Version 5.0 release

May 1, 2006, marked the release of Customer Interaction Solutions, Version 5.0. Version 5.0 brings many new additions, including

  • A two-tiered offering:
    • Contact Center Business Edition
    • Contact Center Enterprise Edition
  • Four new applications:
  • Microsoft support, including support for
    • .NET Framework 2.0
    • Visual Studio 2005
    • All editions of SQL Server 2005
  • Citrix support
  • A new deployment model, including
    • Updater Service, which provides automatic updates of Contact Center Client, Network Monitor, Nodes, and Multimedia
    • Additional deployment options for larger enterprises
  • Applications in Dutch, French (Canadian and European), and Spanish (European and Latin American), including
    • Contact Center Management
    • Contact Center Client, including Network Monitor and Management Console
    • Interactive Contact Center
    • Interactive Visual Queue
    • ACD PhoneSet Manager
    • ACD Softphone
  • Management improvements, including
    • Quick configuration and form imports
    • Summarization
    • Support package wizards

For more information about Customer Interaction Solutions, Version 5.0, please see the online Detailed Release Notes (.pdf).

Want to change your call center to a contact center?

Today's customers expect contact centers to support all multimedia communication channels, including telephone, fax, email, chat, and callback. Customer Interaction Solutions offers a seamless blending of IP and traditional voice technologies to ensure that your contact center can handle all customer interactions efficiently and consistently, regardless of the communication channel.

Email sales@prairiefyre.com to learn more about the numerous benefits of Customer Interaction Solutions or request a live demonstration.










New Version 5.0 training

With the launch of Version 5.0, we have added new training modules and rebundled our training packages to provide customers with new options to suit their individual training needs.

Each Customer Interaction Solutions application has its own set of training modules. Customers can choose training modules based on their level of complexity to create their own custom training packages or select one of our pre-packaged training offerings.

In addition to updating the content of the training material to reflect Version 5.0, we are updating the look and feel of the training manual to coincide with the new look and feel of prairieFyre.com and the Contact Center Management user interface.










Resiliency

Call centers represent the primary interface with our customers, and having agents available when customers need assistance is their primary requirement. Call centers directly impact the bottom line. Whether it is a revenue center (Order Entry) or cost center (Product Support), any downtime in the ACD system will cost money, from lost orders to customer dissatisfaction to ultimately losing the customer. Many call centers operate 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and they cannot afford to be down, but they must have a way of maintaining their system.

What is the solution?

The solution is to configure the 3300 ICP ACD system with NETACD and 3300 ICP device resiliency so that agents can continue answering calls in the unlikely event of a controller outage, ensuring that queued calls are not lost and active calls remain in progress.

What are the advantages?

The Mitel 3300 ICP resiliency solution is highly distributed, spreading trunk density and agents across several nodes. It provides a high level of agent resiliency and ensures that there is no single point of failure. It is also scalable and provides seamless integration with Mitel's existing suite of IP applications (for example, Mitel Your Assistant or Mitel Teleworker Solution).

Version 5.1

Our Version 5.1 offering, coming in July 2006, will include ACD Resiliency reporting and real time monitoring on the secondary controller as well as the primary controller. This means that if you suffer a controller outage, your reports for that day will reflect not only the agents supported by the primary controller but also the agents that were transferred to the secondary controller during the outage.









Business vs Enterprise

To meet the needs of any contact center, the Customer Interaction Solutions portfolio comprises Contact Center Enterprise Edition and Contact Center Business Edition.

Contact Center Enterprise Edition

Contact Center Enterprise Edition (formerly Contact Center Solutions) addresses the highly sophisticated contact center market. Contact Center Enterprise Edition supports all forms of communication including voice, email, web chat, fax and walk-in customer distribution. This scalable, resilient solution combines robust IP communications platforms, Automatic Call Distribution (ACD), and a modular suite of feature-rich, web-based applications for streamlining contact center management and ultimately enabling agents anywhere productivity.

Contact Center Business Edition

Contact Center Business Edition has been developed to focus on individual contact centers with 25 agents or less. Contact Center Business Edition is a cost effective, out-of-the-box solution that allows customers to choose from a number of applications including historical reporting, real-time monitoring, dynamic agent and queue control, screen pops and intelligent messaging. For more information see the Mitel Contact Center Business Edition bulletin.

For more information, please see our comparison table, Contact Center Enterprise Edition vs Contact Center Business Edition










Mitel Ottawa forum

On May 11, 2006, Mike Burnett and Jason Smith attended the VIP session of the Mitel Ottawa forum at the Brookstreet Hotel. Attendees included 48 Mitel resellers.

Mike Burnett delivered a presentation about the new Customer Interaction Solutions products, including an overview of the Contact Center Enterprise Edition and Contact Center Business Edition and the new products available with our Version 5.0 release. Mike also conducted a live demonstration of the new Customer Interaction Solutions products, including Contact Center Client capabilities, Interactive Visual Queue, and the wireless connection of Contact Center Client to a Personal Digital Assistant (PDA).

These presentations were followed by a trade show-style session, during which several attendees visited the prairieFyre demo center and showed a keen interest in the Customer Interaction Solutions portfolio. Attendees also received copies of the new Customer Interaction Solutions sales CD.










prairieFyre's new website

We have completely redesigned prairieFyre's website, giving it a fresh, new look and feel. We have also added a number of features to our public website.

New features on the public website

  • Customer Relationship Management (CRM)

    • With modules for sales, marketing, and customer service, Microsoft Dynamics CRM 3.0 provides all of the tools and capabilities needed to create and easily maintain a clear picture of customers from first contact through purchase and post-sales. As a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner, prairieFyre Software is recognized as a top-tier solution provider for Microsoft Business Solutions, and we can help your organization implement Microsoft Dynamics CRM, including customization, integration, and training. More information is available online.

  • Professional Services

    • The prairieFyre Professional Services team will help you achieve more effective customer interactions by optimizing your contact center, call costing, and CRM applications and processes. Our services include the following:
    • Custom business reporting
    • Contact center health check
    • CRM implementation, integration, and customization
    • Work and call-flow analysis, planning, and optimization
    • Workforce management planning
    • Voice and multimedia self-service solutions
    • Voice and multimedia "screen pop" integrations

    More information is available online.

  • Knowledge Base

    • prairieFyre has developed an online, searchable knowledge base to help you find information on the technologies we incorporate in our products and solve any software issues that arise. More information is available online.

  • Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

    • As part of our commitment to providing superior service and products at all levels, prairieFyre's FAQs will help customers solve common issues they encounter using Customer Interaction Solutions. Topics include everything from the decision to purchase Customer Interaction Solutions to specific actions within those solutions. More information is available online.

  • Sales section

    • prairieFyre's online sales section includes sales support and customer service, both of which ensure that our customers are happy, which ensures that their customers are also happy. More information is available online.

  • Testimonials

    • prairieFyre has received some wonderful feedback, calling our software a "cornerstone and critical success factor," our training staff "of great help," and our staff "very knowledgeable." This online section gives existing and new customers the opportunity to see what people think of our products, training, and support. More information is available online.

  • Our commitment to quality

    • prairieFyre's mission is innovative business solutions and satisfied customers. Our commitment to quality incorporates this mission, our vision, and our values of customer focus, integrity, innovation, excellence, and teamwork. More information is available online.

  • Newsletter sign-up and archives

    • You can now sign up to receive prairieFyre's newsletters by email. You will now also be able to view archived newsletters beginning with the January 2006 issue. More information is available online.









New product videos

Version 5.0 of our Customer Interaction Solutions introduced two new applications: Interactive Visual Queue and Contact Center Softphone. prairieFyre.com now includes online product videos for these two applications.

Interactive Visual Queue

Interactive Visual Queue is a Contact Center Client real-time monitor that enables agents to view calls within queues and then use a drag-and-drop operation to move calls from busy queues to less active queues. Interactive Visual Queue is an add-on application that works in conjunction with Contact Center Management and Interactive Contact Center. The new product video for Interactive Visual Queue is available online.

Contact Center Softphone

Contact Center Softphone adds PC functionality to stand-alone soft phones and traditional telephone sets by enabling agents to use their desktop computers as IP-based phones. Contact Center Softphone integrates with wired and wireless USB headsets. In addition to the telephony features provided by traditional phone sets, Contact Center Softphone enables you to open an agent, employee, extension monitor, or the Queue Now monitor in Contact Center Client and right-click an agent to select telephony functions; for example, when you are on a call, you can consult with an idle employee by right-clicking the employee痴 cell and clicking Transfer/Conference. The new product video for Contact Center Softphone is available online.
 

Become a reference site

Have you had a positive experience with Customer Interaction Solutions? Do you find Call Accounting has greatly improved your business? If so, maybe you'd like to help spread the word about prairieFyre! As a reference site, you can help us educate other companies about prairieFyre products by telling us about your experiences with our software.

For details about becoming a prairieFyre reference site, please contact Lillian Neitzel by email or call 613-599-0045, ext 1110.










