Brendan Read
TMC
Proactive Care Puts Operators One Step Ahead
By Thomas Fuerst, Senior Director, Multimedia Solutions MarketingAlcatel-Lucent
Monitoring and analyzing network data proactively saves operators time, money, and customers.
When a network service fails, it makes headlines, ticks off customers, and costs that network operator money. When a failure is headed off in advance, on the other hand, there might not be praise-laden headlines, but it's newsworthy nonetheless.
The traditional approach to customer care has typically been: a disgruntled customer calls customer service and complains of a service interruption or problem; the rep, learning of it for the first time, sends out a technician the next day, and eventually finds a resolution. Often, customers are left feeling put out, and the operator has spent significant time and money resolving the problem. Even worse is the customer who doesn’t call and just feels this is ‘typical’ of their network experience. That is a customer at risk of leaving.
Proactive care flips this dynamic on its head by using predictive analytics to identify potential outages or errors in the network and stop them before they occur. It consists of three main parts: one, constantly monitoring and measuring data on the network; two, real-time analysis of the data; and three, the most important, acting on that analysis to fix the problem.
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10 Lessons from Volleyball
I've played volleyball for over 25 years. I have traveled around the US to watch the pros live - both indoor...
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Emerging Threats Combats a Million Plus Pieces of New Malware a Week
There are 250,000 plus new pieces of malware being produced each day equating to one piece per person in the US in...
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NFV-Based Software Telcos Need OSS/BSS Interoperability
One of the goals of ETSI NFV is to allow new entrants to provide solutions to carriers based on software instead of...
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SysAid's Lifshitz: The Cloud Will Dominate ITSM Market
Cloud computing has really become a household word with mainstream media outlets running stories on television about the growth in the space...
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Avaya Takes Networking Lead in SPB
At Interop Las Vegas 2013 Avaya was demonstrating their real-world Shortest Path Bridging (SPB) solutions and while interoperating with Spirent, HP and...
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Alianza Wants to Host Your Software Telco
The software telco(r)evolution representing the move from hardware to software is perhaps the biggest trend in the world of carrier telecom this...
Full Story »TMCnet's Call Center Credentials
January 15, 2008
What is Quantcast? It's essentially a team of Web analytics experts who work to help companies understand their U.S.-based Web audiences for the purpose of marketing and advertising. Why is this important? Because a Quantcast study has revealed that when it comes to call center content, TMCnet not only reaches more call center prospects than any other site, but has 23 times more reach than the next 10 call center sites combined.
Power of Direct Marketing
January 15, 2008
The DMA (Direct Marketing Association) this week announced publication of its newest title, "The Power of Direct Marketing: ROI, Sales, Expenditures, and Employment in the US." The book was written to provide readers with comprehensive analyses and forecasts from the DMA/Global Insight economic model on the impact of direct marketing across all industries and sectors of the economy. It's a helpful read for companies looking to position their products, develop product marketing strategies and allocate budgets.
For more info, visit www.the-dma.org/bookstore.
TES
For more info, visit www.the-dma.org/bookstore.
TES
Teleperformance USA Renews First Client
January 11, 2008
Teleperformance USA today revealed that its very first client, a major U.S. telecom provider, has renegotiated its original contract with the company, in an impressive show of loyalty to the company, for an additional three-year period.
Teleperformance USA will continue offering customer care, technical support and customer growth for the (unidentified) customer.
For more info about Teleperformance, visit its Web site at www.teleperformance.com.
Teleperformance USA will continue offering customer care, technical support and customer growth for the (unidentified) customer.
For more info about Teleperformance, visit its Web site at www.teleperformance.com.
Online Bill Payment
January 8, 2008
I pay most of my bills online. It's convenient, fast and saves a stamp. I'm pleased that many companies finally started seeing the light in that online bill payment benefits them. Up until very recently, many companies fixed a surcharge on online bill payments/electronic funds transfer (EFT).
Companies Expect IT Projects To Fail
January 3, 2008
A new study done by Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) revealed some eyebrow-raising stats on the success (or lack thereof) of IT services projects.
