How do call centers work, and how do they compare to contact centers?

Call centers have been around since the 1960s and have continued to operate in much the same way.

It wasn’t until the introduction of instant messaging and other faster, more convenient means of communication that the call center formula began to move forward.

These days, businesses use both call centers and contact centers—but what are the key differences between these two customer service solutions, which is better suited for your business, and why?

What is a call center?

A call center is a centralized office or facility equipped to handle a large volume of incoming and outgoing telephone calls, typically for customer service, technical support, sales, or other inquiries. They’re typically staffed by trained agents who communicate with customers or clients over the phone to address their concerns, provide information, resolve issues, or complete transactions.

Today’s call centers use the following protocols and technologies in their day-to-day operations:

• Call routing: The automated process of directing incoming calls to the appropriate call center representative or department based on predefined criteria, such as caller ID, input selections, or center agent availability.
• Interactive Voice Response (IVR) systems: The utilization of pre-recorded or dynamically generated voice prompts, combined with voice recognition and touch-tone inputs, to interact with callers, collect relevant information, and route calls to appropriate agents or departments—all based on predefined logic and integration with backend databases.
• Queuing: A system that manages incoming calls by placing them in a line and distributing them to available agents based on priority rules and current workload.
• Agent assignment: The method by which incoming calls are allocated to specific customer service representatives based on factors like skill set, availability, and call priority.
• Centralized documentation: The systematic recording of customer interactions, issues, resolutions, and other relevant data within a centralized database.
• Reporting and analysis: The generation and examination of data and metrics related to call center operations to assess performance, identify trends, and inform strategic decision-making.

The specific technologies and policies that a call center uses will change slightly depending on its type. An inbound call center handles incoming calls from customers seeking support, information, or services. These centers focus on addressing customer inquiries, providing technical assistance, processing orders, and managing customer relationships.

An outbound call center proactively reaches out to customers for sales, telemarketing, surveys, and market research. These centers are dedicated to generating leads, promoting products or services, and conducting customer outreach initiatives. A blended call center combines both inbound and outbound call handling within the same facility. This setup allows agents to manage incoming support requests while also making proactive outbound calls.

A virtual call center—or remote call center—operates with agents working remotely from various locations instead of a centralized physical office. Utilizing cloud-based call center technology, virtual operations offer flexibility, reduce overhead costs, and enable businesses to scale their operations efficiently.

An outsourced call center delegates customer service operations to a third-party provider, allowing businesses to leverage specialized expertise while reducing operational costs. In contrast, an in-house call center is managed and operated directly by the company, with all agents employed as internal staff. Some business leaders believe this approach allows for greater control over operations, call center training, and quality assurance, ensuring that the call center aligns closely with the company’s values and objectives.

Lastly, a specialized call center focuses on serving specific industries or handling particular types of inquiries. Common examples include healthcare call centers, technical support centers, or financial services centers—each requiring agents to have industry-specific skills and understanding.

Benefits of having a call center.

From improved customer service and increased efficiency to cost savings, enhanced data collection, and more, the benefits of having a call center are both numerous and essential.

Improved customer service

A call center provides a reliable way for customers to get the help they need when they need it.

Skilled agents are available to answer questions, resolve issues, and provide information—making sure that customers feel supported and valued. Dedicated, easily accessible assistance leads to improved customer satisfaction and can strengthen loyalty, as customers not only need but appreciate having a direct line of support.

Increased efficiency

Call centers are purpose-built to handle large volumes of calls.

With technologies like automatic call distribution (ACD) and IVR systems, calls are quickly directed to the right agents based on their expertise and availability. Such next-generation technologies are particularly important as, beyond their ability to increase efficiency, over eight in 10 customers (81%) say personalized support is an absolute necessity.

Reduced costs

Operating a call center can be more cost-effective than managing multiple smaller support teams.

By centralizing customer service operations, businesses can reduce expenses related to infrastructure, technology, and staffing. This is particularly true for cloud-based solutions, due to their scalable infrastructure that allows businesses to:

• Adjust resources based on demand without significant upfront investments.
• Benefit from pay-as-you-go pricing models.
• Gain access to automatic software updates and maintenance handled by the service provider.
• Support the ability to integrate seamlessly with other cloud-based tools and platforms.

Enhanced data collection and analysis

Call centers are excellent sources of valuable customer data. Every interaction is recorded and stored, providing business leaders and agents insights into customer preferences, common issues, and overall behavior.

Particularly through a customer relationship management (CRM) platform, call centers can meticulously categorize data and link it to individual customer profiles. Moreover, advanced analytics tools within the CRM allow for detailed analysis of call trends, such as:

• Peak contact times.
• Recurring issues.
• Shifts in customer sentiment.

AI-driven CRM granular insight empowers managers to implement more than just targeted training programs, but also develop tailored solutions that address specific customer needs.

Scalability

Scalability is at the heart of modern call center platforms.

As cloud-based call center software becomes the norm, business leaders can benefit from the capacity to scale up or down without the limitations of physical infrastructure. That way, operational leaders can ensure that customer service remains consistent and effective, no matter the business’ evolution.

Call center vs. contact center: 3 key differences.

There’s some overlap between call center and contact center operations. Ultimately, distinguishing between the two means considering their scope of communication and focus on customer experience (CX). It also means taking into account the specific functionality that each offers.

1. Scope of communication

Call centers are mostly focused on handling voice calls, serving as the main point of contact for customers who prefer to speak directly with a representative. In contrast, contact centers expand the scope of communication by incorporating multiple channels beyond just voice calls. They manage emails, live chats, social media messages, SMS, and even video calls—providing customers with various ways to reach out based on their individual preferences.

