Selective Caller Routing in Contact Centers via Agent-Specific Pattern Matching
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Solution Overview
Problem
Conventional contact center routing methods are inefficient, often relying on random processes that do not consider agent performance or caller preferences, leading to suboptimal caller-agent matching and resulting in variables such as reduced customer satisfaction and increased operational costs.
Innovation Solution
Implementing a system that maps a portion of callers to agents based on performance data and pattern matching algorithms, allowing adjustable fractions for individual agents, and using a graphical interface to set and adjust the routing power, which includes a control group for benchmarking the effectiveness of these algorithms.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Ease of operation
If conventional round-robin routing is used to connect callers to agents, then the routing process is simple and fast, but caller-agent matching quality deteriorates leading to reduced customer satisfaction
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments the routing process into two distinct portions: a first portion that uses performance-based and pattern matching algorithms for optimized caller-agent pairing, and a second portion that uses conventional round-robin routing. This segmentation allows the system to apply complex matching logic only when beneficial, while maintaining simplicity for routine routing scenarios.
Solution Approach 2:
The system applies performance-based routing selectively to a controlled portion of callers rather than all callers. By adjusting the proportion parameter, the system can apply optimized routing to a partial set of callers (e.g., 30-70% of traffic), achieving improved matching quality without fully committing to complex routing for every single caller.
2Reliability
If performance-based routing algorithms are applied to all callers, then caller-agent matching quality improves, but system complexity and computational resources increase
Solution Approach 1:
The system applies performance-based routing algorithms to only a portion of callers rather than all callers. The proportion parameter controls this segmentation, allowing the system to optimize matching quality for selected callers while avoiding the full computational overhead of applying complex algorithms to every single caller in the queue.
Solution Approach 2:
The system introduces a proportion parameter that dynamically controls the extent to which performance-based routing is applied. By adjusting this parameter, the system can fine-tune the balance between matching quality and computational resource consumption, scaling the algorithmic complexity to match available resources and performance requirements.
3Productivity
If performance-based routing is implemented without a control group, then optimization effectiveness improves, but ability to benchmark and measure improvement deteriorates
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments the caller population into two distinct groups: a treatment group that receives performance-based routing optimization and a control group that receives conventional round-robin routing. This segmentation enables direct comparison of outcomes between the two routing approaches, providing precise measurement of the optimization effectiveness through controlled experimentation.
Solution Approach 2:
The system incorporates feedback mechanisms that track and compare performance metrics between the optimized routing group and the control group. By measuring outcomes such as customer satisfaction, call resolution rates, and agent utilization for both groups, the system generates feedback that quantifies the actual improvement achieved by the performance-based routing algorithms.
Data Source
AI summary
Systems and methods are disclosed for routing callers to agents in a contact center, along with an intelligent routing system. An exemplary method includes mapping a first portion of callers to agents according to a performance and/or pattern matching algorithm based on comparing caller data associated with the callers and agent data associated with the agents and mapping a second portion of the callers (e.g., the remaining portion callers) to agents differently than the first portion of the callers (e.g., mapping based on queue order), which may provide a control group for monitoring or analyzing the effect and/or training of the pattern matching algorithm. The first and second portion may be varied separately for each agent within the contact center. The method may further include displaying the effect of the routing on at least one outcome variable, which may include revenue generation, cost, customer satisfaction, first call resolution, cancellation, or other variable outputs from the pattern matching algorithm of the system.