[June 05, 2015]

ANSWERS Announces Rollout of Its Next-Generation VOC Platform at 2015 Answers Summit

Answers Corporation, owner of the leading Internet brand Answers.com and a premier provider of cloud-based voice of customer (VOC) solutions, revealed highlights from its annual Answers Summit, held recently in Scottsdale, Arizona. Hosting a record-breaking number of attendees over three days, the event spotlighted best practices and lessons learned from engaging today's multichannel customers through case studies, interactive workshops, and emerging trends from clients, partners and executives. Answers™ also gave an exclusive first peek at its upcoming voice of customer platform products, including text analytics, sentiment analysis, enhancements to its customer experience analytics, and its groundbreaking feedback tool, all designed to bolster customer engagement, generate insights and strengthen brand influence.

"Marketers today utilize dozens of point solutions from a wide range of vendors in an attempt to capture, analyze and activate the massive volumes of structured and unstructured customer experience data across different channels and devices. They struggle to make sense of these highly siloed insights and are challenged in developing a holistic view of their customers," said Jim Yang, SVP of Products, Marketing and Services, Answers. "Over the course of this year we'll be rolling out a number of new products to extend our unique, one-stop platform for integrated VOC and customer experience solutions, enabling organizations to tap into deeper consumer insights and to more effectively engage their target audience."

The Answers Summit's speaker roster included senior vice presidents, directors and managers of digital, e-commerce, customer insights and business intelligence from Delta Air Lines, AT&T (News - Alert), Home Depot, Lowe's, GM, Wells Fargo, Vera Bradley, Vitamin World, Microsoft, Nordstrom, Autotrader.com and many others. Chip Heath, professor and author from the Stanford Graduate Schoolof Business, kicked off the Summit with an inspiring presentation on how businesses and individuals can master the challenges that come with a change environment. Scott Stratten, president of UnMarketing, closed the event with an energetic discussion of customer expectations on social media and the importance of authenticity, transparency and immediacy in brand-building.

Sessions explored the full range of customer experience (CX) topics including data and analytics, employee engagement, content marketing, mobile and sentiment. Key takeaways include:

• Unparalleled View into the Customer's Mind: Answers Text Analytics will enable brands to extract insights buried deep in the unstructured information captured by surveys, consumer reviews and social media to gain a better understanding of the factors that drive customer satisfaction. This free-form data is funneled into the Answers Text Analytics engine, allowing companies to drill down into the data to identify sentiment and topical insights.
• Insights Vital for Anthem's Superior Digital Experience: Kim Rival, Staff Vice President of Portals and Content Management at Anthem discussed the critical importance of leveraging insights to improve the consumer experience. Anthem, which serves 70 million individuals across 14 states, saw an influx of new members in early 2014 resulting in higher call volumes and lower web satisfaction. Through VOC data, the company was able to quickly prioritize enhancements, leading to a 25 percent reduction in calls, a 163 percent increase in web payment transactions and an 18-point increase in online satisfaction.
• Leverage a Top-10 Web Community to Power Shopper Answers: Boasting more than 60 million monthly unique visitors to its Q&A experience, Answers.com (News - Alert) is uniquely positioned to funnel crowdsourced answers to customer product questions for manufacturer and retailer clients of Shopper Answers, a product Q&A tool.
• Maintaining Brand Consistency Through Global Syndication: At Mattel, the goal of the organization is to bring joy to kids worldwide. But with hundreds of brands in 150 countries and 33 languages, it's difficult to maintain brand consistency. With the company introducing 4,000-5,000 products per year, Mattel utilizes Webcollage by Answers to activate localized rich media assets across non-Amazon Global eRetail and Amstel branded sites, enabling local teams to specialize collateral for specific audiences.
• Hyperlocal Insights to Improve Experiences at Store Level: For organizations with brick-and-mortar locations, it's imperative to understand the differences in the consumer mindset between regions as well as individual stores. Answers can now deliver insights regarding the customer experience down to a hyperlocal level, empowering regional and in-store managers to address specific challenges to improve satisfaction.

For a more detailed recap of the event, please visit our blog here.

About Answers Corporation

Answers' mission is to empower consumers, brands and organizations by connecting them with the information they need to make better-informed decisions. The Answers Voice of Customer (VOC) Platform leverages the sizable reach of the top-10 Internet brand Answers.com (source: Quantcast (News - Alert)), along with leading cloud-based solutions from ForeSee, Webcollage and ResellerRatings, to enable businesses and organizations to engage with customers at every interaction point, drive investment decisions from customer insights and deliver content that powers the customer experience. Answers is headquartered in St. Louis with offices in Ann Arbor, New York City, Silicon Valley, Cleveland, London, Vancouver and Tel Aviv. For Answers, visit http://www.answers.com.

ForeSee and Answers.com are registered trademarks of Answers Corporation in the United States and in jurisdictions throughout the world. All other trademarks, trade names or service marks used or mentioned herein belong to their respective owners.

View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20150605005085/en/

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