A new VoIP-enabled version of its outbound dialing and campaign management software, Interaction Dialer, has been released by Interactive Intelligence, a global developer of business communications software. Interaction Dialer is a solution designed for contact centers, teleservices firms and collections operations.

Now based on the SIP standard, this latest release of Interaction Dialer can operate in an all-software, all-VoIP environment in order to help reduce costs and simplify management. The release includes an all new SIP gateway called Interaction Gateway (News - Alert)™ which is an application connecting legacy telephone trunks (T1s) to VoIP networks. Combined with Interaction Dialer, Interaction Gateway provides high-volume outbound contact centers accurate predictive call analysis capabilities.

According to Yankee Group (News - Alert) senior analyst, Ken Landoline, Interaction Gateway is unique in that it provides advanced outbound call analysis, such as distinction between answering machines versus live speakers, and wrong numbers versus network issues, while taking full advantage of the open SIP standard.

Landoline added that combined, these enhancements result in more effective dialing campaigns, simplified deployment and configuration, lower cost, better redundancy and unbeatable flexibility compared to that of traditional outbound dialing solutions.

Interactive Intelligence (News - Alert) has positioned the new SIP-based Interaction Dialer as having the ability to lower costs by between 10 and 50 percent compared to traditional TDM-based dialers through the reduction in hardware requirements.

The company claims that Interaction Dialer can reduce costs even further by using Interaction Gateway at strategic locations to ensure that it uses the most cost-effective call routing. In a typical configuration, ISDN PRI trunks from the public phone network are connected to Interaction Gateway. After that point, the entire configuration is VoIP which provides significant geographic independence.

Chris Adomaitis, president of network and telecom services for Dialogue Marketing, an Interactive Intelligence customer since 1998, contributed that as an outsourced provider of CRM services, Dialogue Marketing customers drive the company’s technology requirements. A key requirement across the board is to offer highly customizable services at an affordable price. Interaction Dialer’s new Gateway option enables Dialogue Marketing to do just that by using a pure softswitch, thus dramatically reducing costs associated with hardware.

Other Interaction Dialer enhancements include improvements to its patented pacing algorithm, which maintains the optimum balance between low abandon rates and maximum agent utilization; a single “Health View” interface which allows supervisors to monitor and analyze Dialer statistics from campaigns, workflows and outbound calls; and a “Contact Import Wizard” to simplify campaign management by providing a tool that will import records into call list tables from a variety of commonly used sources, such as CSV files, Microsoft (News - Alert) Access, Microsoft Excel, SQL Server and Oracle (News - Alert).

As contact and call centers are increasingly discovering the multiple benefits of the VoIP environment, the demand for a solution such as Interaction Dialer has grown throughout the industry. These centers are making significant investments in technology advances to offer customers better access while also enhancing the overall experience. Any solution that enables the center to focus on these technology initiatives while also promising to reduce costs is worth consideration.

Beyond the ability to operate in a VoIP environment, Interaction Dialer is also providing additional enhancements that will enable the contact or call center to operate more efficiently while trying to achieve specific service goals. The solution is certainly addressing many of the demands in the industry, but the question over the long term will be if the innovation will continue to keep up with technology demands of the customer. For now, Interactive Intelligence is off to a good start.

What’s the number one VoIP conference in terms of attendance? What’s the leading VoIP expo for exhibitors in terms of lead generation? And which VoIP industry event will feature special attractions for service providers, resellers, and the enterprise and SMB market as well as an overview on the Future of IP Telephony? Answer: INTERNET TELEPHONY Conference & Expo, WEST, which runs October 10-13, 2006. See you in San Diego!

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Susan J. Campbell is a contributing editor for TMC and has also written for eastbiz.com. To see more of her articles, please visit Susan J. Campbell’s columnist page.