Realize VoIP, September 2011

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In This Issue

Editor's Note

By Amir Zmora, VP Marketing & Products

Following on our previous newsletter, which focused on Telemedicine, we are dedicating this issue to video for the financial sector, focusing mainly on Business-to-Consumer (B2C) communication using next-generation Video Call Centers. With the current turbulence in the markets, financial institutes are looking for ways to strengthen their grip on their customers by finding better ways to convey their messages and convince them to perform certain actions. Virtual face-to-face communication is essential to achieving this goal, thus increasing the demand for innovative Video Call Centers and a better user experience.

A simple approach to adding video to financial call centers would be to change the clients and add support for video to the infrastructure. However, when we look at the added value and complexity that video brings to the solution, a different approach must be taken.

This newsletter reviews the different aspects of B2C video communication for the financial sector, starting from the need for and value of interaction through video, then reviewing the overall solution, tying call scenarios to current business logic and end user devices and clients, and concluding with a case study.

Complementing this newsletter is a webinar that we will host on this topic.

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Video Call Center - Why Now?

By Amir Zmora, VP Marketing & Products, TBU

In enterprise communication, video is common today mainly in the form of enterprise islands that are dominated by room systems. Typically, this means a high quality, high bandwidth - 1-2 Mbps and above for a typical room system - and high price solution.

At the other end, we have consumer video communication, which is typically free or very cheap - it requires much less than 1 Mbps of bandwidth, bandwidth common today in most home Internet connections, to achieve good call quality.

The missing link is to connect these two worlds and bring the consumer into the enterprise.

There is a common saying: people like to do business with people they like. Who would you like to do business with more? Someone you have virtually met face-to-face, or an anonymous voice on the other side of the line?

As simplified as it may seem, this is the cornerstone of the demand for video call centers for the financial market. Statistics of current financial video call center implementations show that when the customer sees the agent, the success rate for closing a deal grows and the number of calls required for convincing the customer is reduced.

But why now? What has changed? Video call centers and video IVRs were a hot topic when 3G video calling was a hype, but they never realized their promise.

3G video calling did not succeed, for two main reasons:

Quality was bad. Let's face it: QCIF with 10 FPS on a small mobile phone screen is not a compelling experience.
It was too expensive. That is, the infrastructure to deploy it, not the actual call for the end user.

These two issues are resolved with today's technology.

So why is Business-to-Consumer (B2C) video calling becoming a commodity for the financial sector?

Agents fall in love with it once they try it, as the face-to-face interaction with the customer increases their success rate and hence, their earnings.
Financial institutions gain higher customer retention, higher revenue and a platform for publicizing additional services through promoted content.
The acceptance of video communication in the consumer market is significantly higher today than 5-10 years ago.
Technically it is possible to provide a high quality user experience in most consumer network specifications.
Technologies for deploying such a solution are available today. There is no need to develop all components from scratch. For example, RADVISION provides the BEEHD video deployment solution, which supports exactly this.

The following are the components and user experience needed for building a successful financial call center:

Web integration that allows the user to request a call from the browser
A simple process for entering into a call. It should:
- Include easy installation, if needed
- Work with internal and external peripherals of the computer
- Allow the user to be called instead of having to wait on the line in a video call
Call user experience should allow:
- Connectivity with good audio/video quality from anywhere: Internet café, home, office, on the go
- Working on any type of device: Desktop, Mobile, Tablet
- Data sharing, so the agent can show information to the customer
- Integration with financial applications on the agent side and in some cases also on the customer side
Scalable FW/NAT traversal that will work regardless of network topology
(Optional) Recording and conferencing, based on specific needs.

The next article in this newsletter, "From Customer Login to Video Session", offers a closer look at the solution components and provides an innovative approach to using Web applications for building call center logic and scenarios.

From Customer Login to Video Session

By Tsahi Levent-Levi, CTO, TBU

Video contact centers are different than video conferencing in enterprises in the following ways:

They involve customers, who are external to the organization
There are no specific numbers, people or rooms to dial; customers just try to contact an agent - any agent
There is a business logic behind each and every call; nothing is done in an ad-hoc fashion or in a scheduled way
The goal of calls is not internal collaborative work; it is to provide a service or sell a service or product.

This means that the architecture and mindset of how video conferencing is deployed for contact centers needs to change: it needs to take these changes into consideration.

The diagram above illustrates the network topology of a suggested solution for the video contact center.

If you are looking for a Gatekeeper or SIP Server in this architecture, you won't find it - not because it shouldn't be there, but because the value it would add to the solution is rather marginal: it would provide the connectivity of the actual signaling and media between customers and agents, but it would not provide a suitable enabler to tie in the business logic. This is where a new component is needed: the Video Contact Center.

The Video Contact Center can be a cloud-based solution or a solution hosted on-premise, if this requirement exists. The main purpose of the video contact center is to manage the business logic and call flow of the customer care provided by the financial institute. Since similar voice solutions already exist, the video contact center in such a case needs to have integration and customization capabilities that can tie in the required functionality with the existing service.

