"The desktop brings forward data that resides elsewhere in Pivotal's CRM application, such as pricing information, product data and credit histories," he said. "That way, the agent can access that information through a single click."

OEM-ing Integration

The new Pivotal product has integrated an OEM (original equipment manufacturer) version of Intel Dialogic CT Connect, which is the integration component that links the desktop into the telephony switch and the IVR (interactive voice response) system. This provides the customer service rep with a pop-up screen that shows the customer's account record or other identifying features, Soechtig said.

He cited the typical example of a bank customer calling an IVR for her account information. Once she gets her balance, she might discover she needs to talk to a rep about a missing check. "As the call get routed, CT Connect takes the data entered into the IVR, and the rep is able to view that customer's complete account record and bring forward other checking-account details," he said.

"It brings the agent to the exact point the customer was at inside the IVR."

Other features provide the rep with telephony control in case he or she needs to transfer a call or escalate it to another department, he said.

Scaled for the Middle

Soechtig noted that the Pivotal contact application and its open standards-based architecture reflect Pivotal's sole emphasis on the mid-market.

For example, to keep costs manageable, mid-market enterprises -- as well as divisions of larger companies -- have begun shifting toward smaller contact centers distributed across multiple cities and geographies. To be effective, that strategy requires near real-time synchronization of customer and corporate information -- a requirement that Pivotal claims its product meets.

Whither the Mid-Market?

Not that this is a universal trend. Bryan Smoltz, director of product management for Onyx, which offers a competing product, told CRMDaily he has noted the opposite movement.

"Companies are consolidating their regional call centers into mega call centers in order to reduce costs. These aggregated call centers need to support tens of thousands of transactions and often require multi-language support."