workforce management software are transforming the simple call center into multidimensional contact centers. Continue Reading
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Opinion
23 Feb 2022
Zoom CCaaS a big bet on the future of customer service
Zoom already integrates with the most popular contact-center-as-a-service platforms. So why has Zoom come out with a CCaaS of its own? Continue Reading
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Feature
29 Dec 2021
How bad writing, templates and chatbots kill customer service
Leslie O'Flahavan, a writing coach specializing in contact center communications, discusses how humans, AI and bots can work together to provide good customer service. Continue Reading
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Tip
23 Dec 2021
Top 5 challenges in field service management
Many organizations overlook field service management in their customer service strategies, yet this area -- and its challenges -- are critical to CX success. Continue Reading
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Feature
14 Dec 2021
Top customer service certifications and courses
Here are some customer services courses to help frontline employees provide customers with a better experience. Continue Reading
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News
09 Dec 2021
Automating customer service empathy a work in progress
Bots and AI tools can help clean up customer service texts, emails and chats -- and make them more consistent. But finding empathy is still mainly the purview of humans. Continue Reading
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Feature
03 Dec 2021
8 tips to build and manage a customer service team
While customer service has its challenges, managers can build, run and maintain great customer service teams with good communication, up-to-date training and shared goals. Continue Reading
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Feature
29 Nov 2021
15 customer service skills and how to develop them
Some customer service skills include problem-solving, empathy, product knowledge and patience. Continue Reading
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Feature
19 Nov 2021
9 steps to create a customer service plan
Crafting a customer service plan is a key step to improving customer satisfaction and building loyalty for an organization. Continue Reading
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News
18 Nov 2021
Google makes chatbots accessible with Bot-in-a-Box
Available on Google Cloud, the feature is deployed in AI-powered Business Messages. Using pre-made bots, enterprises can connect with customers on different branded channels. Continue Reading
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Feature
11 Nov 2021
Augmented reality emerges in customer experience tech
For customer experience, augmented reality is more common than virtual reality. Marketing and field service are the early adopters of AR, with sales and e-commerce trailing. Continue Reading
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Feature
02 Nov 2021
The 3 types of chatbots for beginners and how to build them
Various types of chatbots exist, but three types, in particular, are easiest for beginners to learn and build independently. Find out more in this chapter excerpt. Continue Reading
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Feature
02 Nov 2021
Beginner's guide to essential chatbot best practices
In this Q&A, author Andrew Freed lays out key chatbot best practices for beginners, the biggest challenges and how organizations can tell when to adopt chatbot technology. Continue Reading
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Feature
28 Oct 2021
What does a customer service manager do?
Customer service managers are an integral part of contact centers. They are the team leader, trainer and policy maker. Continue Reading
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News
28 Oct 2021
Salesforce Field Service adds scheduling, Lightning web tools
Salesforce turns its attention to field service technology development, bringing mobile app and web experiences more in line with consumer-grade customer service. Continue Reading
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Tip
05 Oct 2021
Benefits of moving to a cloud contact center
Cloud contact centers have various benefits for organizations, including cost savings, more interaction channels and staying with -- if not ahead of -- the competition. Continue Reading
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News
02 Oct 2021
Contact center agents' post-pandemic future
The pandemic changed how contact centers operate and the technologies used to provide customer service. In this Q&A, ICMI's Brad Cleveland predicts what's next. Continue Reading
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News
30 Sep 2021
Amazon Connect adds voice ID, agent assist features
AWS adds tools to search knowledge bases for answers based on terms picked up via in-call voice recognition, as well as voice ID to confirm identities of callers. Continue Reading
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News
09 Sep 2021
Salesforce Service Cloud to add Servicetrace RPA, Slack
Salesforce plans to release features that increase Service Cloud's flexibility for contact centers to manage agents working remotely either part time or full time. Continue Reading
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News
09 Sep 2021
IBM Watson Assistant tools aim to speed contact center CX
IBM has released new AI capabilities to speed virtual agents and automate more contact center tasks. The vendor also formed a partnership with contact center vendor IntelePeer. Continue Reading
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News
02 Sep 2021
FACE Act aims to improve government CX
The bipartisan bill that would codify the measurement of customer experience for federal agencies cleared the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Government Affairs. Continue Reading
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News
17 Aug 2021
Initial Salesforce-Slack integrations: Sales, service, marketing
Salesforce unveils the first Slack integrations. But it could be Slack Connect -- which extends Slack's reach outside the Salesforce user's organization -- that is the killer app. Continue Reading
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Tip
02 Aug 2021
10 voice of the customer tools to consider
A voice of the customer tool is invaluable for creating an action plan to improve the customer experience. Continue Reading
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News
28 Jul 2021
Nice expands contact center AI offering with ContactEngine buy
Nice acquires ContactEngine conversational AI technology to support customer self-service and live agent conversations across multiple digital channels. Continue Reading
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Tip
23 Jun 2021
7 best practices for a voice of the customer program
A voice of the customer program can be tremendously fruitful for an organization -- if it is done well. Continue Reading
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Answer
17 Jun 2021
How do omnichannel vs. multichannel marketing differ?
While multichannel marketing connects customers and companies through various forms of communication, omnichannel marketing takes it further and removes any silos. Continue Reading
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Feature
19 May 2021
ServiceNow's vision for AI, customer service management
ServiceNow's John Ball discusses the Now Platform's approach to AI, customer service and field service management, and why he left Salesforce as EVP of product for Einstein. Continue Reading
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News
12 May 2021
Salesforce low-code features in beta; GA slated for winter
Salesforce gives users a taste of Dynamic Interactions low-code features to come with a beta release of features planned for its next major platform update. Continue Reading
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News
16 Mar 2021
ServiceMax releases Engage field service management app
ServiceMax Engage app gives users' customers a snapshot of their service contract benefits, and gives users vital updates for asset managements of property in the field. Continue Reading
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News
11 Mar 2021
ServiceNow Customer Service Management grows in Quebec
ServiceNow telecom and financial services users targeted for growth as the company expands customer service offering in Quebec, its latest platform release. Continue Reading
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News
26 Feb 2021
Salesforce Field Service spring release adds map features
Salesforce dubs pandemic and post-pandemic times 'the appointment economy' for field service operations and builds mobile app features to accommodate it. Continue Reading
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News
24 Feb 2021
Digital queues avert COVID-19 vaccine registration crashes
Q&A with Cloudflare co-founder and CEO Matthew Prince on how digital waiting rooms can help public health agencies register their constituents for COVID-19 vaccinations. Continue Reading
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Tip
09 Feb 2021
4 tips for effectively handling emails in a call center
New service channels emerge, but email remains a popular way for customers to contact businesses. Call centers should use the proper email management software and strategies. Continue Reading
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News
21 Jan 2021
AWS contact center AI services expand to Salesforce, Avaya
Cloud contact center vendors that compete with Amazon Connect for customers will push AWS AI-powered intelligent search, speech recognition and language processing services. Continue Reading
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Feature
13 Jan 2021
IFS Field Service Management software: Overview, pros, cons
IFS FSM software is meant to manage field staff and assets. Learn about its advantages and disadvantages and whether your company should put it on a vendor shortlist. Continue Reading
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News
02 Dec 2020
Salesforce adds customer service management features
Salesforce adds AI-powered features to enable contact center workforce management and agent staffing models for call volume, as well as email and messaging channels. Continue Reading
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Tip
30 Nov 2020
10 technologies to transform customer experience in 2021
AI-powered technologies such as sentiment analysis, chatbots and real-time transcription can help customer service organizations improve the customer experience. Continue Reading
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Tip
20 Nov 2020
8 customer service metrics to measure call center success
Measuring call center metrics and KPIs benefits organizations by showing where issues occur. Average handle time, service level and cost per call are a few metrics to start with. Continue Reading
- E-Zine 17 Nov 2020
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Feature
09 Nov 2020
7 ways to avoid remote work burnout in call centers
Many factors contribute to remote work burnout, including juggling too many tasks, isolation and a work-life balance. Here are some tips for managers to help minimize burnout. Continue Reading
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News
06 Nov 2020
Adobe forges data partnerships for Experience Platform
Adobe adds bidirectional feeds to Experience Platform to manage post-sale customer data from third-party sources such as customer service and loyalty program platforms. Continue Reading
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Tip
03 Nov 2020
8 best practices for call center monitoring programs
To create the foundation for an advanced quality monitoring program, contact centers need to invest in call monitoring and speech analytics software. Continue Reading
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Guest Post
30 Oct 2020
Create a customer experience strategy before tech investment
Align customer expectations with your customer experience strategy before making any investments in CX technology. Bob Azman has 10 questions to ask yourself before making any moves. Continue Reading
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Guest Post
26 Oct 2020
Mobile wallet mania: Contactless payments are here to stay
The COVID-19 pandemic has affected a lot of B2C industries and one aspect of customer experience that is likely permanently shifting is the increase in mobile wallet adoption. Continue Reading
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Infographic
21 Oct 2020
The evolution of customer service
Today's customer service meets the consumer where and when it is convenient for them, with multiple contact channels, self-service and always-on coverage. Continue Reading
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Answer
19 Oct 2020
8 ways to improve call center agent performance
Side-by-side evaluations, reinforcement, training resources and coaching can help call center agents improve their performance and catch up to the pack. Continue Reading
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Tip
29 Sep 2020
AI improves customer experience, call center efficiency
Customers and employees can benefit from the use of AI in contact centers. Businesses can use AI to provide customer self-service options and help make agents more productive. Continue Reading
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News
18 Sep 2020
Oracle CX upgrades focus on field service, contact center
Oracle adds self-service features, field tech tools and call center capabilities to its CX stack in response to customers' business needs in pandemic. Continue Reading
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Feature
18 Sep 2020
Knowledge bases benefit customer service, call center training
Knowledge bases provide call center agents with training documents and answers to frequently asked questions as they continue to work from home, handling high call volumes. Continue Reading
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Feature
08 Sep 2020
Supply chain-customer service partnership is vital
A company's success depends on a supply chain that can meet customers' expectations. To do that well, supply chain leaders must partner with their customer service counterparts. Continue Reading
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Tip
08 Sep 2020
Evaluate call center outsourcing costs and benefits
Outsourcing call center operations can take some financial burden off businesses -- depending on what partner they choose. But there can also be some drawbacks. Continue Reading
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News
03 Sep 2020
Emerging Genesys cloud strategy makes Amazon friend and foe
Amid a leadership change, Genesys retools cloud strategy, adds partnerships with Infosys, Adobe and others as its relationship to Amazon and AWS veers toward 'co-opetition.' Continue Reading
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Tip
31 Aug 2020
How video chat improves customer service and engagement
As restrictions continue due to the COVID-19 crisis, many organizations adopt video chat capabilities to continue business operations and keep customers engaged. Continue Reading
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News
28 Aug 2020
Twilio Flex deployed for COVID-19 contact-tracing agents
Tech teams supporting agents working remotely on COVID-19 surveillance efforts in several U.S. cities and the state of Illinois eschew traditional IT and opt for cloud platforms. Continue Reading
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News
26 Aug 2020
Salesforce confirms around 1,000 layoffs after monster quarter
Salesforce says COVID-19 did not precipitate the layoff of about 1,000 employees, but the pandemic did show the company where customer needs are headed. Continue Reading
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News
25 Aug 2020
Zendesk Support, Sunshine CRM expand data sharing, analytics
New Zendesk Explore Enterprise analytics and data visualization tools enable small and midsize users to create dashboards to share across organizations. Continue Reading
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Tip
07 Aug 2020
Average handling time calculation is critical to contact centers
Knowing how to calculate average handling time is an essential component of contact center management, as it helps to determine proper staffing levels within the department. Continue Reading
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Tip
27 Jul 2020
A look at contact center technology and support costs
With so many technology options available to contact centers, per-agent spending can vary greatly. It's up to businesses to figure out what technology matters most to them. Continue Reading
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News
14 Jul 2020
Broken Pega RPA bots can heal themselves with new AI feature
Pegasystems robotic process automation tools, popular in contact centers, add AI capabilities that allow some RPA bots to fix themselves. Continue Reading
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Feature
10 Jul 2020
Customer experience involves people, process and tools equally
Robert Azman breaks down why people, process and tools are all crucial for a successful customer experience strategy. Continue Reading
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Feature
04 Jun 2020
10 ways to improve CX when developing virtual agents
Consider these 10 methods when building new virtual agents for your clients to help balance design, user experience, technical feasibility and business value. Continue Reading
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News
15 May 2020
Talkdesk adds virtual agents, rebrands CCaaS suite as CX Cloud
Talkdesk refocuses it CCaaS suite on customer experience by adding 20 features, including virtual agents and remote work features for contact center agents. Continue Reading
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Tip
12 May 2020
How speech analytics can benefit call centers
Speech analytics software in call centers helps organizations pinpoint areas of weakness to address in an effort to improve customer experience and efficiency. Continue Reading
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News
08 May 2020
Pega adds unified messaging to customer case management
Pega Customer Service Unified Messaging Edition, built from last year's In The Chat acquisition, adds omnichannel messaging to the company's customer support cloud platform. Continue Reading
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News
04 May 2020
Customer service agents, chatbots dial up empathy in pandemic
AI virtual assistants can provide help for embattled customer service agents during the pandemic, but adapting them to changing customer needs and new business models isn't simple. Continue Reading
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Tip
23 Apr 2020
How remote contact centers benefit businesses, employees
As businesses move to remote contact center models amid the COVID-19 crisis, they're finding benefits in the form of real estate cost savings and happier employees. Continue Reading
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Tip
17 Apr 2020
Renewed focus on contact center trends in 2020
As contact centers move from office settings to remote work environments, businesses renew push for sustainable work-at-home programs, enhanced AI and cloud technologies. Continue Reading
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Tip
15 Apr 2020
6 tips for handling emergency calls in contact centers
Many contact centers do not have a procedure for handling emergency calls, but they should. It is important for agents to know how to react to emergency situations. Continue Reading
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News
15 Apr 2020
LogMeIn launches CCaaS platform to complement GoToConnect
LogMeIn releases GoToConnect call center as a service features during a high-demand period for supporting remote customer service work amid COVID-19 stay-at-home orders. Continue Reading
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Tip
26 Mar 2020
Tips for creating remote call center programs amid COVID-19 pandemic
To create a sustainable work-from-home contact center program, businesses need to adjust a number of processes, including, hiring, training, supervision and technology. Continue Reading
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News
24 Mar 2020
Zendesk Relater primes customers for remote call center work
Zendesk focuses on fledgling Sunshine and Sell CRM platforms, as well as helping its well-established customer service base switch to remote call center work. Continue Reading
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Tip
23 Mar 2020
Businesses move toward UC and contact center integration
Integrating unified communications and contact center software is trending and it can provide a number of benefits to both business employees and customers. Continue Reading
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Tip
16 Mar 2020
Tips for call center crisis management amid coronavirus pandemic
Call centers can receive an influx of calls from customers during times of crisis, such as the COVID-19 pandemic. Here are some steps businesses can take handle the call volume. Continue Reading
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News
06 Mar 2020
Amazon chatbots to employ neural networks for CX
Amazon tests neural network bots to help site customers and human agents more quickly identify answers to refund and order-cancellation questions. Continue Reading
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Tip
19 Feb 2020
Best practices for using AI-enabled self-service
AI in customer self-service is right behind robotic process automation in terms of growth. Here are some best practices to implement the technology in your organization. Continue Reading
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News
07 Feb 2020
Salesforce Trailhead Playground launches starter app to help users
The new starter app features tips for new Trailhead Playground users, along with an easier way to install packages from AppExchange and receive login credentials. Continue Reading
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Answer
03 Feb 2020
What are some benefits of SSO in contact centers?