The video contact center needs to handle multiple activities:

Take care of downloading and updating the customer's client used to access the video contact center
Integrate with the institute's Website and promotions around the Web
Integrate with an existing video contact center or other CRM solutions used by the institute

A video contact center cannot be treated in the same way as a voice contact center due to the added requirements of resources but it also cannot be treated as classic video conferencing. For video contact centers, a new approach is necessary - an approach for which we can offer a solution today - the BEEHD Cloud.

The BEEHD Cloud is a cloud-based service that can be used to easily control and manage any BEEHD-based device. It enables developing and enabling any application logic you see fit, using Web 2.0 technologies in an environment that makes it easy to integrate with existing solutions used by vendors: CRM, ERP, scheduling systems or other servers.

The BEEHD Cloud keeps the customer's applications up to date and provides components that make it easy to download and upgrade them to the machine of the end customer - all through simple integration into the vendor's own Website.

To top it, the BEEHD Cloud comes equipped with its own video contact center that you can deploy "as is" or use as a baseline for integration to your own environment.

Left to Its Own Devices?

By Anatoli Levine , Director of Product Management, TBU

We live in a time of devices. A myriad of big and little helpers is available everywhere, assisting us to do chores, to communicate, entertain and be entertained. While these devices have surrounded us for the last 20-30 years, over the decades they have changed in every possible way - in their look and feel, capabilities, features and sheer usefulness.

Nothing has changed as dramatically in the last four years as communication devices. The appearance of the first iPhone, the App Store and then the iPad have changed the foundation of communication devices - forever. And the advent of 4G networks delivering native IP connectivity and substantial bandwidth everywhere has changed what we can do with these communication devices - also forever.

Take a look around (don't go too far or wide - you can start with your own purse or briefcase) -everybody carries around a number of devices, a smart phone or two (Apple, Android, BlackBerry, Windows), an iPad or the other Pad. We love these devices so much that we have managed to force our IT departments to accept the fact that no matter what type of work we do, we will bring our beloved devices to work, and IT guys had better learn how to support them - or else (in nice terms this is called the Consumerization of IT). We have also gotten accustomed to the fact that no matter what we need our devices to do, "there will be an App for that".

As we focus on financial markets, let's look at what you can do with your Android or Apple device today. Visit an App Store and you will find a substantial number of applications in the Banking and Financial categories that allow you to login to your bank account, check funds, pay bills, balance your budget, setup a debt reduction plan, do research and trade stocks - all on the go, using your mobile device. These apps come from major banks and financial institutions as well as from independent developers.

If we look at all apps together, they give you access and control over various aspects of your financial life at any time and from any place, but they only allow you to manipulate data. What's missing? What if you needan advice on your mortgage situation - should you lock the rate now or next week? You desperately need to refinance - how can this be done quickly? You need a loan - but which loan is right for you? You need to start saving for college - what is the best program? Traditionally, you will want to discuss all your financial issues at your local bank branch or the office of an investment company - face to face. And this is what's coming to the phone in your pocket, the smart pad in your briefcase or your desktop at home.

We should, however, keep in mind that a number of challenges exist that should be addressed to make functionality such as "video communication on the go" practical and usable. One challenge is the sheer diversity of devices. A high quality video implementation typically requires hardware codec optimization, and in light of the variety of chipsets that power different mobile devices, the creation of a "universally optimized code" is difficult and requires additional engineering efforts. Of course it is possible to use software codecs, but this would increase the computational load on the device and require ever more powerful CPUs, which in turn would lead to power consumption issues. Another challenge is maintaining high quality video over various connectivity scenarios: an IP connection on a mobile device can be cycled through 3G, 4G and Wi-Fi networks with packet losses and the connection bandwidth going up and down, all of which require special technologies, such as Forward Error Correction and RADVISION's NetSense, to maintain the quality of the video stream. Additionally, as stated above, the ability to manage a video call from a mobile device through integration with a video call center allows creating a new level of service that goes far beyond simple chat application.

RADVISION's BEEHD Solution addresses all of these challenges, supporting a wide variety of mobile and desktop devices and platforms. Using video client frameworks such as BEEHD for Personal Devices and BEEHD Cloud allows developers to enable their banking and financial applications for conversational video by integrating BEEHD technology into their applications on mobile devices. The same functionality can be offered on various desktop platforms using BEEHD for Desktop, enabling conversational video on the main banking and financial websites. Customers will be able to start a video chat session with a bank representative, mortgage specialist or investment banker - and engage in face-to-face conversation - without the need to go to the branch office. The next level of consumer power is around the corner, and it will arrive soon.

Bank Call Center Case Study

By Tomer Saar, Product Manager, TBU

Who doesn't like friends? Friends are on your side, they understand you and want nothing but the best for you. This is why this particular bank wants to become very good friends with its customers.

