Convergys, an outsource provider of teleservices and billing services formed in August by the spinoff of Matrixx Marketing and CBIS from Cincinnati Bell, has partnered with KnowledgeBase Marketing to enhance database marketing capabilities for its clients. The companies will announce the agreement at this week's DMA Fall Show in San Francisco.
The multi-year agreement makes KnowledgeBase Marketing, Chapel Hill, NC, the sole supplier of database marketing solutions to Convergys clients. Solutions include data warehousing, processing and data mining. KBM, in turn, will use Convergys to fulfill the teleservices needs of integrated marketing campaigns.
KBM will help Convergys hone existing predictive modeling capabilities and make actionable information from data warehouses readily available to call center representatives with direct customer contact. Maintaining better data on customers in a more timely fashion will allow call centers to personalize response and command a greater role in a client's marketing plans, according to Roger Schorr, general manager of the marketing, research and database unit of Convergys.
“The major force in partnering with KnowledgeBase is to move faster,'' Schorr said. “We are in the business of targeting, acquiring, servicing and retaining customers for our clients. And what better way to do it than if we can handle calls in a more intelligent fashion.''
In addition to database technology, Convergys selected KBM for its experience in developing customer loyalty programs. The partnership has already been tested in a customer retention pilot project with the wireless industry that used models to predict when a customer would give up cellular service and outbound calling for proactive retention.
KBM views the partnership as an opportunity to expand the range of database marketing to call centers and build its brand as a database services provider.
“Working with Convergys is a tremendous opportunity to combine another channel of execution for database marketing and explore new ways to reach customers,'' said Mike Keleher, KBM group director of telecommunications.
