Channel
What is channel?
A channel is a communication technology that a customer uses to communicate needs, concerns and requests. Upstream Works provides a flexible approach to channel handling that allows channels to be added with minimal configuration. Agents can handle customer contacts in the same consistent fashion, no matter what the channel.
Common contact center channels include voice, email, web chat, SMS, social messaging and video. Each has its own pace and expectations: a phone call is synchronous, while email and many messaging channels allow a conversation to continue over hours or days. Customers often use more than one channel to resolve a single issue, so how channels are connected matters as much as how many are offered.
Operationally, channels are usually managed through routing rules, queues and service-level targets set per channel. Buyers look at how easily a new channel can be added, whether agents work all channels in one interface, and whether interaction history follows the customer from one channel to the next. Reporting by channel helps show where demand is growing and where contacts fail to resolve.
Related: Omnichannel contact center, Multichannel contact center, Chat messages / chat channel, Totalix.