When the bank approached us, it already had a traditional phone-based call center where agents were manning positions and customers were calling a dedicated phone access number. Upon dial-in, the customer would hear a greeting followed by an automated call distributer (ACD). The ACD identified the customers with his account number and PIN, followed by a series of questions to which the customer replied by pressing the keys on his phone. Eventually, the customer would be connected with the relevant banker - an investment specialist, mortgage advisor or checking account clerk.

The main concern of the bank was the frustration of the customer at connecting with a different clerk each time, thereby losing the personal touch that people so like to have. This concern was to be solved with a more personalized communication method between customers and bankers: video communication.

With better communication and intimacy in mind, the new system would allow customers and bankers to talk to and see each other. This would create a better personal experience and increase customer satisfaction.

Besides changing the medium of communication, the bank did not want to change any other paradigms, meaning that it would still require some sort of call distribution and queuing mechanism.

The Solution

We provided the BEEHD for Desktop V²oIP Client framework. Using this SDK, the bank's affiliates built two types of clients: one for bankers and one for customers.

The client for bankers connects to the bank's CRM and retrieves customer and account info, similar to the old phone-based system, while the client for customers is more simplified.

Each client connects to two types of servers: one is the call center management server (facilitated by RADVISION's BEEHD Cloud), the other is the V²oIP server. In this case, RADVISION's H.323 infrastructure was used, but RADVISION could also support a SIP-based infrastructure.

The customer's client was enriched, allowing the agent to share personal account information and market data with the customer.

Some type of connection between the bank's Website and the V²oIP Client was needed. For this purpose, the bank used RADVISION's BEEHD Launcher, which integrates the V²oIP Client with the customer's branded HTML page. The Launcher is an ActiveX and XPI plug-in (suitable for all common Web browsers) capable of automatically downloading, installing, launching and connecting a call to the appropriate agent - all without user intervention.

RADVISION's BEEHD Cloud is also used for queue management. The bank has programmed various rules into it to serve "better" customers faster than others, according to its criteria.

The Experience

What have we achieved?

Agents are using BEEHD for Desktop-based software clients, capable of receiving video calls from customers and connecting to the bank's CRM system.
Customers are logging into the bank's Website, identifying themselves, selecting the appropriate service on which they want to chat with an agent and then being connected to a smiling agent ready to serve them and share account and market information with them.

The Results

Customer satisfaction has increased. There are two types of customers for this system: account owners and agents, and both are using the system to their satisfaction. Looking into the eyes of your counterpart while talking to them is priceless. It raises confidence on both sides and creates a feeling of partnership. A customer is not "just an account number" anymore, and the more personal feeling translates directly into business.

What's next

Using RADVISION's BEEHD for Personal Devices, the bank plans to bring the same experience to the customers' mobile phones and tablet devices. This will allow customers on the go to experience the same human-rich experience of talking to their bank agent face to face.

Product News and Updates

The following are new RADVISION product releases:

BEEHD for Personal Devices v2.7 Audio version was released. The BEEHD/PD Audio version is device agnostic, meaning it can run on any Android-based device no matter the make, model, or chipset, as long as it runs Android 2.3.

The new version above is available to customers under maintenance agreements.

Blog Highlights

Here's a quick glance at some recent relevant and interesting blog posts on our blog network:

NetSense 101 Part 1: Why do we need Bandwidth Estimation?

The fact that our networks are getting faster and wider does not necessarily mean that video calling can ignore the simple question of how much bandwidth is available.

NetSense 101 Part 2: Packet-loss-based Bandwidth Estimation

There is an industry standard for bandwidth estimation. It might not be the best, but it is how solutions work today. In this post, Tsahi will explain the packet-based bandwidth estimation approach and its limitations.

NetSense 101 Part 3: Delay-based Bandwidth Estimation

NetSense is a bandwidth estimation algorithm that looks at delays instead of packet losses. This trait gives it a significant advantage over other techniques.

NetSense 101 Part 4: Q&A

Wrap ups our series about bandwidth estimation with a few questions and answers regarding NetSense, a delay-based bandwidth estimation mechanism.

Upcoming Webinars

Title

Where?

Beyond the Board Room: Video Communication for the Financial Industry

View online

VoLTE 2011, Nov 8-10 in Paris - Amir Zmora, VP Marketing & Products for the TBU will be lecturing on the subject "Are OTT The New Walled Gardens?".

Amir will also participate on a panel "IMS: Why Operators Need it for Voice Service in LTE and How Can They Implement it?"

We managed to get you a 20% discount for the conference.

Title	Where?
Unified Communication as Key Enabler for Telemedicine	View online
The Evolution of UC Clients - Visual Communication	View online
Making Real-Time Video Work over the Internet	View online
Realizing "FaceTime" on Android Devices	View online
The Hidden Challenges of Developing HD Visual Communication Products	View online
Voice and Video over IP Communications: Assessing and Improving User Experience	View online
Unified Communication HD Visual Communications for the Masses	View online
LTE - The Future of IMS	View online
SIP Beyond Telecom	View online

In Closing

This newsletter aims to be useful to you. If you are not finding value in it, PLEASE REPLY and tell us how we can improve. For more information from RADVISION, you are invited to follow the links below: