Carrier-implemented call event data management

• US 20090141876A1
• Filed: 11/30/2007
• Published: 06/04/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 11/30/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Callbright Corp.
• Original Assignee: Callbright Corp.
• Inventors: Carter, David H., Aragon, Samir B., Brockman, Robert T.
• Granted Patent: US 8,503,647 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 379/112.10
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/58 based on statistics of usage or network monitoring
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 2215/0188 Network monitoring; statistics on usage on called/calling number
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 3/5183 Call or contact centers with computer-telephony arrangements

Abstract

Methods and systems implemented in an information handling system are provided for managing call event data between agents and callers for calls completed through a carrier. Functionality provided by certain embodiments includes, but is not limited to, one or more of the following features: the ability to automatically update customer information databases according to call event data in real-time, dual-tone multi-frequency (DTMF) activity of the caller and/or agent, do-not-call (DNC) verification and updating, agent identification, lead source and content identification, the recording of calls, the automatic translation of voice communications to textual transcripts, key word detection, communication of customer demographic data to an agent before or during phone calls, audio file management, agent call tracking, and other functions and advantages as will be apparent with the benefit of this disclosure. Methods and systems are also included for data associated with managing broadcast campaigns.

Claims

1. A method implemented on an information handling system for managing call event data for caller-to-agent-by-carrier calls comprising:

providing a customer information database with a plurality of customer data records wherein each customer data record comprises a plurality of caller facts, the plurality of caller facts comprising a caller identity and a customer phone number;

allowing a caller to establish a first telephonic connection to a carrier wherein the caller initiates the first telephonic connection to a destination phone number from a telephonic device, the telephonic device having a caller phone number associated with the telephonic device;

playing a preselected audio recording to the caller over the first telephonic connection;

determining the caller phone number with a caller identification device;

selecting a customer data record that has a customer phone number corresponding to the caller phone number from the customer information database;

storing a call occurrence in the customer data record of the customer information database;

establishing a second telephonic connection to an agent;

establishing a computer network connection between the carrier and the agent;

sending one or more of the caller facts to the agent via the computer network connection;

allowing the first telephone connection to be in voice communication with the second telephonic connection so as to establish a telephonic connection between the caller and the agent, the telephonic connection having a call duration; and

populating the customer data record with additional caller facts wherein each of the additional caller facts corresponds to one or more call events.

2. The method of claim 1 further comprising detecting a dual-tone multi-frequency (DTMF) activity of the caller before the step of establishing a second telephonic connection to an agent;

and wherein the step of detecting DTMF activity occurs before updating the customer data record of the customer information database with DTMF data representing the dual-tone multi-frequency (DTMF) activity of the caller.

3. The method of claim 1 further comprising detecting a dual-tone multi-frequency (DTMF) activity of the agent corresponding to a do-not-call (DNC) request;

and updating the customer data record of the customer information database with a do-not-call flag.

4. The method of claim 1 wherein the step of populating the customer data record with additional caller facts occurs substantially simultaneously with each of the one or more call events.

5. The method of claim 1 wherein the step of populating the customer data record with additional caller facts occurs after a disconnection of the first telephonic connection and wherein the step of storing the call occurrence occurs after the step of establishing the second telephonic connection to the agent.

6. The method of claim 4 wherein the computer network connection occurs over an Internet connection and wherein the one or more call events occur during the call duration.

7. The method of claim 1 further comprising transmitting, before establishing the telephonic connection between the caller and the agent, a source identification over the second telephonic connection to the agent wherein the source identification is an identifier that corresponds to the destination phone number.

8. The method of claim 1 wherein the call occurrence is a time-date stamp that corresponds to one of the following:

a commencement time of the telephonic connection, a termination time of the telephonic connection, or both a commencement time and a termination time of the telephonic connection, or a combination thereof.

9. The method of claim 1 wherein the step of sending one or more of the additional caller facts to the agent via a computer network connection occurs, at least in part, during the call duration.

10. The method of claim 1 further comprising displaying a live console interface on a computer display device to the agent that displays one or more of the caller facts to the agent and

11. The method of claim 10 further comprising updating the live console interface to reflect one or more of the additional caller facts that occur during the call duration.

12. The method of claim 1 further comprising allowing an agent to transmit an agent request wherein the agent request is a do-not-call (DNC) request to the carrier via the computer network connection and updating the customer data record of the customer information database so as to identify the caller as a do-not-call caller or a DTMF activity of the agent.

13. The method of claim 5 wherein the plurality of caller facts is one or more of caller demographic information, caller identity information, the customer phone number, the destination phone number, caller frequency, a time-date stamp of one or more previous calls by the caller, or any combination thereof.

14. The method of claim 5 wherein the plurality of additional caller facts is one or more of caller dual-tone multi-frequency (DTMF) activity detected during the call duration, agent dual-tone multi-frequency (DTMF) activity detected during the call duration, the destination phone number, the call duration, a time-date stamp corresponding to the telephonic connection, agent identification, or any combination thereof.

15. The method of claim 1 further comprising recording the voice communication between the caller and the agent and storing the recorded voice communication in the customer data record of the customer information database.

16. The method of claim 1 wherein the step of recording commences upon detecting a particular dual-tone multi-frequency (DTMF) activity of the agent.

17. The method of claim 1 further comprising translating the voice communication to a textual transcript and storing the textual transcript in the customer data record of the customer information database.

18. The method of claim 17 further comprising detecting an occurrence of one or more trigger words and storing the occurrence in the customer data record.

19. The method of claim 15 further comprising translating the voice communication from an audio speech to a textual transcript and storing the textual transcript in the customer data record of the customer information database.

20. The method of claim 1 wherein the first telephonic connection to the carrier occurs over a public switched telephone network (PSTN).

21. The method of claim 20 wherein the second telephonic connection occurs over a Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) connection.

22. The method of claim 1 further comprising providing a routing database wherein the routing database comprises a plurality of routing agent phone numbers and wherein the step of establishing the second telephonic connection to the agent comprises the steps of selecting a routing agent phone number from the routing database according to a set of selection criteria and establishing the second telephonic connection to the selected routing agent phone number.

23. The method of claim 22 wherein the step of selecting a routing agent phone number is accomplished according to criteria contained in the routing database that specify which routing number should be used under the criteria.

24. The method of claim 1 wherein the preselected audio recording varies according to the caller facts.

25. A method implemented on an information handling system for tracking agent to customers calls comprising:

providing a customer information database with a plurality of customer data records wherein each customer data record comprises a plurality of customer facts, the plurality of customer facts comprising a customer identity and a customer phone number;

providing a plurality of access codes wherein each access code is associated with one of the customer phone numbers;

allowing an agent to establish a first telephonic connection with a carrier;

allowing the agent to transmit a first selected access code to the carrier wherein the first selected access code is one of the plurality of access codes;

selecting a first customer data record that is associated with the first selected access code of one of the customer data records of the customer information database, the first customer data record being associated with a first customer phone number;

establishing a second telephonic connection to the first customer phone number;

allowing the first telephone connection to be in voice communication with the second telephonic connection; and

populating the first customer data record of the customer information database with one or more call event facts related to the first customer phone number.

26. The method of claim 25 wherein the one or more call event facts are one or more of the following:

a time-date stamp, a call duration, dual-tone multi-frequency (DTMF) activity of the agent, lead identification, lead content, DNC requests, agent identification, or any combination thereof.

27. The method of claim 25 further comprising:

allowing the agent to transmit a second selected access code to the carrier wherein the second selected access code is one of the plurality of access codes;

selecting a second customer data record that is associated with the second selected access code of one of the customer data records of the customer information database, the second customer data record being associated with a second customer phone number;

establishing a third telephonic connection to the second customer phone number;

allowing the first telephone connection to be in voice communication with the third telephonic connection; and

populating the second customer data record of the customer information database with one or more call events related to the second customer phone number.

28. The method of claim 25 wherein the step of allowing the agent to transmit a first selected access code to the carrier comprises detecting dual-tone multi-frequency (DTMF) activity of the agent before the step of establishing the second telephonic connection.

29. The method of claim 25 wherein a plurality of access code are associated with a plurality of customer phone numbers by a mathematical algorithm that results in a one-to-one correspondence between the access codes and the customer phone numbers.

30. The method of claim 29 further comprising verifying that the first selected customer record does not include a do-not-call flag before establishing a second telephonic connection to the first customer phone number.

31. The method of claim 29 wherein a plurality of access code are associated with a plurality of customer phone numbers by a mathematical algorithm that results in a one-to-one correspondence the access codes and the customer phone numbers.

32. The method of claim 29 wherein the first access code, once used, is expired so as to prevent establishing the second telephonic connection to the first customer phone number more than one time.

33. A method implemented on an information handling system for communicating online user form data to an agent comprising:

allowing a user to enter data on an online web site form;

translating the data into an audio speech representation of the data;

establishing a telephonic connection to the agent; and

transmitting the audio speech representation of the data across the telephonic connection to the agent.

34. The method of claim 33 further comprising detecting a dual-tone multi-frequency (DTMF) activity of the agent and populating a customer data record of a customer information database with data corresponding to dual-tone multi-frequency (DTMF) activity of the agent.

35. The method of claim 33 further comprising detecting a dual-tone multi-frequency (DTMF) activity of the agent and after detecting the DTMF activity, establishing a telephonic connection to the user so as to place the user and the agent in voice communication with one another.

36. The method of claim 33 further comprising detecting a dual-tone multi-frequency (DTMF) activity of the agent corresponding to a do-not-call (DNC) request;

and updating a customer data record of a customer information database with a do-not-call flag.

37. The method of claim 33 wherein the data is textual information input by the user, form data selected by the user from multiple choice fields on the form, or any combination thereof.

38. A method implemented on an information handling system for associating audio files with a broadcast campaign comprising:

establishing a computer network connection between an agent and a carrier so as to permit the agent to view a first web page served by the carrier;

allowing the agent to indicate a request to be called via a telephonic connection;

establishing the telephonic connection between the agent and the carrier;

recording a voice communication occurring over the telephonic connection so as to produce an audio recording; and

allowing the agent to associate the audio recording with an action from a plurality of actions listed on a second web page served by the carrier to the agent wherein the plurality of actions are related to the broadcast campaign.

39. The method of claim 38 wherein the request comprises clicking on a click-to-call link.

40. The method of claim 38 wherein the second web page is substantially identical to the first web page.

41. The method of claim 38 wherein the action comprises playing the audio recording during a broadcast telephone campaign to a plurality of customers.

42. A method implemented on an information handling system for associating audio files in an audio file database comprising:

establishing a computer network connection between an agent and a carrier so as to permit the agent to view a first web page served by the carrier;

allowing the agent to indicate a request to be called via a telephonic connection;

establishing the telephonic connection between the agent and the carrier;

recording a voice communication occurring over the telephonic connection so as to produce an audio recording; and

allowing the agent to associate the audio recording with an action from a plurality of actions listed on a second web page served by the carrier to the agent.

43. An information handling system for managing call event data for caller-to-agent-by-carrier calls comprising:

a carrier call server comprising a processor and a memory;

wherein the carrier call server is adapted to be in communication with a plurality of telephonic connections and wherein the carrier call server is configured to receive telephonic connections from a plurality of callers;

wherein the carrier call server is configured with a customer information database with a plurality of customer data records wherein each customer data record comprises a plurality of caller facts, the plurality of caller facts comprising a caller identity and a customer phone number;

wherein the carrier call server is adapted to receive a first telephonic connection;

wherein the carrier call server is adapted to play a preselected audio recording to the caller over the first telephonic connection;

wherein the carrier call server is adapted to determine the caller phone number with a caller identification capability;

wherein the carrier call server is adapted to select a customer data record that has a customer phone number corresponding to the caller phone number from the customer information database;

wherein the carrier call server is adapted to store a time-date stamp in the customer data record of the customer information database;

wherein the carrier call server is adapted to establish a second telephonic connection to an agent;

wherein the carrier call server is adapted to establish a computer network connection between the carrier and the agent;

wherein the carrier call server is adapted to sent one or more of the caller facts to the agent via the computer network connection;

wherein the carrier call server is adapted to allow the first telephone connection to be in voice communication with the second telephonic connection so as to establish a telephonic connection between the caller and the agent, the telephonic connection having a call duration; and

wherein the carrier call server is adapted to populate the customer data record with additional caller facts wherein each of the additional caller facts corresponds to one or more call events that occur during the call duration.