Meet the prairieFyre sales team

The prairieFyre sales team is committed to providing superior service and products at all levels.


From left to right: Jason Smith, Malcolm Teasdale, and Mike Burnett

Our sales team also supports customers with
  • Personal product demonstrations
  • Online demonstration of Contact Center Management
  • Product videos
  • Customer testimonials
  • Professional Services
  • Contact center Health Checks
  • CRM integration
  • Documentation
  • Resources for Channel Partners









New employees

Since our last newsletter in January, prairieFyre has hired 7 new employees. In this section, we'd like to introduce you to the newest faces of prairieFyre:

Mohamad Alhabib, Technical Support

My name is Mohamad, and I知 part of the Customer Support Team, whom I enjoy working with every day. I知 looking forward to continue working here at prairieFyre and to face all technical challenges that are ahead of us.

Justin Ghantous, Software Developer

Hi everyone, my name is Justin Ghantous, and I知 a new addition to the Application Team.

I've only been here since March and feel right at home. The people here are friendly and hard working.

Looking forward to developing cutting-edge applications, I feel there's no limit to what prairieFyre can accomplish; I'm very excited to be part of the team.

Bonnie Horton, Manager, Human Resources and Administration

Hi folks, my name is Bonnie Horton, and I値l be replacing Sheri-Lynne while she is away on maternity leave. I知 looking forward to working with all of you over the next year.

Marc Langlois, Technical Support

Hi everyone, my name is Marc Langlois, and I am the newest addition to the CS department. I am very excited to be part of a team of such dedicated and talented people, and I look forward to contributing to their continued success. I really enjoy the positive atmosphere here at prairieFyre and am looking forward to the challenges ahead.

Kaming Li, Software Developer

Being at the vanguard of new technologies and having an extensive knowledge base and industry experience from its team of dedicated professionals, prairieFyre is the ideal environment to contribute and learn. I知 proud to be a developer with prairieFyre.

Jason Smith, Sales Representative

As a professional sales person, I have been fortunate to work for good companies in a variety of different markets. But something was always missing, be it customer support, a great product, or the right market. Selling for these organizations was a challenge, because you had to overcome these deficiencies.

So when I came to work for prairieFyre, I felt like I had found sales person痴 heaven! With a solid product line, excellent technical support, first class management, and a group of talented, helpful, dedicated people, prairieFyre has a wining combination. I talk to customers every day, and they love our products. All this means my job is a lot easier, and that痴 a good thing all around.

Greg Thomas, Software Developer

Hi everybody, I'm Greg Thomas, and I started on the Applications Team at prairieFyre in March. I've really enjoyed my first few months at prairieFyre; the pace, the people and our approach to delivering great products. I'm the kind of guy that likes to learn and be challenged, and prairieFyre provides the perfect environment for me to achieve those goals.









Technical tips

In each newsletter, we provide you with a number of tips to help ensure your experience with Customer Interaction Solutions is a great one. This month's tips include information on the new features of Version 5.0, including tips on

Troubleshooting Contact Center Client

 If you receive an error when you log on to Contact Center Client after you install Client Component Pack, verify the Client Component Pack installation:
  1. Open Control Panel from the Start menu on your desktop.
  2. Double-click Add/Remove programs.
  3. Look for Client Component Pack in the list.
    If Client Component Pack is not listed, install it by double-clicking Client_Setup.exe. This file is located where you saved it when you downloaded Client Component Pack.

Distributing reports

 Reporting Service, which was formerly known as Report Distributor, now runs on the server itself, so you no longer need to install it on each client system. All scheduled reports will be sent out from the server for each user profile. To set up Reporting Service on the server, consult the Version 5.0 Customer Interaction Solutions User Guide.

Updating client computers

 All updates are now deployed automatically to client computers. You no longer need to update each client computer when the server is updated.

Performing management functions

 All management functions, such as backing up and restoring a database, summarizing historical data, and creating a support package, can now be performed on any client computer using Contact Center Client. You no longer need to access the server directly.

Setting alarm notifications

 In Version 5.0, an email notification can now be sent for any performance alarms you specify in Contact Center Client. This enables you to send an email in the event of a triggered alarm (for example, when data collection times out).

About the prairieFyre newsletter

The prairieFyre newsletter is a quarterly bulletin that contains information on the latest news, events, product features, and tips to help you make the most of Customer Interaction Solutions.

If you no longer want to receive the prairieFyre newsletter, unsubscribe or send an email to support@prairiefyre.com.

Such forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risk, uncertainties, and other factors which may cause the actual results, performance, or achievements of the company to be materially different from any future results, performance, or achievements expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements.