For many years, companies wanting to record phone conversations (let alone transcribe them) had to invest in complex phone system set-ups and hardware. And even then, accessing recordings required companies to submit requests to their call recording vendors each time they wanted to review a call. 

Thankfully, with the advance of softphone systems utilising the benefits of cloud technologies, recording and transcribing phone conversations has now become a staple and accessible feature. 

But apart from meeting compliance requirements in some industries, having recordings and transcriptions in of themselves, aren’t that useful. 

With the advance of AI technologies such as Automatic Speech Recognition (ASR) and Natural Language Processing (NLP), it is now possible to transform the ‘noise’ of phone calls into useful, actionable data. 

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The benefits of recording and transcribing phone conversations

Training with real-world context

Recordings and transcriptions serve as great resources for training material. For underperforming agents, listening through past calls or reading transcripts with a manager to identify areas for improvement can quickly iron out issues. 

Or with a lighter touch, the best softphones will allow managers to ‘mark-up’ recordings and transcripts with annotations on where and how the agent could improve. The agent in their own time, can then review any previous calls that their manager has annotated.

Conversely, managers could share recordings and transcriptions of successful calls from high performing agents, in a coordinated effort to up-skill the entire team. 

Real-time monitoring across 100% of calls

As we alluded to above, the real value of recording and transcription is that they transform phone conversations into collections of meaningful data.

With transcription active on live calls, NLP technology can be used to analyse what’s been said in real-time. Softphone systems with transcription embedded can then pass alerts to managers or compliance teams if agents are saying the wrong things or if there is cause for concern with regard to fraud or customer vulnerability. 

With the accuracy of call transcription and NLP improving all the time, monitoring of agents in the office or remotely, is fast becoming an automated process - protecting companies and their customers alike. 

Real-time call coaching

Not only can live transcription and NLP be deployed to keep managers alerted, it arguably serves greater value providing real-time assistance to agents during a call. 

With live topic detection, NLP listens to the content and context of a phone conversation, detecting and bookmarking important sections. In this way, sales opportunities, competitor mentions, complaints etc are captured automatically. Once detected, phone systems with CRM integration can then initiate workflows to create and update records automatically, removing post-call admin work for the agent. 

Additionally, transcription and NLP allows for the monitoring of call script adherence, providing suggestions to agents in real-time about how to navigate questions and objections dynamically. Similarly, tips and live analytics can be provided to agents during a phone conversation to improve call success. 

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Surface new insights‍

The rich data gathered from transcription and speech analytics, can surface some incredibly detailed, untapped insights about agent and team performance. 

Mapping call sentiment, emotion and script adherence to opportunities closed and tickets served, provides a whole new way to measure performance. No longer do sales and marketing leaders need to make guesses based on anecdotal agent data. Instead, in real-time they can measure and adjust tele-sales or marketing campaigns. 

Surfacing insights from call data can also serve as a unique way to gamify the calling experience for agents. 

How to transcribe phone conversations with VoiceIQ

Call recording is available as standard on calls within VoiceIQ and transcription is available on the A.I plan. 

1. From the call centre screen, agents are able to start and stop recording (and transcription) by toggling the record button in their control bar. 

2. Agents can view the live call transcription by navigating to the to “Transcript” tab 

3.Agents can view live call analytics by clicking the “Conversation Analytics” from the side menu

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Is it legal to record and transcribe phone calls?

All countries governed by GDPR (EU and UK) state that companies can only record and transcribe phone conversations if one of six conditions are met: 

1. You have the contact’s explicit consent
2. You have a contractual obligation to record calls
3. You have a legal obligation to record calls
4. It is in the public’s interest 
5. It protects the vital interests of one party 
6. You have a legitimate interest to record calls
   

Qualifying for some of these conditions can be complex to determine, so the vast majority of companies keep things simple by opting for explicit consent.

Related blog for full details on when you can record phone calls

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Obtaining consent can be done verbally by an agent or automatically through pre-recorded messages that play to the caller before being connected. 

Get in touch with our team to learn more

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