Press ReleasesIan Yellin CHARTER ONE BANK SELECTS INQUIRA TO FUEL 24X7 SELF-SERVICE AND SEARCH FOR ONLINE BANKING AND BILL PAY CUSTOMERS InQuira's Customer Search and Navigation Solution Beats "Keyword Search" for Delivering Precise Answers to Customers' Web Inquiries in "Two Clicks Or Less" SAN BRUNO, CA, May 6, 2003 — InQuira, Inc, the leading provider of customer search and navigation applications, today announced that Charter One Bank, one of the largest bank holding companies in the U.S., has just completed implementation of InQuira 5™, the company's flagship software application for transforming the business Web site into a powerful tool for acquiring new customers, up-selling and cross-selling products and services, reducing the number and cost of service incidents, and driving customer satisfaction. Charter One chose InQuira software over traditional 'keyword search' tools because of its ability to meet the company's key objective — enabling the 400,000+ businesses and consumers that are served through Charter One Bank's free online banking service to easily find and access information and buy services online, as well as get answers to their service questions anytime, day or night, in "two clicks or less." "Online banking customers want the flexibility of contacting us whenever they have questions about their account," said Donna Winfield, vice president, interactive marketing manager for Charter One. "InQuira's natural language technology makes it easier for Charter One customers to get answers to their questions about our market-leading products and services." "The promise of search has always been compelling: to turn business Web sites into increasingly more useful sales, marketing and business communications tools for all a company's key constituents, especially customers and prospects," said Michael Murphy, chief executive officer, InQuira. "InQuira's customer search and navigation application delivers on that promise to enable customers like Charter One to develop a powerful and effective vehicle for attracting and converting prospects into customers, delivering cost-effective customer service, and empowering prospects and customers alike to interact withthe company on their own terms." Another key objective for Charter One Bank was the ability to provide channel consistency for customers that have selected the Web as their preferred channel for interacting with the company. As customers increase their use of Charter One's online banking services, the need to provide a consistently high level of service is increasingly important. The friendly, intuitive interface delivered by InQuira's self-service function provides Charter One Bank customers precise answers to their questions, related content to pre-empt follow-up queries, and transaction options so they can quickly find the information they need — and are empowered to take immediate action. Other key components of the InQuira system are the managed response and built-in dictionary features that enable customers like Charter One Bank to customize information for their customers and prospects based on industry-defined terms and language. Charter One was able to use existing corporate information and customer service data to incorporate pre-defined answers into the site, while also creating a series of managed answers that will enable customers to get more precise answers when they're searching for information online. The InQuira software will also enable Charter One to manage and evolve the solution in-house, so they can continuously improve the search mechanism for customers. InQuira customer search and navigation applications are used by e-businesses and online customer service centers to optimize the Web experience of their prospects and customers. Using a natural language interface, InQuira enables site visitors to quickly and easily navigate rich corporate content, and then interprets and responds to the real intent of their query — whether that is an answer to a specific question, links to additional information, or opportunities to buy products and services. About Charter One About InQuira InQuira, Inc., InQuira 6 are trademarks or registered trademarks of InQuira, Inc. User Interface Engineering, User Interface 8 Conference, and UI8 are trademarks of User Interface Engineering. All other company and product names may be trademarks of the company with which they are associated. |
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