The Seattle Times Selects VoicePort’s CircPort Customer Service IVR

PRESS RELEASE: The Seattle Times has selected VoicePort’s cloud-based interactive voice recognition (IVR) service to provide automated subscription services and support to their readership.

The solution combines VoicePort’s proven CircPort™ automated IVR services with advanced SIP telecommunications, funneling inbound customer service calls to CircPort’s user-friendly, intuitive, dual modality speech and touch tone IVR. Callers whose accounts require specialized agent handling are transferred via smart skill-based routing to The Seattle Times call center.

“At The Seattle Times, we have a major project underway to replace our circulation database with a state of the art SalesForce-based circulation system,” said Dayne Turgeon, Customer Relations and Sales Manager for The Seattle Times. “This project is called AMP (Audience Management Project), for which we required an advanced IVR to interface directly. CircPort was selected for its unique interface capabilities and features that will allow The Seattle Times to take maximum advantage of AMP’s capabilities,” continued Turgeon. “VoicePort’s IVR is highly intuitive and our expectation is to see an increase in customer satisfaction while maximizing the customer value and understanding the customer experience.”

With CircPort’s IVR customer service, The Seattle Times now has the ability to handle 100% of inbound call traffic regardless of call volume spikes, maximize IVR containment, and further reduce caller wait times and dropped calls.

“The Seattle Times realized that VoicePort’s CircPort was unequivocally the most flexible solution and provided features that can unlock the full potential of their SalesForce CRM,” said Christopher Mann, president and CEO of VoicePort. “CircPort continues to expand self-service options provided within the IVR, as clients look to maximize the value of their subscribers the solution can identify and segment callers, offering unique call flows and handling.”

CircPort is deployed within geo-redundant co-locations with SIP trunking and MPLS networks. CircPort also uses SIP trunking to effectively reduce cost and improve reliability.

“The Seattle Times BPO partner Alorica has numerous newspaper clients and CircPort is the IVR for many of the newspapers. Working with The Seattle Times and Alorica, we are able to facilitate CTI and other advanced call center features improving agent efficiency and customer satisfaction,” said Mann.

The Seattle Times is now benefiting from utilizing a cost-effective IVR solution while VoicePort continues to develop, advance and innovate technology to better serve the newspaper industry.