2023 - 2024 Real-Time Guidance Product and Market Report

Real-time guidance solutions that listen/read and analyze customer conversations in the moment can improve the customer experience (CX), employee experience (EX), and productivity. These applications deliver the content, procedures, knowledge articles, scripts, and guidance to assist agents and drive positive outcomes.

It has taken close to 20 years, but the convergence of the processing power of the cloud, interaction analytics (IA), artificial intelligence (AI) technologies, and a shift in what agents are empowered to do for customers is finally making the concept of real-time contact centers a reality.

DMG Consulting LLC's “Real-Time Guidance Product and Market Report” analyzes the emerging real-time guidance (RTG) market, vendors, and products. This Report explores the increasing importance, value, and benefits of RTG and its ability to enhance the customer and agent experience.

The rapid growth and trajectory of this sector is being fueled by the digital transformation and AI revolution. Vendors from many disciplines, including new startups, workforce engagement management (WEM), customer relationship management (CRM), contact center as a service (CCaaS), and verticalized specialists, are offering these capabilities now that enterprises see what they can do for their customers, agents, and bottom line.

The Report provides a comprehensive and insightful analysis of the RTG market, competitive landscape, products, and upcoming innovations, as well as market, business, and technology trends and challenges for this essential application. It explores product pricing and offers implementation best practices to help users realize a rapid and strong return on their investment. In addition, the Report reviews the analytics-enabled quality management (AQM) and integrated coaching capabilities that are included or offered by the featured RTG solution providers.

8 RTG vendors are analyzed in the Report:

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• 20 years in the making. DMG introduced the concept of the real-time contact center two decades ago, but it's taken a major revamp of systems, a shift to the cloud, and AI, including generative AI, to make them viable and cost-effective.

• Practical applications are endless. From presenting the best recommendations for handling objections to close a sale, supplying procedures to resolve customer inquiries, or identifying approaches to increase collections, RTG solutions have countless possibilities.

• Shifting the service paradigm from reactive to proactive. RTG solutions are transforming the CX and EX by empowering employees with in-the-moment guidance.

• Increased first contact resolution (FCR) and customer satisfaction (CSAT). When agents know what to do, they get it right, eliminating the need for transfers and holds.

• Increased employee satisfaction and retention. RTG improves employee engagement and reduces attrition by focusing on positive interaction outcomes, enhancing agent performance, and supporting work-at-home/hybrid staffing models.

• Working smarter, not harder. Productivity increases when agents have on-the-fly access to the right information to handle customer interactions, reducing average handle time.

Report Highlights

This is the only report in the market that provides an in-depth analysis and comparison of contact center RTG applications. Key elements of the Report include:

• Real-time guidance explained, including a high-level overview of the key functional capabilities in the 8 featured RTG solutions

• Market, business, and technology trends and challenges driving product innovation and influencing enterprise investments

• Overview of how RTG solutions are leveraging traditional AI, generative AI, and automation

• A look at how RTG solutions are transforming the EX, elevating the CX, and delivering quantifiable productivity improvements

• Examination of the ways enhanced transcription, emotion detection, and sentiment analysis are being leveraged to improve and extend RTG capabilities

• How AQM solutions deliver a comprehensive omnichannel approach to QM and improve agent coaching, performance, and engagement

• Market activity and 5-year revenue projections

• Review and assessment of the RTG competitive landscape

• High-level company information and overview of the core and optional modules in the 8 featured RTG solutions, as well as packaged/verticalized offerings

• Implementation analysis including third-party integrations, training/workshops, and pre- and post-implementation professional services

• Benefits for building a business case and ROI timeframes for an RTG and AQM implementation

• Pricing comparison and analysis for a 250-seat cloud-based RTG and AQM implementation

• Detailed company reports for the 8 RTG vendors, analyzing their products, functionality, and future product development plans

• RTG vendor directory

Real-time guidance applications:

• Utilize IA and AI technologies, including generative AI, to structure, analyze, and understand live conversations as they occur

• Use insights from the analysis to deliver actionable alerts or recommendations to agents and/or supervisors

• Locate and deliver pertinent information in real time to agents from disparate systems, databases, knowledgebases, and more

• Combine contextual information about the interaction from the agent's desktop with insights from the conversation

• Guide agents to success by optimizing outcomes for their customers and the enterprise, enhancing the CX and EX, and improving productivity

This Report is intended to help contact center managers select the right solution, technology, functionality, and partner to give them a competitive edge.

Real-Time Guidance Vendor Capabilities

Vendor messaging for the many competitors may sound the same, but the applications are highly differentiated. This Report provides a detailed functional analysis of several key capabilities for the 8 featured RTG competitors, including transcription, emotion detection, sentiment analysis, conversation analytics, automation, and more.

More Than Guidance!

• RTG applications deliver a new, positive, and practical approach to coaching and training. Especially beneficial for new hires, RTG expedites the agent ramp-up process by providing an "always available" coaching/training resource.

• RTG capabilities help all agents stay current by supplying links to appropriate articles, knowledgebases, internet/ intranet sites, and other training materials.

• AQM capabilities (often available with RTG solutions) leverage IA and AI technology, business rules, and automation to identify, classify, and cost-effectively score up to 100% of voice- and text-based conversations between agents and customers.

• Real-time AQM provides immediate insights about agent performance and assesses their impact on the brand, CX, and customer effort. AQM provides an unbiased, comprehensive, and effective method of assessing many aspects of agent and contact center performance.