Category Archives: News

News

AnswerNet Celebrates Twenty-Five Years

AnswerNet, a full-service provider of inbound, outbound, automated, and BPO contact center services, marks its twenty-fifth anniversary in business. The company rolled out a new corporate logo to further mark the important milestone.

On this commemorative day, AnswerNet is thanking its clients, partners, and employees who the company believes would not be where they are today without their ongoing support. AnswerNet is humbled by their profound loyalty and dedication throughout their business journey.

AnswerNet was founded in 1998, with roots tracing back to 1929. Its AnswerAmerica division began as The Western Union Telephone Answering Service answering calls for individual businesses, many of which they still service today. AnswerNet steadily grew, and by 2000, became the largest telemessaging business in the country.

Fast forward to 2023, AnswerNet services some of the largest companies in the world across multiple communication channels, including SMS, live chat, email, social media, interactive voice response, and AI. The business is a thriving global organization with over 2,000 full-time premised-based and remote employees across six continents and thirty delivery teams.

“AnswerNet’s twenty-five years of growth and success reflect my original vision and the company’s overall dedication to helping our clients and partners grow profitably while providing fulfilling career paths for our employees, said Gary Pudles, AnswerNet’s president and CEO. “I started the business with a mission to position AnswerNet as an industry leader at the forefront of call center technology and innovation—and that is exactly what we’ve become.”

AnswerNet’s commitment to its culture and work environment is reflected in the accolades both Gary Pudles and the company have received over the years, including the prestigious “Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year,” “Philadelphia Titan 100”, “Inc. Power Partner,” as was as landing on thetwenty-first spot of Inc. Magazine’s “Inc. 500.”

As the AnswerNet journey continues, the company remains focused on bringing their clients, the people, and the technology that allows them to run their businesses, their way.

Headquartered in Willow Grove, PA, AnswerNet is a full-service provider of inbound, outbound, automated, and BPO contact center services. The company has over 2,000 full-time premised based and remote employees across six continents and thirty delivery teams. Specialty divisions include Agriculture, Nonprofit, Education, Appointment Setting, Energy, and Third-Party Verification.

News

Active Insights

Amtelco Cloud-Based Platform Solution

Automated Call Scoring, Quality Assurance, Detailed Analytics

The new secure, cloud-based Active Insights platform provides access to call, message, and speech analytics. Call centers can use Active Insights to quickly find detailed information about calls and agent performance, complete with automated call scoring. Active Insights is user-friendly, fast, and easy to deploy, and provides accurate insights about overall call handling.

Automated Call Scoring: Active Insights features customized call-scoring scripts to automatically rate calls, saving hours of valuable time for supervisors and creating impartial scores for agents. Unique scoring scripts can be created for diverse types of calls, such as HVAC, utilities, and building maintenance.

The scripts focus on the crucial details for each type of call, such as requesting a location on service calls. As part of the script, the importance of each item can be indicated by including several points for each item, such as five points for asking for a last name, and ten points for verifying the caller’s phone number. Active Insights displays the scores for each script item, instantly showing how well agents handle calls.

Provide Agent Feedback: Supervisors can use the unbiased feedback from Active Insights to give agents positive feedback in areas where they excel, along with suggestions for improvement. Since the scripts provide details on specific areas, such as whether an agent paged a technician, supervisors can praise agents and suggest strategies for better ways to handle future calls.

Flexible Search Options: With the hundreds to thousands of calls handled each day, finding a specific call could be daunting, but Active Insights makes it easy. A wide range of search criteria helps instantly find a call, even with limited information. Supervisors can search for any calls taken: by a particular agent, on a specified date and time, for an individual client, or that include a specific phrase, such as power outage.

Complete Call Review Capabilities: Supervisors can see and hear exactly what happened on calls with Active Insights. A color-coded waveform graph indicates when the agent was speaking, and when the caller was speaking. Supervisors can view the recording of the agent’s screen as they listen to the call, read the call transcription, and see the individual scores for each item in the script. This helps them confirm that the call quality is up to the expected standards and makes it easy to identify and address any issues.

