Connect First Call Center Software

The ability to utilize an at-home agent base with all of the bells and whistles provided by an on premise ACD. Ease of use for the agents and admins has been wonderful. Uptime and customer service have been perfect. We get a high quality product that provides value to our services.

Pros

Both the agent UI and the admin UI are intuitive and user friendly. We consistently train new agents and the overall ease of use makes this software a breeze to train on. Agent and queue set-up are easy and the ability to clone makes the process go quickly. The admin dashboards are easy to customize and make real-time management of agent activity easy to stay on top of. Overall making supervisory and management more efficient.
We couldn¿t ask for a better agent and admin experience.

Cons

The new reporting capabilities are fantastic and can be seriously customized. However, new report set-ups are more complicated and less intuitive than their previous reporting capabilities which were more user friendly but had limited customization capabilities.

Pros

ease of use of dialer, you can configure a lot, pretty much everything. that helps make most automatic.

Cons

the reporting part is kind of confusing and unreliable at times, is not so intuitive and some reports are just too hard to figure out

It allows us to manage a large amount of call volume to our call center. It also allows for us to pull recorded calls for audit and quality control purposes.

Pros

The customer service has been great in helping us set up queues and other issues. We like the different recording options. There are many ways to search for recorded calls to help eliminate calls we don't need.

Cons

Setting up the queues can be challenging and not all calls are recorded and stored. When pulling calls, the site is not that easy to navigate.

Immense amount of data that has allowed us to find areas of concern within our operation where we could improve our efficiency. Also, allows us to provide data to our customers as requested.

Pros

Excellent reporting capabilities. More data available than I could ever imagine needing for our use as well as our customers' needs. Very reliable.

Cons

User-generated report set up could be a bit more intuitive, but the excellent customer support from ConnectFirst has helped get me over any challenges I might face.

Pros

Has a lot of good call center features. The IVR set up is good. I like the SOAP/HTTP options to send GET or POST calls with call center parameters. The survey set up is nice and can add custom HTML functionality. Connect First customer support it very good.

Cons

It's based in flash so the interface feels slow and old. The software randomly logs a user out and they have to log back in. Searching for records can be slow.

Working with a forward thinking company like Connect First as an integrator allowed us to build our business utilizing their underlying technologies. The software allows us to manage multiple customers within the call center and lead management space.

Pros

Connect First has been a solid partner for us, providing our customers with an innovative diverse product suite. With our customers demanding more real time data, their open API offerings rise to the challenge to meet these demands.

The new admin and agent UI are intuitive and allow for the customization of campaigns and security features allowing management to provide views and alerts of real time campaigns and data to the appropriate managers.

List management is intuitive and allows for a good workforce management flow.

The IVR and Scripting drag and drop solutions allows our customers to easily make real time changes to their solutions without generating additional customer service requests.

Web service integrations are easy to setup and manage allowing us to pass the requested data to multiple endpoints.

Easy configurations to manage all aspects of campaign, audio , email tfn , did and scheduled tasks.

Tons of canned reporting, with the ability to customize and schedule ad hoc reporting to manage any business case.

Cons

CRM integration could be made more intuitive. Integration with some pre integrated a third party marketing apps would bring some additional value. Would like to see add ons for some AI and channel integration.

Pros

I like the access it allows the admin users to configure everything and how CF made it so easy for somebody even if they are not that technically inclined.

Cons

I love the software. It will be perfect if they have technical support on weekends that is available even if its for technical queries only. When testing / configuring something we usually do it on weekends when the call center is OFF and somebody with CF expertise will be a big help.

Pros

Reporting and export tools are easy to use. The technical support team is top notch . The account team is very responsive.

Cons

Process to customize a report or export with added selects is more involved that I would like. Request system email updates and notifications are duplicated.

Pros

Time to find a new ACD supplier.

Cons

- Weak, confusing and what seems like inaccurate reporting.
- Significant down time, with no real diagnosis by Connect First.
- Customer Service and Account Management with no sense of urgency and limited product knowledge.
- AHT is not accurate, with Hold apparently mixed into talk time? Sad as we use this to plan staffing needs.
- Seems to have been designed by engineers that had little understanding of the call center world.

It enables us to run our business reliable and confidently. Basically, it allows me as the CEO to sleep well at night.

Pros

I have used a few different cloud call center vendors over the years and there is no question Connect First is the most reliable and has the best customer support. I have heard horror stories about downtime from some of the publicly traded vendors that my colleagues have used.

Cons

The lack of a true omni-channel messaging solution, but I hear that is being released very soon. Right now, we have to use two different platforms for live chat and voice. I am looking forward to being able to use one platform for all of our communication channels.

Streamlined operations and integration. Great data visibility. Overall just a perfect fit.

Pros

Very feature rich Enterprise package. Extensive APIs. Intuitive. Easy to use. State of the art. Top in the industry.

Pros

The customer service is great, the system always is working with little downtime. It is easy to get clients set up.

Cons

The new adhock reporting is cumbersome, not super easy to use. Using the IVR studio in Chrome, sometimes does not allow you to unconnect two items.

Pros

The design and layout make the platform very easy to use. It also has a wide array of reporting tools at your disposal.

Cons

The platform can be buggy at times and crash or have trouble loading. In addition while there is a lot of reporting, there is still more that could be created,

Pros

user friendly. Very easy to teach agents how to use. it is really a self explained system and we really enjoy working in it

Cons

the reporting system is very complex. there are a lot of reports to choose but nt exactly the ones we normally needs.

Pros

Ease of use, responsiveness, and reliability. Customer service is always ready to help when it comes to any issue or question.

Cost effective operations of our 2-1-1 Call Center.

Pros

Connect First is user friendly! Even for those professionals who may not be the most technically advanced, the common sense operational format makes this a tool that is both effective and sensible!

Cons

The internal chat format is a bit cumbersome but still easy to implement among users - it just takes a little getting used to.

Pros

Getting the same message out to our guest, we can record the information and everyone gets the same message instead of several different voices.

Pros

The reporting tools are very useful. They proivde a great breakdown of many different key performance indicators.

Cons

Timing out of management tab after just a few moments of not being used. Requires a log in and log out to get back to usage.

Pros

The reporting available and customer support has been superb! The backup received is extremely detailed making it easy to break down campaigns and costs.

I have been very happy with Connect First, we have been working in it for just a little over a year now. There are a few things we could use, like productivity reports for agents as well as utilization/occupancy reports. We have spent a lot of time with our Account Manager trying to come up with a report and have had no luck. To me, these are standard call center reports that should be accessible in the reporting studio. I would like to commend the support staff, both technical and the Account Manager (Brice Hogan) as they certainly understand the call center business and work with a great sense of urgency!

Pros

Very easy to use, from a management/reporting perspective. I also enjoy working the such a high caliber of people AND I like the value that I am receiving with this product.

Cons

That I did not know the soft phone was separate and had to be purchased separately. I also understand this is going to change with the new release. I would also like to be included in future release details so we better understand what is in the works.

Advice to Others

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