Contact center agents often need to remember a number of passwords to log in to multiple applications. Single sign-on can alleviate that pain point and increase productivity. Continue Reading
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News
28 Jan 2020
ServiceNow acquisition of Passage AI to boost chatbots
ServiceNow will acquire Passage AI, a startup conversational AI vendor, in an effort to further develop existing conversation capabilities in its chatbots. Continue Reading
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Tip
24 Jan 2020
IoT and the customer experience: What to expect in 2020
Consumers are finding themselves increasingly surrounded by technology that talks to each other. See how retail is incorporating IoT and affecting customer experience. Continue Reading
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Tip
08 Jan 2020
Video conferencing adoption a growing trend among businesses
B2B and B2C video conferencing is on the rise as businesses strive to provide exceptional CX to customers. Nemertes shares some of its research results. Continue Reading
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News
17 Dec 2019
How Amazon customer experience became e-commerce standard
Amazon made personalization, one-click shopping, quick shipping and easy returns de facto standards for all B2C and now, B2B businesses. Read about how the company did it, and what's next. Continue Reading
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Tip
12 Dec 2019
4 steps to successful contact center technology implementation
Before starting implementation of any new technology in a contact center, it is important to have a strategy to ensure both employee and customer satisfaction. Continue Reading
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Feature
05 Dec 2019
AppExchange, acquisitions key to the future of Salesforce
In the first 20 years of Salesforce's history, acquisitions and products drove rapid growth. In the next 20, AppExchange partners will play a crucial role in the company's growth. Continue Reading
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Answer
03 Dec 2019
What chatbot evaluation metrics do you use to measure performance?
Chatbots are an important contact center component -- as is measuring their performance. Learn how to measure chatbot performance in your organization. Continue Reading
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Answer
27 Nov 2019
How can you best use contact center AI?
While AI is still an evolving technology, agent assist benefits contact center employees by improving agent efficiency improve the overall customer experience. Continue Reading
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Tip
18 Nov 2019
Contact center agent experience needs massive overhaul
Research shows several areas in which contact centers are failing their agents and what changes organizations are making to improve the experience and reduce turnover. Continue Reading
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News
04 Nov 2019
Microsoft Power Platform adds chatbots; Flow now Power Automate
Microsoft changes name of Flow to Power Automate, adds virtual agents to Power Platform among host of robotic process automation tools in latest release. Continue Reading
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News
08 Oct 2019
New website helps identify use cases for Salesforce AI
Einstein's Guide to AI Use Cases is designed to help people identify use cases and Salesforce products for AI in different industries by determining which KPI is most important. Continue Reading
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News
03 Oct 2019
Zendesk Sell apps marketplace extends Sunshine CRM platform
Zendesk's Sunshine CRM gets an apps marketplace built on its Sell sales force automation platform, adapted from the 2018 acquisition of FutureSimple's Base. Continue Reading
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Guide
26 Sep 2019
How unified communications is getting down to business
This guide will get you up to date on what's happening in the world of UC, including how UC employs AI now, and what's new with UC tools for business messaging and contact centers. Continue Reading
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Tip
04 Sep 2019
The difference between autodialers and predictive dialers
Some people don't know that a predictive dialer is a type of autodialer. There are, in fact, five broad categories of autodialers contact centers need to know about. Continue Reading
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Tip
28 Aug 2019
8 live chat best practices for organizations to consider
Organizations find that live chat can be a means to improve customer experience -- when implemented correctly. Here are some best practices to put into action. Continue Reading
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Podcast
31 Jul 2019
How a punk rocker would go about simplifying CX
When the tech stack and measurement metrics overcomplicate CX, destroy it like a punk rocker, U.K. author Adrian Swinscoe suggests in this 'Pipeline' podcast interview. Continue Reading
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News
25 Jul 2019
Increases expected from new Microsoft Dynamics 365 pricing
Microsoft's move to a la carte pricing for Dynamics 365 could lead to higher costs for some customers. The new pricing plan takes effect Oct. 1. Continue Reading
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Feature
01 Jul 2019
Autonomous, self-service technology can't replace human touch
Self-service and autonomous technology can be found in any number of businesses, including hospitals, restaurants and retail -- but they are not a substitute for human interaction. Continue Reading
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News
26 Jun 2019
Talkdesk Boost turns legacy ACDs into cloud contact centers
Large businesses that aren't yet ready to abandon legacy call routing can now link that equipment to the Talkdesk cloud contact center through a SIP trunk. Continue Reading
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News
10 Jun 2019
Evan launches customer experience SaaS platform for IT help
IT support vendor Evan introduced an automated SaaS offering for large businesses. Evan360 intends to connect users with IT experts to solve problems immediately. Continue Reading
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News
05 Jun 2019
LogMeIn Bold360 CX tool adds AI features for bots, human agents
LogMeIn bundled together Bold360 customer service tools as a single CX platform underpinned by its AI technology by rebranding some pieces and introducing some others. Continue Reading