2. Focus on CX

While both call centers and contact centers aim to deliver excellent customer service, contact centers place a stronger emphasis on providing a comprehensive omnichannel customer experience. This means ensuring consistency, continuity, and convenience across all communication channels. Contact centers prioritize creating a seamless journey for customers, where their interactions are interconnected and personalized regardless of the channel used.

Call centers focus on resolving issues and handling inquiries via voice interactions. While they strive for high customer satisfaction, the lack of integration with other channels can result in a less cohesive overall experience.

3. Functionality

Typically, contact center platforms offer increased functionality over their call center counterparts. They offer unique capabilities that call centers often lack, such as:

• Omnichannel routing engines: Contact centers utilize sophisticated algorithms and real-time data to intelligently route customer interactions across various channels based on factors like contact center agent skill set, current load, and customer preference.
• AI-driven chatbots and virtual assistants: Contact centers employ natural language processing and conversational AI algorithms to perform a variety of otherwise time-consuming tasks, such as booking appointments, processing orders, troubleshooting technical issues, and managing account inquiries. These AI tools can escalate interactions to human agents when necessary.
• Social media management tools: Contact centers integrate with leading social media channels using APIs to monitor, analyze, and respond to customer interactions in real-time. Their features include sentiment analysis, automated tagging, and engagement tracking.
• Interactive Voice Response (IVR) with multi-channel capabilities: Advanced IVR systems not only manage voice call routing but also initiate follow-up interactions through preferred digital channels.
• Predictive analytics: Contact centers utilize big data technologies and machine learning models to analyze interaction patterns, forecast demand, and generate actionable insights. Centralized contact center platforms provide dashboards with key decision-making metrics, such as customer satisfaction scores, first contact resolution rates, and agent performance indicators.

Next-generation contact center solutions also offer robust APIs and software development kits (SDKs) that enable seamless integration with third-party applications, custom channel additions, and bespoke workflow automation. This flexibility allows contact centers to tailor their technology stack to specific business needs and rapidly adapt to emerging communication trends.

How to know when your business needs a next-generation call or contact center solution

Call and contact centers adopt next-generation solutions for various reasons: enhanced customer self-support, unified internal collaboration, enhanced scalability, improved data security, and more.

In the case of First Horizon Bank, the adoption of Webex Contact Center increased the bank’s customer self-service rate to 87%. The increase allowed the bank to reallocate its 750 agents to address more complex customer issues.

A leading global shipping and logistics company adopted Webex Contact Center for a different reason, namely, to reduce agent burnout and improve customer experiences via conversational AI:  “During the pandemic, our U.S. customer center service teams were struggling with supply chain disruptions, which required increased customer support through phone channels. AI Assistant helped us identify early indicators of agent burnout, so we could take action to ensure their wellbeing in these challenging times.

Their spokesperson continued, saying, “Before leveraging AI Assistant, our leadership team only discovered challenges after the fact when they had one-on-one conversations with CX agents. Instead, the AI Assistant tool can help our managers detect pain points from agents in advance and take actions to mitigate impact to both our agents and customers.”

In the case of the City of Buffalo, Webex Contact Center allowed the 311 call center to successfully transition to remote operations within 48 hours in response to COVID-19 stay-at-home measures. This swift move ensured uninterrupted support for 250,000 residents and facilitated a new collaborative model between the city and other public institutions.

That’s to say that each contact center solution use case is different. Yet, what all share in common is the need to adapt and optimize their operations. Particularly as customer expectations are steadily increasing, service providers of all forms must evolve to ensure they provide seamless, omnichannel, and highly personalized service.

If you want to improve your contact center’s capacity to meet rising customer demands, facilitate enhanced internal collaboration, and maintain optimal security, then the time to adopt a next-generation solution is now.

Enjoy more robust and reliable customer service.

Speaking on how Webex Contact Center improves their operations, Jason O’Dell, Voice Services Manager at First Horizon Bank, said:

“As First Horizon continues to find ways to improve our client’s experiences, we also look at the agent experience. Happy agents lead to better engagement with our clients. To that end, we have started testing Cisco AI Assistant’s dropped call summaries. The summaries are concise, providing the important context of a customer’s earlier interaction during repeat calls. These can be leveraged by our virtual bankers to avoid repeat conversations and improve customer experience.”

Beyond call summaries, organizations are leveraging contact center AI across the full customer journey—working to both empower agents and provide exceptional customer experiences. Specifically, Webex Contact Center integrates AI to provide businesses with:

• Simple self-service, offering a self-service platform that allows customers to easily resolve issues and find information using intuitive, AI-enhanced interfaces.
• Smart chat support, employing advanced AI chatbots that handle initial customer inquiries and smoothly hand off more complex issues to live agents.
• Live content delivery, providing real-time, AI-powered assistance and data to agents—enabling them to offer informed and efficient responses to customer queries.
• Improved call wrap-up, automating the transcription of call notes and, in turn, enabling faster and more accurate call wrap-ups.
• Actionable customer insights, gathering and presenting comprehensive data on customer interactions and feedback across the full lifecycle.

Additionally, Webex Contact Center’s open APIs allow businesses to develop bespoke AI solutions tailored to their specific operational needs.

According to Forrester’s TEI study, organizations that deployed Webex Contact Center achieved the following results:

• Reduced customer care and quality management costs by 35%.
• Avoided 50% of customer support system downtime.
• Deflected 20% of calls due to improved interactive voice response (IVR), email, and chatbot and self-service capabilities.

Forrester’s interviews and financial analysis revealed that the composite organization achieved $15.22 million in benefits over three years compared to $3.77 million in costs. This resulted in a net present value of $11.45 million and a return on investment of 304%.

Learn how Webex Contact Center can centralize your customer communications for a better, more reliable customer experience.

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