Campaigns and Dialing Methods

Managing Call Results

Call outcome information has 3 purposes in Softdial Contact Center™ (SCC):

  1. Reporting
    Both in the logs compiled for support purposes, as well as in management reporting.
  2. Retry Management
    CRM systems uses call outcome information to determine which calls should be retried and the scheduling of retries.
  3. Feedback Input to the predictive dialing engine
    Some of the data is also used as input to VEM® (SCC's predictive dialing engine) where it is used to manage the overdialing performance.

After the CRM (or Softdial Campaign Manager™) has requested Softdial CallGem™ to make a call, the result of this request can be one of 5 general outcomes:

For calls that are sent to the telephony switch (CTI layer) there are 2 methods of reporting call outcomes back to Softdial CallGem™ depending on whether or not the call was connected to an agent:

  1. Dialing Cycle Outcomes - for calls that are terminated at the switch (i.e. non-live calls)

    The Dialing Cycle outcome code is derived from the information returned from the network, whether this is ISDN, SIP or SIT tone based. The CTI layer must convert the network cause code information to a valid Dialing Cycle Outcome code as defined in Softdial RepositoryDialing Cycle Outcomes. This outcome code is returned to Softdial CallGem™ in the Call Failed [CF] message for all calls that are sent to the CTI layer (in a Call Initiate [CI] message) but not connected to an agent.

    See also Signalling Issues - Passing call outcome information back to Softdial CallGem™

  2. Agent Outcomes - for calls that are passed to an agent (i.e. live calls)

    The Agent outcome code is specified by the agent or agent application and must be a valid agent outcome code as defined in Softdial RepositoryAgent Outcomes (specified at landlord or tenant level). This outcome code is returned to Softdial CallGem™ in the Transaction Complete [TC] message sent by the agent layer.

    In addition, when a call is connected to a waiting agent it may be a fax, answering machine or other type of non-live call. Answering Machine Detection (AMD) is not 100% accurate and some networks may return non-standard signalling not recognised by the CTI layer. Such calls may be classified using agent outcomes which may be mapped to the appropriate Dialing Cycle Outcome.

Notes

Integrators must enable the agent to classify calls via the Agent Outcome (AO) parameter in the Transaction Complete [TC] message.

Additional outcome codes may be created, e.g. for specific non-live calls presented to agents. This is done at landlord or tenant level using Softdial Repository™.

When Softdial CallGem™ has gained the result information for a call, the result is reported back to the campaign layer. This information is sent in the Reason (RE) and Agent Outcome (AO) parameters of the Number Back [NB] message The Reason (RE) parameter contains either the Cause (CA) parameter value, for calls that were not connected to an agent, or a Softdial CallGem™ generated outcome code for other scenarios.

If a call is connected to the agent layer, then any data relating to the call may be passed from the agent layer to Softdial CallGem™ using the Data (DT) parameter of the Transaction Complete [TC] message, and then on to the campaign layer using the Data (DT) parameter of the Number Back [NB] message.

Note that scenarios 1, 2, 3 and 5 above will always return a Number Back [NB] message to the campaign layer. However, scenario 4 (successful calls) will only return a Number Back [NB] message if the Return Option (RO) parameter is specified in the Open Campaign [OC] message.

In scenario 4 above, a live call connected to an agent, no Dialing Cycle Outcome code is returned to Softdial CallGem™ (as there is no Call Failed [CF] message). In this case Softdial CallGem™ generates a default outcome code of 10 which is returned to the campaign layer in the Reason (RE) parameter of the Number Back [NB] message.

See also:

Signalling Issues
Telephony Issues
Resilience Measures - Network provider issues - Fast Busies

 

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