Outbound Call Center Featured Article

Contact Center Agent Performance Optimization Market Recovering Strongly in EMEA Region, Says Study

By Tracey E. Schelmetic
TMCnet Contributor

The economy of the last few years hasn't really been good to anyone (except maybe for a few Wall Street bankers, but that's a different story). The downturn, which was far reaching and affected not only North America but Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) as a whole, slowed the growth in a lot of enterprise software market sectors, and the agent performance optimization (APO) marketplace was no exception. Even as the sector declined in 2009, the seeds of recovery and future growth were apparent. The highest growth was witnessed among centers in the 150 to 200 contact center seat range, according to a new study by analyst group Frost & Sullivan (News - Alert).

Both quality management (QM) and workforce management (WFM) represent significant growth opportunities in many consider to be under-served eastern and southern EMEA regions, where so-called “greenfield” contact centers are still being opened. In those areas, greenfield centers have been able to “leapfrog” a generation and start their businesses with next-generation technology such as Internet protocol (IP) technology and advanced add-on applications.

The new report from Frost & Sullivan, EMEA Agent Performance Optimization Markets, has found that the market earned revenues of over EUR 122.7 million in 2009 and estimates these to reach EUR 201.7 million in 2016.

“Call recording and QM have found homes in some business environments outside the center, including back offices and branch locations,” said Frost & Sullivan Principal Analyst Keith Dawson (News - Alert). “WFM has proven to be very adaptable to non-contact center environments for knowledge workers and retail staff.”

An increase in collaboration has also encouraged centers to create and report on metrics that have meaning outside their narrow operating environments. This has put the spotlight on analytics tools that bridge the gap between the static activity-counting metrics (usually telephony-based) that centers usually collect and the goal-oriented business metrics that marketing, finance and c-level executives use to measure effectiveness.

The decline in APO sales was related to the decline in ACD and switch sales. Sales of the more expensive switching infrastructure often include APO tools as add-on products. Trends indicate that the EMEA economies will begin to recover during 2010, with marginal growth in the APO sector, and experience more robust growth rate in the range of 5 percent to10 percent in the future. The key to spurring growth will be the adoption of newer and more sophisticated applications for analyzing customer experiences and expediting operational efficiency.

Outside the UK, the predominant model for selling APO applications is through the reseller channel. The Tier 1 APO vendors coming predominantly from outside of the core EMEA market are aggressively nurturing networks of developers, integrators, and resellers to cover geographies where they do not have physical presence.

“Contact centers in EMEA are also under-utilizing the enhanced applications that complement APO, such as analytics, coaching, and e-learning,” said Dawson. “At the same time, the underlying call handling platforms are open enough to allow a wide choice of applications on top of them.”