The Next Steps for Call Theory
It's Patrick again. I've alluded to various changes coming to Call Theory, so it's time to explain those in detail - along with the decision making behind the changes.
As Ray Arnold in Jurassic Park said: "Hold onto your butts..."
Expected Changes
Call Theory subscriptions are now focused on the training and implementation of account-level scripting for platforms that include Five9, Twilio, Asterisk, and Amtelco.
We will not be providing break-fix technical support or database optimization services without a managed services contract moving forward.
Things we can help you with:
- Amtelco Intelligent Series scripting, contact-based architecture, and more
- Asterisk-based dial-plan, troubleshooting, and configuration
- Five9-based HTML/javascript agent scripting
- Twilio API integrations including SMS, Voice, WhatsApp, Studio, and Flex
- Other 3rd-party API integrations used by call center clients
Our new online learning portal will provide documentation opportunities available as video training series coupled with AI-driven interfaces (chat-bots and similar) to give you access to all of our knowledge and scripting in an easy-to-use interface.
Office hours agenda and topics will be published weekly, and we'll be hosting additional office hours. Look for reminders and updates when the new portal launches in October!
Of course, we still offer infrastructure, environment, and database management, but we do require you to be on a managed services plan. The Call Theory subscription bundle was not the right place for that.
The New Call Theory Plans
Our customer plans are changing, including the addition of non-subscription contract-programming hours and new-account setups. This is possible with the addition of two account programmers trained during our Summer Space Camp.
Non-Subscription Options
New: You don't have to be a subscriber to take advantage of these offerings!
Same-Day New Account Setup: Have an important or advanced account that needs a rush-setup? We dedicate our team to one rush-account per day - covering same-day account setup with a 48-hour long followup process that covers unlimited changes for the duration.
Call Theory
Three-Levels of Account Programming: We have separated contract-based scripting into multiple levels of proficiency, allowing you to take advantage of mass updates for process-based changes at a lower rate than a master-level programmer would charge.
These are available to purchase in hourly blocks (up to 40% discount when buying blocks of 16 hours or more - automatically applied in your cart.)
Call Theory
Subscription Options
Our new subscription options are going live in October. Existing customer plans are not changing. Subscribers still benefit from no-minimum contract scripting at the best available hourly rate.
- Call Theory Learning Portal: Access to our documentation through our AI-powered interfaces, video training series, invitations to our weekly office hours, and community support. Customers will experience a new learning portal, but otherwise will not have any disruption.
- Call Theory Dedicated Training: Everything from our learning portal, along with a private, dedicated weekly training meeting to cover technical topics of your choice.
Online video-training series, AI-chatbot, and subscription updates are launching in October along with the ability to sign up as a new customer again!
Mission Control Updates
The Call Theory Mission Control Dashboard is an on-premise dashboard for call centers bringing in the latest privacy-focused AI features for call transcription, analysis, and agent assistance.
Mission Control is no longer included with our paid learning portal plans and is only available as a stand-alone subscription.
We are expanding our Mission Control dashboard to provide broader set of tools and utilities - usable by most modern call center systems:
- Recording transcription using the open-source, on-device Whisper.cpp tool
- Plug in popular open-source LLVM's and run your own company's AI chat-bot
- Handle inbound email with modern, easy-to-understand parsing and link-handling
- Custom-music streams for hold music and customer advertisements
- Private account-level AI trained to your customer data - available to your agents
- Pre-configured IFTTT and Zapier integrations
We are keeping a couple of our Amtelco-specific integrations around for our existing customer-base:
- mFax and RingCentral faxing with IS Faxing integration
- Board check feature allowing you to QA messages effectively
- Recent Caller API allowing quick-filling caller information on repeat calls
- WCTP/SMS aggregator supporting Twilio, Bandwidth.com, Commio, and more
Mission Control tools are privacy focused and open-source based whenever possible. Your company and customer data is important - advocate for better data privacy laws in the U.S. and support products and services that don't monetize you.
Why are you making changes?
Some of the changes are meant to help me communicate expectations to customers better. Specifically - any level of technical monitoring or management will require a managed services contract - no more blanket inclusion of "anything goes" for technical support.
Other changes, such as supporting more platforms and creating tools usable by the broader call center industry, came as a result of partnership changes that impacted our ability to provide support on customer integrations.
We're also concerned with the state of data privacy in the United States. We want to offer cutting-edge AI options for our customer base without the necessity of using big-tech services and privacy-invasive providers.
Finally, I have grown more in-favor of video training over the last 2-3 years and want to modernize the Call Theory learning experience with useful video training - from someone who can be opinionated without worrying about vendor favor.
Your thoughts?
As always, our plan changes are directly influenced by your feedback. Please let us know if you have thoughts on any of the updates.
In my reality, I think the changes boil down to:
- We're being a little more strict on what services are offered through the Call Theory subscriptions versus needing a managed services contract
- Call Theory subscriptions are getting a video and AI facelift
- We added manpower to provide additional scripting options to customers - including services for non-subscribers.
- Our call center dashboard will be usable by a broader set of users and be focused on privacy-forward options as an alternative to mainstream big-tech.
But of course, if you think I'm missing the mark - please let me know.
Hope to see you on the other side...
Patrick Labbett