Key Takeaways: Forrester Wave for Conversation Intelligence: Sales And Marketing, Q4 2021

The editors at Solutions Review have read the Q4 2021 iteration of The Forrester Wave for Conversation Intelligence: Sales And Marketing report and compiled the takeaways worth knowing.

Technology advisory firm Forrester Research recently released the latest Forrester Wave™: Conversation Intelligence: Sales And Marketing, Q4 2021 report, identifying ten of the most significant providers in the conversation intelligence (CI) market. The report also offers analysis and comparisons of each provider to help sales and marketing teams find the right solution for their needs.

The Q4 2021 iteration of the report highlights how the conversation intelligence market is expanding on account of new solution providers, evolving products, and investor funding. These tools are primarily used to optimize marketing efforts and drive sales. Forrester says that customers looking for a CI solution should prioritize products that collect insights from an interaction that has ended, improve a conversation while it’s happening, extract insights from those engagements, and align to their company’s sales motions.

The Forrester Wave: Conversation Intelligence: Sales And Marketing, Q4 2021 report segments the ten solution providers it lists into four categories: Leaders, Strong Performers, Contenders, and Challengers. The editorial team at Solutions Review has read the report and compiled the most important takeaways and updates you should know about the report and the vendors listed.

Note: The opinions described in this article belong to the researchers and editors of the Forrester Wave: Conversation Intelligence: Sales And Marketing, Q4 2021

Key Takeaways: Forrester Wave for Conversation Intelligence: Sales And Marketing, Q4 2021

Leaders

Invoca’s conversation intelligence solution uses machine learning (ML) and artificial intelligence (AI) capabilities to help marketers track, attribute, route, and provide additional insights into inbound calls. The company features automated quality assurance (QA) scoring, closed-loop conversion reporting via platforms like Google and Adobe, and predictive models that leverage call data to help marketers optimize their efforts. Invoca’s signature feature is the Signal Discovery tool, which uses ML technology to prioritize insights sales and marketing teams may have missed. Forrester says Invoca is best suited for companies with conversation intelligence for marketing and sales at the center of their growth strategy.

ringDNA is the second and final Leader in Forrester’s report. The company provides real-time sales guidance, insights, and tools to help B2B marketers increase revenue. Its strengths as a conversation intelligence provider include real-time coaching services, insights about customer calls informed by previous interactions, and suggested content for users to pull from when on a call with a customer. Other features include support for communication loops between sales and marketing, allowing sales reps to rate inbound calls and send feedback to marketing about lead quality.

Strong Performers

Chorus.ai is the first Strong Performer in Forrester’s report. It receives high marks for its differentiated video experience for B2B companies but lacks the breadth of real-time features offered by other CI vendors. On account of its acquisition by ZoomInfo, Chorus.ai has expanded its video functionalities with new features designed to streamline sales calls, analyze feedback, and link that feedback to specific participants in a call or meeting. Forrester says the platform is a good fit for B2B companies looking for a product that focuses on advanced postcall CI functionalities.

Gong provides sales teams with an easy-to-use platform that automatically captures a breadth of customer interactions, delivers insights on customer data, and improves sales outcomes. While the company isn’t as focused on CI as other providers listed here, its revenue intelligence (RI) functionalities are well-regarded. They can help B2B sales leaders aggregate omnichannel data, assess risks on deals, and assess their sales pipelines.

Marchex rounds out the Strong Performer category with a suite of capabilities optimized for companies looking to connect revenue initiatives to distributed locations. Its functionalities include contextual routing that enables users to connect marketing campaigns to individual sales executions, action alerts that help sales managers send timely follow-up messages to prospects, an easy-to-use interface, and in-depth reporting tools. Forrester notes that Marchex is best suited for B2B2C organizations but doesn’t have the real-time tools some B2C sellers might be looking for.

Contenders

Balto’s solution focuses on powerful real-time capabilities for B2C sales execution and outcomes. The company is equipped with a suite of optimized, real-time CI features that can help users improve their calls with tailored checklists, real-time sentiment detection capabilities, automated triggers, and more. While Balto’s integration options and postcall sales and marketing tools are limited, it’s a strong product for companies focusing on real-time CI features to improve their B2C sales call outcomes.

CallTrackingMetrics provides its users with a platform that, while complex in its UI, is outfitted with an extensive suite of comprehensive and customizable routing, tracking, automation, and data insight functionalities. The company is actively expanding its capabilities with new features and updates, including a more prominent partner ecosystem and more integrations with marketing platforms. CallTrackingMetrics is a good fit for companies prepared to train themselves to use a complex, feature-rich, and customizable solution.

i2x offers one of the easiest real-time keyword spotting tools on the market and focuses its CI efforts on helping customers with real-time feedback and micro-training services. While its overall capabilities are somewhat limited, the growing company will alert sales reps and managers when they use words and phrasing they were (and were not) supposed to use, which helps reinforce sales script compliance. i2x is a newer player in the CI field and should be used by sales teams looking for a straightforward, configurable solution for training their representatives.

Challengers

ASAPP’s solution analyzes everything a seller does and says during a call and uses that data to make suggestions for improvement and, when possible, automate more activities to help improve that seller’s productivity. The company offers some unique features for a CI platform, including tools for predicting customer satisfaction (CSAT) and Net Promoter Score (NPS) results and using that data to improve sales and marketing efforts.

Rounding out the Forrester Wave for Conversation Intelligence report is XSELL Technologies, which provides sales and marketing companies with the tools they need to identify their best sellers, optimize sales scripts, and intervene in real-time with suggestions and prompts as required. While Forrester notes that XSELL’s suite of features has room to grow, it does offer an impressive toolset for guiding reps through long, complex sales conversations.

Read the entire Forrester Wave for Conversation Intelligence: Sales And Marketing, Q4 2021 report here.