Conserve Disk Space: Since Active Insights is cloud-based, it doesn’t use on-site server space. Managers can easily track cloud storage utilization and adjust as needed. Managers can also select which clients to provide these services for, making it an easy revenue-generating opportunity.

Active Insights works with the Amtelco Genesis system.

Amtelco and Telescan

Amtelco was founded in 1976 to provide communication solutions to the answering service and healthcare communications industry and is a leading supplier and trusted name in contact center systems, software applications, and secure texting technologies. Amtelco focuses on innovative contact center solutions that meet or exceed customer expectations, backed by top-notch service and support.

News

Wisconsin State Journal Named Amtelco as a Winner of the Madison, WI Top Workplaces 2023 Award

Amtelco Cloud-Based Platform Solution

Amtelco has been awarded a Top Workplaces 2023 honor by the Wisconsin State Journal Top Workplaces. The list is based solely on employee feedback gathered through a third-party survey administered by employee engagement technology partner Energage, LLC. The confidential survey uniquely measures 15 culture drivers that are critical to the success of any organization: including alignment, execution, and connection, just to name a few.

“Earning a Top Workplaces award is a badge of honor for companies, especially because it comes authentically from their employees,” said Eric Rubino, Energage CEO. “That’s something to be proud of. In today’s market, leaders must ensure they’re allowing employees to have a voice and be heard. That’s paramount. Top Workplaces do this, and it pays dividends.”

Amtelco, a family-owned business located in McFarland, Wisconsin, has been a trusted name in call center systems, software applications, and secure texting technologies for over 45 years. Founder Bill Curtin, II, and Amtelco have received more than 30 U.S. Patents for telephony software, data handling methodologies, and telephone switching devices. Millions of calls are processed every day by Amtelco systems around the world.

Mr. Curtin’s ingenuity and generous spirit are reflected throughout the company. Amtelco has earned industry praise with its award-winning products and proudly supports local and international charities.

Both employees and customers are treated like family. Matt Heron, President, and CEO of AnswerFirst, an Amtelco customer, states, “Working with the Amtelco folks has always been a pleasure, and I can’t say enough about you all. I am always impressed at your success in creating a strong culture, lasting relationships, and people-first support.”

Amtelco and Telescan

Learn more at Amtelco.com.

News

Amtelco Goes Green with Solar Energy

Amtelco Cloud-Based Platform Solution

Amtelco completed its long-awaited solar panel project and has begun using solar energy to help reduce its carbon footprint and fossil energy usage. Amtelco is forecasting to offset its energy consumption with solar power by 59 percent of its current use.

In the past, Amtelco’s building manager had researched how their HQ building in McFarland, WI, could cover a sizable portion of its roof with solar. At the time, it wasn’t a feasible option for the company. However, in the fall of 2021, Tom Curtin, CEO of Amtelco, decided to take another look. Tom says, “Knowing that our roof has 100 precent exposure to that beautiful southern sun would always make me think, ‘Someday it would be so great to be able to go green with that roof.’ I am so excited that through all the Amtelco teams’ efforts, we finally made that dream a reality.”

According to the EPA, electric power generates the second largest share of greenhouse gas emissions. Tom continues, “For many years, it was just a wonderful wish to reduce the greenhouse gas contribution we make. We are fortunate that Amtelco has been successful. And so, we invested in our community and the future of our families through renewable energy.”

Amtelco has been eco-minded and dedicated to recycling in the office for years. Recently, Amtelco concluded a six-month period of collecting eligible plastic bags, films, wraps, etc., for the Trex® Company’s Recycle Beyond the Bag program to earn a Trex bench made from the recycled materials.

Amtelco and Telescan

As a leading provider of innovative communication applications for more than 45 years, Amtelco has its roots in the early 1950s when its founder, William J. Curtin, invented and patented solutions for his call center. With Amtelco systems currently operating in all fifty of the United States and in more than twenty foreign countries, Amtelco customers process millions of calls monthly. Amtelco is well known in various industries for continually developing advanced call center solutions designed to streamline communications, all backed by Amtelco’s superior 5-star service and support.

