Customer Engagement Tool Adds Social Media MonitoringCustomer Engagement Tool Adds Social Media Monitoring

Buzzient and Interactive Intelligence have partnered to create an integrated social media monitoring, routing, and reporting solution that melds Buzzient's social media analysis capabilities with Interactive Intelligence's multi-channel queuing, routing, and reporting applications. The product allows businesses to more effectively and efficiently manage online social media content for enhanced customer experience management.

Despite -- or perhaps because of -- more opportunities to communicate with businesses, consumers apparently are more frustrated than ever when their complaints about bad products or poor service fall on deaf ears. But an investment in customer service can pay off: 92% of enterprise customers and 81% of residential customers said they are more likely to continue doing business with vendors whose support they believe has improved, according to a May 2010 study by Accenture.

"Most organizations today understand the benefits of social media applications -- from improved customer service and retention, to better products and services," said Buzzient CEO, Timothy Jones, in a statement. "Without integration to a company's communications routing and reporting systems, however, there is a far greater chance for wrong, inappropriate, or inefficient responses, which can turn minor customer annoyances into major public crises."

The joint offering includes monitoring across popular social networks such as Facebook, LinkedIn, MySpace, Twitter, and YouTube, as well as blogs, wikis, online forums, and other social media platforms. It recognizes content in more than 60 languages and supports sentiment analysis for English, German, and French, according to the developers.

"Social media now represents an amazingly fast-growing communications channel," said Joe Staples, chief marketing officer at Interactive Intelligence. "For years our solutions have enabled customers to effectively manage phone calls, faxes, e-mails, Web chats, and business objects. Buzzient now adds social media content to our multichannel mix, so regardless of the media type, users are assured that information is routed to the right person for strengthened customer relationships and enhanced brand opinion."

Buzzient monitors social networking sites by continuously scanning the web for keywords that are relevant to an organization. When keywords are located, Interactive Intelligence's Interaction Attendant sorts through Buzzient's e-mail notifications to determine the appropriate user or agent. The software creates a viewable workflow that tracks the history, from origination to response to resolution.

Businesses also can create scheduled or on-demand customizable reports using Interaction Center Platform. Companies can track positive and negative posts, mentions about the company or brand, products, keywords, or brand volume trends, for example.

The product is available now in the United States and Europe. Pricing was not available.