``Virtual Agents'' Boost Revenues Per Call, Upsell Conversions Over Traditional IVR Systems, Live Agents.

OLDSMAR, Fla. -- In the direct response marketing industry, few technological advances can match the impact intuitive speech technology has had on costs and revenues. In fact, today's "virtual agents" not only offer lower per-call costs and higher conversion rates over traditional interactive voice response (IVR) systems and live agents, but also as much as a 25 percent improvement in up- and cross-sells when properly implemented and tested.

A typical sales call to a live agent costs approximately $3.20 for a four-minute call, compared to approximately 68 cents for a call handled by an IVR. However, when next-generation intuitive voice response systems are implemented in place of more antiquated legacy IVR systems, the result is a dramatic increase in revenue per call in addition to the low per-call cost, as well as enhanced functionality. Further, by automating activities such as cross-selling a related product, intuitive voice response systems increase productivity and create new revenue streams within the customer service center. Finally, the user experience with an intuitive voice response system is greatly enhanced, resulting in a higher customer satisfaction rating than with traditional "push-button" IVR systems.

"Because virtual agents are able to understand and quickly translate the spoken word into a transaction, they offer a higher conversion rate at a lower cost than traditional systems," says Doug Winslow, president and CEO of Advanced Interactive Sciences, LLC (AIS). "Also, virtual agents offer a consistency of messaging that's not possible with live agents and, unlike IVR systems, they can interact with customers in real-time. As a result, they tend to have higher upsell and cross-sell conversion rates."

AIS offers Intuitive Speech Technology(R), a sophisticated tool set designed to address the three distinct actions that must be considered when interacting with customers, including:

--Acquire(TM), the industry leading intuitive acquisition application, is able to interact with callers as if it were a real person. Acquire's virtual agent understands human utterances and quickly translates a call into a transaction, thereby lowering costs and increasing conversion rates over other legacy systems.

--Boost(TM) is designed to increase sales by improving upsell and cross-sell capabilities. Its ease-of-use and smooth transition from Acquire allows Boost to generate a 25 percent lift over existing legacy systems by providing enhanced consistency of messaging and a virtual agent that is able to interact with callers in real-time.

--Pursue(TM), AIS' answer to outbound telemarketing entities trying to reach existing clients, can start with just a phone number from an abandoned order. After a pre-determined amount of time, Pursue's virtual agent calls the phone number and engages the caller with a new offer, usually regarding the same product. Currently, Pursue boasts a real-person contact rate of more than 70 percent and a call-to-conversion rate of more than 10 percent.

Consider the results of a recent side-by-side comparison of AIS' Interactive Speech Technology and an outsourced telemarketing agency that used a combination of IVR and live agents that was conducted by an AIS client on DRTV sales of a consumer product. After handling more than 100,000 calls since mid-December from consumers interested in purchasing that product, AIS' system achieved a higher conversion rate, a lower cost-per order and an average order that was significantly higher than the telemarketing agency's more traditional system. Since then, the client has expanded its relationship with AIS and continues to see similar results for other product lines.

Media Power, Inc., which markets to consumers under the name MP Direct and acquires customers mainly through DRTV and direct response radio, saw its conversion rate double when it implemented AIS' Boost to upsell to its CalMax customers. At the end of a sales call, the company's live agents asked customers to hold for an important offer and transferred them to the Boost system. The end result was an increase in the upsell conversion rate of 14 percent over live agents at a cost-per-conversion of 60 cents. In fact, Boost was so successful for the first upsell, that MP Direct implemented a second one to customers who responded to the first, resulting in a net conversion of 11 percent at a cost-per-conversion of 80 cents.

"Key to the success of an intuitive speech recognition system is the ability to test and tweak messages on the fly to maximize revenues," says Ed Barbara, executive vice president of business development for AIS. "After implementing Acquire, one AIS client realized an immediate increase in revenue of 25 percent per order. But we knew from our testing that those results could be better. We enhanced and re-deployed the script, after which revenues increased by another 12 percent, with 98 percent of customers taking the higher offer."

In addition to increased revenues and decreased costs, intuitive speech recognition systems also reduce the number of calls to live agents, shorten call lengths, reduce hold times and decrease abandonment rates. As a result, their benefits extend beyond the measurable financials to include improvements in employee satisfaction as agent burnout and employee turnover decrease and repetitive inquiries are passed off to the automated system, and increased customer satisfaction.

But it takes more than just the technology to make intuitive speech recognition systems work to their maximum potential, says Winslow.

"Think of it this way; anyone can play catch but it takes years of training, the right coaches and a good dose of natural ability to be a major league ball player. This is no different," he says. "Anyone can buy the technology, but it takes the right partner with the right mix of application, messaging, testing and experience to maximize revenues and speed the return on investment."

About Advanced Interactive Sciences

Advanced Interactive Sciences, LLC (AIS) is the leading provider of intuitive speech technology. An industry pioneer, AIS - http://www.aisvoice.com - helps companies deal with the variability that comes with call center management by integrating artificial intelligence with advanced speech recognition and combining that with executive reporting and workforce management. By deploying AIS' "virtual agents" and other industry-tailored technologies and services, companies are realizing increased up-sell and cross-sell conversion rates, significantly reduced costs per sale and improved account resolution.