The Behind the Scenes Role of Development

For every user and visitor that has used live chat functionality provided by Click4Assistance, there has been a busy development team hard at work to make it all possible.

Building the Foundation

The new enhanced chat box for website solution took almost 2 years in the making. The development team were at the heart of this project, from drafting the initial plans through to the release. 

The art to building the system that has many components working individually but also in conjunction with each other is to see the bigger picture first; what does it need to achieve? What will need to be put in place for that to work?

Questions like these gave way for the top navigation to be formed:

• My Account – an area to configure users, permissions, websites and choose what functionality your organisation requires.
• Settings – a place to configure the functionality that will aid operators to handle incoming enquiries and manage what teams users are a part of.
• Tools – The section to select what communication channels are used on your website and their appearance.
• Reports – The area for analysts to review data on screen, and save or schedule their reports.
• Dashboard – The central console for handling incoming enquiries and managing the solution’s operations.

This then allowed each module to be taken in turn and developed to ensure they provide the required functionality.

During this process the development team were in regular contact with other departments. This included the operations team who needed to plan for improving our infrastructure, and with our senior account managers who initially shared client suggestions to be considered. At later stages they then needed to confirm what information they could disclose to their customers.

Nearer to release the development team needed to keep in contact with the beta testers, ensuring that any bugs entered into TFS (Team Foundation Server) was resolved and fully tested. Therefore organisation and communication became key skills for this massive project.

Additional Enhancements

Now that the new version of the solution had been released at the beginning of 2018, the foundation can be developed upon to enhance the functionality further.

The next enhancements that were developed for ‘Experiences’ included: 

• Auto Storing that automatically archives a chat when it matches the defining rule
• Social Media integration that allows Facebook messages to be received and answered within the solution
• Artificial Intelligence which gives organisations the ability to reduce resources by having a chat bot answer FAQs and /or to ask prequalifying question etc.

Bespoke Developments

One of the key priorities is that the solution’s usability remains simple. Therefore the Click4Assistance development team can be commissioned to build bespoke functionality that will benefit any organisation in a non-complex way.

This includes bespoke reports that collate data from multiple sources within the solution and provides it in one easy to read format. Reducing the time analysts spend gathering data which allows them to identify any trends much sooner; especially useful when completing this type of task regularly.

Other bespoke development has included the Meeting Room functionality which was available within ‘The Toolbox’ (previous version of the software). Brazilian Naval Commission in Europe approached Click4Assistance to build a private chat environment that allowing multiple visitors to participate in live reverse bid auctions. The communication channel was then adapted for public release, and is now widely used especially with universities.

The latest bespoke development project to be commissioned is a branded wallboard for a large insurance firm. The functionality allows real time statistics to be displayed on a central screen (most commonly a wall mounted TV). This enables supervisors to review their live performance of agents and act upon it if necessary, helping to improve their operations immediately rather than when analysing data that is hours, days or even weeks old. 

Click4Assistance has been providing live chat box for website software for over 10 years with a strong development team providing the foundation and enhancements. For more information on our company and /or solution contact our team on 01268 524628.