According to TCS’ first annual survey on IT services delivery:
I smell opportunities for forward-thinking IT service delivery providers.
Check out the full summary on TCS's Web site: http://www.tcs.com/AboutUs/Research_survey.html
TES
According to TCS’ first annual survey on IT services delivery:
62 percent of organizations experienced IT projects that failed to meet their schedules; 49 percent suffered from budget overruns; 47 percent had higher-than-expected maintenance costs; and 41 percent failed to deliver the expected business value and ROI. The most depressing stat was that, "43 percent of IT managers say that their organizations’ business managers and the board simply accept problems as a necessary evil."
I smell opportunities for forward-thinking IT service delivery providers.
Check out the full summary on TCS's Web site: http://www.tcs.com/AboutUs/Research_survey.html
TES
The Hispanic Marketplace
January 2, 2008
According to a new study called Reaching the US Hispanic Market: Consumer Attitudes and Buying Behavior commissioned by the DMA (Direct Marketing Association), the U.S. has the fifth-largest Spanish speaking population in the world.
The report also highlights some interesting facts about this potential market:
You can find out more about the new report at www.the-dma.org/bookstore
TES
The report also highlights some interesting facts about this potential market:
- Major cities in the Southern U.S. have seen the most dramatic Hispanic population growth;
- Over one-third of Hispanic households earn over $50,000 per year; and
- Hispanic-American's purchasing power currently exceeds $700 billion and is expected to reach $1 trillion by 2008.
You can find out more about the new report at www.the-dma.org/bookstore
TES
Bad Spam
October 31, 2007
You might argue that all spam is bad, and you'd be right. But some spam is worse than others.
I just got this one:
"Summer is coming. Time to tone up!"
Given that spamming is a career for failures, when you even fail at spam, it's time to just give up on life.
TES
I just got this one:
"Summer is coming. Time to tone up!"
Given that spamming is a career for failures, when you even fail at spam, it's time to just give up on life.
TES
Vonage V. Verizon
October 26, 2007
Too many "V" words to keep track of...
In any case, here's an interesting case presented by TechDirt that Vonage was the true innovator, and Verizon essentially came late to the game and sued Verizon out of a bad case of sour grapes:
http://techdirt.com/articles/20071025/184419.shtml
TES
In any case, here's an interesting case presented by TechDirt that Vonage was the true innovator, and Verizon essentially came late to the game and sued Verizon out of a bad case of sour grapes:
http://techdirt.com/articles/20071025/184419.shtml
TES
Fed Do Not Call List Upheld
October 23, 2007
The Federal Trade Commission today announced its decision to keep the five-year-old federal do-not-call registry intact. When the Registry was created, the FTC had originally adopted a five-year re-registration mechanism before essentially "starting over," requiring people who had been on the list (now 145 million numbers) to re-register to ensure that the list is up to date.
The decision was made today to retain the list as is.
According to the FTC, "The Registry has been implemented successfully for five years and has included a scrubbing program that has removed disconnected and reassigned numbers each month. Finally, “[T]he Registry has enjoyed unprecedented popularity and helped enhance the privacy of the American public in a tangible way.”
You can read the full release here on the FTC's Web site: http://www.ftc.gov/opa/2007/10/dnctestimony.shtm
TES
The decision was made today to retain the list as is.
According to the FTC, "The Registry has been implemented successfully for five years and has included a scrubbing program that has removed disconnected and reassigned numbers each month. Finally, “[T]he Registry has enjoyed unprecedented popularity and helped enhance the privacy of the American public in a tangible way.”
You can read the full release here on the FTC's Web site: http://www.ftc.gov/opa/2007/10/dnctestimony.shtm
TES
Find Me, Follow Me
October 19, 2007
I recently needed my chimney cleaned. It had been a while, and I'm one of those people who forever worry about chimney fires. I'd never had it done in this house before, so I did a Google search for chimney sweeps in my town. I found five names.
