Lowering costs nowadays seems to be the new thing. In fact, everyone is looking to slash overheads in some area or another. From residential to commercial, government to non-profit, everyone=92s cutting back. Many companies out there are dedicated and committed to helping people lower their costs. These companies, such as Freedom TeleWork, offer advanced = and cutting edge technological innovations at very competitive pricing, in = order to ensure and maintain the growth and strength of companies out there. = They are able to make such improvements with the help of a Virtual Call = Center.

A Virtual Call Center is an =93automatic=94 call center. It is basically = the same thing as a call center, only costing a fraction of the price and = being a lot easier to handle and mange. Included in most Hosted Call Centers = are numerous amounts of advanced inventions and developments. One such innovation is a Predictive Dialer. Predictive Dialing reduces the amount = of wasted time by agents. The Predictive Dialer will organize and rearrange = the calling list that the agent has. It then filters out the =93bad=94 = numbers, such as not in service numbers, or disconnected numbers, while relisting = other numbers, such as busy signals or unanswered calls, at the bottom of the list. The Predictive Dialer will then try the next few numbers towards = the end of the Virtual Call Center agent=92s call. By doing this, this = allows the Virtual Call Center agent to maximize his time working and minimize his = time being occupied with unnecessary and often bothersome and unproductive = work.=20

Predictive Dialing has come a long way. It first started as an = autodialer, which merely just dialed calls for an idle or waiting agent. A = Predictive Dialer uses a variety of algorithms in order to predict the availability = of both Virtual Call Center agents and potential customers and therefore customizing each calling process to suit what=92s best for both agent = and customer. Based on a 2002 survey, a Predictive Dialer can dramatically increase the amount of talk time agents utilize per hour as opposed to a traditional agent without a Predictive Dialer. The ratio is 50 minutes = per hour utilized with a Predictive Dialer comparing to 20 minutes per hour = used without using Predictive Dialing.=20

Other Hosted Contact Center features are Voice Broadcasting, which = enables mass phone messaging to endless amounts of customers, and IVR, or Interactive Voice Response, which enables customers to =93do it = themselves=94 thereby reducing the need for customer service representatives. In = addition to these features, Freedom TeleWork offers unique and amazing Hosted = Contact Center Supervisory tools through their TeleWorkers campaign. These = unique tools help Freedom TeleWork customers to ensure that the TeleWorkers are working properly and efficiently. These tools are Spy mode, Barge In = mode, Whisper mode, MP3 recording of calls, monitoring of key strokes and = random screen captures of agents=92 screens. Not only do these features allow customers to check on their TeleWorkers, but they also give customers = the ability to further train and coach their Virtual Call Center agents. =20

Submitted by: Steve Cohen, VP of Sales, Freedom TeleWork