News

2023 NAEO Annual Conference/Advanced Technical Workshop Update


Over 140 people attended the 2023 NAEO Annual Conference held at the Sheraton New Orleans Hotel in New Orleans, March 12–15. From the opening reception to the Amtelco party, and finally the annual general meeting, there was no shortage of education and networking.

Marie McGuire and her conference committee did an exceptional job of putting together a time of fun, fellowship, and learning. Amtelco showed off the latest advances in IS, Genesis, MSM, and miTeamWeb. Amtelco trainers and users demonstrated how-tos with MergeComm and unique IS solutions. A panel of technical experts discussed technical maintenance and another panel of operations experts discussed remote operators.

Just as important as all the educational sessions were the small groups in the morning, afternoon, and evening of colleagues and sponsors networking and sharing ideas for success or things to avoid.

The Saturday and Sunday preceding the convention give a deep dive advanced technical workshop. It was held with a couple dozen technical members learning the huge number of opportunities that SQL and API integration offer through Intelligent Series.

Festivities ended with the annual general meeting where Tifani Leal presided as president and handed over the gavel to Michael Leibowitz, president elect. The crowd also thanked Alana Nikiforuk and Jason Miller for their time on the board of directors as they rotate off and welcomed new board members Don Quarterman and Natalie Crossno.

The 2024 NAEO Annual Conference will be March 24–27, 2024, at the Hyatt Regency-Tamaya Resort in Albuquerque, New Mexico featuring amazing scenery, golf, and an on-site spa.

News

Wisconsin State Journal Names Amtelco a Top Workplaces, 2023

Amtelco Cloud-Based Platform Solution

Amtelco announced that it has been awarded a Top Workplaces 2023 honor by the Wisconsin State Journal Top Workplaces. The list is based solely on employee feedback gathered through a third-party survey administered by employee engagement technology partner Energage, LLC.

The confidential survey uniquely measures fifteen culture drivers that are critical to the success of any organization: including alignment, execution, and connection.

“Earning a Top Workplaces award is a badge of honor for companies, especially because it comes authentically from their employees,” said Eric Rubino, Energage CEO. “That’s something to be proud of. In today’s market, leaders must ensure they’re allowing employees to have a voice and be heard. That’s paramount. Top Workplaces do this, and it pays dividends.”

Amtelco, a family-owned business located in McFarland, Wisconsin, has been a trusted name in call center systems, software applications, and secure texting technologies for over forty-five years.

Founder Bill Curtin, II, and Amtelco have received more than 30 U.S. Patents for telephony software, data handling methodologies, and telephone switching devices. Millions of calls are processed every day by Amtelco systems around the world.

Mr. Curtin’s ingenuity and generous spirit are reflected throughout the company. Amtelco has earned industry praise with its award-winning products and proudly supports local and international charities.

Both employees and customers are treated like family. Matt Heron, president, and CEO of AnswerFirst, an Amtelco customer, states, “Working with the Amtelco folks has always been a pleasure, and I can’t say enough about you all. I am always impressed at your success in creating a strong culture, lasting relationships, and people-first support.”

Amtelco and Telescan

 For more information, visit Amtelco.com.

News

nCall v4 Released

Gives Performance, Security, and Resilience

The result of nearly two years’ work, nSolve released nCall v4, Jan 2023. It is a significant rework of the suite bringing performance, security, and resilience. Major enhancements include:

Operator Console Offline Mode: If the operator’s console detects a connection dropout with the nCall central server, it automatically switches to offline mode. In offline mode operators can continue to handle calls and take messages, even if the connectivity loss is multiple hours. When the console detects connectivity has been re-established the calls and messages taken offline are automatically synchronized to the central server. The console then reverts to its normal mode with no operator input required.

Console-Server Security: Console to server connections are now secured by SSL certificates. This provides extra data privacy protection. In the long term it removes the need for a private network connection (VPN), along with associated IT administration savings.

Built in Web-Browser Updated: nCall v4 now uses the Edge Browser. This allows support for more modern websites and scripts. It also provides security and performance improvements.

Rebuilt with Newer Development Tools: While invisible to the user, nCall applications are now created using up-to-date compiler tools. This ensures better long-term support to the nCall suite.

Softphone Encrypted Audio Added: Improvements to the nCall Buzz softphone include allowing the audio calls to be encrypted and the SIP server to be verified using TLS certificates.

For more information contact sales@nsolve.com or visit nsolve.com.

News

AnswerNet Expands Traditional Answering Service to Include Text Support


AnswerNet launched AnswerMyTexts, the first true business text answering service solution. AnswerMyTexts lets business owners handle texts on their business phone number or have those texts handled by AnswerNet agents. The goal of AnswerMyTexts is to allow businesses to use their answering service for non-voice channels for the first time, and to encourage all businesses to text-enable their business phone lines.

AnswerMyTexts, allows the business owner to manage their own texts and leverage support in three ways, with Scheduled Answering, On-Demand Answering, and Overflow Answering.

As part of this new service, AnswerMyTexts has created an easy-to-use system to text-enable any landline number in minutes. If a business does not have an existing number, AnswerNet will provide a new one.

“The use of texting-to-business numbers has been slowed because there has been no solution that allows the business to handle its own texts, or to have a third party handle them when the business is unavailable”, said Gary Pudles, CEO of AnswerNet. “With the AnswerMyTexts service, AnswerNet is leading the revolution in helping businesses move seamlessly into text communications.”

Today, statistics show that nine out of ten consumers prefer communication with companies via text, which leads to a better customer experience and a higher perceived customer satisfaction. 

Headquartered in Willow Grove, PA, AnswerNet is a full-service provider of inbound, outbound, automated, and BPO call center services. Founded in 1998, the company has over 30 sites with 2,000 full-time employees across the U.S. and Canada.

News

Amtelco Adds Staff to Support Increasing Customer Base

Amtelco Cloud-Based Platform Solution

Amtelco announced that several new positions have been added as part of a growth program to develop new innovations and provide even better service to their growing customer base. These include additions in various departments, including implementation, software development, project management, customer support, and administration.

Recognized as a Top Workplaces employer, Amtelco is committed to designing outstanding innovations, providing the tools to help customers run their businesses more efficiently today, and software to help them build their businesses for the future.

Amtelco was founded in 1976 to provide communication solutions to the answering service and healthcare communications industry and is a leading supplier and trusted name in contact center systems, software applications, and secure texting technologies. Amtelco is focused on innovative contact center solutions that meet or exceed customer expectations and are backed by top-notch service and support. For more information, visit Amtelco.com.

News

New Sales and Marketing Book

Peter Lyle DeHaan Releases Sticky Sales and Marketing

Peter Lyle DeHaan released his latest book, Sticky Sales and Marketing: Produce Positive Long-Term Results and Relationships. It is book two in the Sticky series.

Sticky Sales and Marketing addresses sales management, sales tips, marketing management, and marketing tactics.

Sticky Sales and Marketing: Produce Positive Long-Term Results and Relationships

In Sticky Sales and Marketing, Peter Lyle DeHaan, PhD uses a coherent story-driven process to highlight what works and what doesn’t to break down sales and marketing strategies.

Regardless if you’re selling products, services, or ideas, Sticky Sales and Marketing teaches practical, real-world examples of why some techniques work—and others don’t.

Through insightful stories and insightful examples, you’ll discover how to:

  • Close more sales and foster repeat business.
  • Understand the keys to a high-producing sales team.
  • Figure out what marketing channels to use and how to implement them.
  • Apply proven marketing tactics to your business.
  • Gain confidence in your sales and marketing skills.

Sticky Sales and Marketing provides the building blocks to develop a sales and marketing strategy that will stick, as well as escape promotion failures that could damage your reputation, hurt your business, or harm your career.

Peter Lyle DeHaan, Publisher and Editor of Connections Magazine

Peter Lyle DeHaan‘s Sticky Sales and Marketing is book two in the beloved Sticky series. Upcoming titles include Sticky Leadership and Management (2023) and Sticky Living (2024).

Sticky Sales and Marketing is now available in e-book, paperback, and hardcover.

Peter Lyle DeHaan, PhD, is the publisher and editor-in-chief of Connections Magazine. He’s a passionate wordsmith whose goal is to change the world one word at a time.  Read more of his articles at PeterDeHaanPublishing.com.