What is a Call Center?

A call center (often referred to as a contact center) is a function which provides customer service and support. Companies staff call centers with agents who are trained to assist with a variety of service requests. A call center can typically handle inbound and outbound calls.

A call center will generally utilize some form of telecommunications software such as an automatic call distributor (ACD) to route calls to the appropriate agent. This call center software is fundamental to delivering a positive customer experience. Companies looking to modernize operations and transform their ability to deliver exceptional customer experiences are increasingly turning to cloud call center software solutions as they offer greater agility and flexibility to meet rapidly changing customer expectations.

What’s the difference between a call center and a contact center?

It is not uncommon for the terms to be used interchangeably. However, there is a difference in that a call center focuses on telephone-based interactions with customers; whereas, a contact center supports multiple interaction channels, including voice (telephone), chat, email, messaging and more. Contact centers that can support multiple channels are often called omnichannel. In an omnichannel contact center, customers can interact with an agent using the access method of choice – phone, chat, email, etc. – and agents can seamlessly manage interactions across these multiple channels simultaneously.