Systems and methods for storing and searching data in a customer center environment

• US 7,930,314 B2
• Filed: 03/30/2007
• Issued: 04/19/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 09/28/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Verint Americas Incorporated (Verint Systems Incorporated)
• Original Assignee: Verint Americas Incorporated (Verint Systems Incorporated)
• Inventors: Gupta, Rajan
• Primary Examiner(s): LeRoux; Etienne P
• Assistant Examiner(s): Pyo; Monica M
• Application Number:
  US11/693,899
• Publication Number:
  US 20080082502A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,481 Days
• Field of Search: 707/3, 707/10, 707/100, 707/770, 707/802, 707/999.003, 707/999.01, 707/999.1, 707/769, 705/7, 705/8, 705/9
• US Class Current: 707/769
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/242 Query formulation
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99933 Query processing, i.e. searching
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99934 Query formulation, input preparation, or translation
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99935 Query augmenting and refining, e.g. inexact access

Abstract

Systems and methods for storing and searching a customer center environment. In this regard, a representative method comprises: generating data from workforce applications, at least one of the workforce applications including at least one of forecasting, scheduling, recording, and monitoring functionalities; storing the data in unstructured databases, at least one of the unstructured databases being operative to communicate with one of the workforce applications, the at least one of the unstructured databases including unstructured data that does not have a data structure; receiving search parameters that are used to search the data in the at least one of the plurality of unstructured databases; searching the at least one of the plurality of unstructured databases according to the search parameters; and displaying search results on a displaying device.

Claims

1. A method for storing and searching in a customer center system, comprising:

generating data from workforce applications, at least one of the workforce applications including at least one of forecasting, scheduling, recording, and monitoring functionalities;

determining whether at least some portions of the data should be stored in at least one of a plurality of unstructured databases or at least one of a plurality of structured databases, or both;

converting at least a portion of the data into a text format, resulting in converted data;

transferring the converted data for storing in the at least one of the plurality of unstructured databases;

storing the data in the at least one of the plurality of unstructured databases or the at least one of the plurality of structured databases, or both, the unstructured and structured databases being operative to communicate with at least one of the workforce applications, wherein at least a portion of the data stored in the at least one of the plurality of unstructured databases is the converted data;

receiving search parameters that are used to search the data in the at least one of the plurality of unstructured databases or the at least one of the plurality of structured databases, or both;

searching the at least one of the plurality of unstructured databases and the at least one of the plurality of structured databases according to the search parameters, resulting in search results, wherein the search results indicate a portion of the data associated with the search results from the at least one of the plurality of unstructured databases and the at least one of the plurality of structured databases;

determining whether each of the search results is from the at least one of the plurality of structured databases or the at least one of the plurality of unstructured databases;

indexing the portion of the data associated with the search results;

storing the portion of the data associated with the search results in a search result database; and

displaying the search results on a display device.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the at least one of the plurality of structured databases comprises data that has been categorized, and the at least one of the plurality of unstructured databases comprises unstructured data that does not exhibit a data structure.

3. The method of claim 1, further comprising responsive to one of the search results being from the at least one of the plurality of structured databases, encoding and converting the portion of the data associated with the one of the search results to a text format, resulting in converted search results data.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein storing the data in the at least one of the plurality of unstructured databases comprises storing the converted data in the at least one of the plurality of unstructured databases.

5. The method of claim 3, further comprising storing the converted search results data in the search result database.

6. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

planning at least one campaign to implement goals;

scheduling and deploying a workforce in accordance with the at least one campaign to produce a plurality of agent-customer interactions;

measuring performance of an agent on at least a portion of the plurality of agent-customer interactions to produce a set of quality metrics for the agent;

analyzing the set of quality metrics to produce a rating of the measured interactions;

combining at least a portion of the set of quality metrics to produce performance indicators; and

using the performance indicators in the planning step of a second campaign or another iteration of the at least one campaign.

7. A system for storing and searching in a customer center system, comprising:

a plurality of workforce applications, the plurality of workforce applications including at least one of forecasting, scheduling, recording, and monitoring functionalities, at least one of the plurality of workforce applications being operative to generate data related to customer center functionalities when executed by a workforce application apparatus;

a non-transitory computer readable medium having a plurality of unstructured databases and a plurality of structured databases being operative to store the data, the plurality of unstructured databases and the plurality of structured databases being operative to communicate with the at least one of the plurality of workforce applications, wherein at least a portion of the data stored in at least one of the plurality of unstructured databases is converted data;

a determining component configured to determine whether at least some portions of the data should be stored in the at least one of the plurality of unstructured databases or the at least one of the plurality of structured databases, or both;

a converter configured to convert at least a portion of the data into a text format, resulting in the converted data, and transfer the converted data for storing in the at least one of the plurality of unstructured databases; and

one or more computer systems having a search engine operative to;

receive search parameters that are used to search the data in the plurality of unstructured databases or the plurality of structured databases, or both,

search the plurality of unstructured databases and the plurality of structured databases according to the search parameters, resulting in search results, wherein the search results indicate a portion of the data associated with the search results from the at least one of the plurality of unstructured databases and the at least one of the plurality of structured databases,

determine whether each of the search results is from the at least one of the plurality of structured databases or the at least one of the plurality of unstructured databases, or both,

index the portion of the data associated with the search results,

store the portion of the data associated with the search results in a search result database, and

display the search results on a display device.

8. The system of claim 7, wherein the at least one of the plurality of structured databases comprises data that has been categorized, and the at least one of the plurality of unstructured databases comprises unstructured data that does not exhibit a data structure.

9. The system of claim 7, wherein responsive to one of the search results being from the at least one of the plurality of structured databases, the search engine further configured to encode and convert the portion of the data associated with the one of the search results to a text format, resulting in converted search results data.

10. The system of claim 9, wherein the search result database comprises the converted search results data.

11. The system of claim 7, wherein the plurality of unstructured databases are operative to store the converted data.

12. A system for storing and searching in a customer center system, comprising:

a plurality of workforce applications, the plurality of workforce applications including at least one of forecasting, scheduling, recording, and monitoring functionalities, at least one of the plurality of workforce applications being operative to generate data related to customer center functionalities when executed by a workforce application apparatus;

a plurality of unstructured databases and a plurality of structured databases being operative to store the data in a non-transitory computer readable medium, the plurality of unstructured databases and the plurality of structured databases being operative to communicate with the at least one of the plurality of workforce applications, wherein at least a portion of the data stored in at least one of the plurality of unstructured databases is converted data;

a determining component configured to determine whether at least some portions of the data should be stored in the at least one of the plurality of unstructured databases or the at least one of the plurality of structured databases, or both;

a converter configured to convert at least a portion of the data into a text format, resulting in the converted data, and transfer the converted data for storing in the at least one of the plurality of unstructured databases;

one or more computer systems having a search engine operative to;

receive search parameters that are used to search the data in the plurality of unstructured databases or the plurality of structured databases, or both,

search the plurality of unstructured databases and the plurality of structured databases, or both, according to the search parameters, resulting in search results, wherein the search results indicate a portion of the data associated with the search results from the at least one of the plurality of unstructured databases and the at least one of the plurality of structured databases,

determine whether each of the search results is from the at least one of the plurality of structured databases or the at least one of the plurality of unstructured databases,

index the portion of the data associated with the search results,

store the portion of the data associated with the search results in a search result database, and

display the search results on a display device;

wherein the at least one of the plurality of structured databases comprises data that has been categorized,

wherein the search engine being operative to determine whether the search results are from the at least one of the plurality of structured databases or the at least one of the plurality of unstructured databases, or both.