Abstract:
A method and apparatus route telecommunication calls in a telecommunication switching system by receiving visual information for a caller of one of the telecommunication calls; analyzing the received visual information for characteristics of the telecommunication calls; and routing the one of the telecommunication calls based on the analyzed visual information.

Description:
TECHNICAL FIELD 
     This invention relates to the routing of telecommunication calls. 
     BACKGROUND 
     In the prior art, customer relation management systems (also referred to as call centers or automatic call distribution systems) receive incoming calls and route these calls to agents attached to the customer resource management system so that the agents can assist customers. Within the prior art, it is known for CRM systems to be quite large and have hundreds of agents that are connected to the CRM system. A CRM system may service a plurality of corporations with sets of agents being assigned to each corporation. This allows the agents to have experience with the needs of the customers of a particular corporation. In addition, it is known to have certain agents who are considered experts on a particular subject, and the less skilled agents can transfer customers to the more skilled agents for additional information. 
     SUMMARY 
     A method and apparatus route telecommunication calls in a telecommunication switching system by receiving visual information for a caller of one of the telecommunication calls; analyzing the received visual information for characteristics of the caller; and routing the one of the telecommunication calls based on the analyzed visual information. 
    
    
     
       BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWING 
         FIG. 1  illustrates an embodiment of a system; 
         FIG. 2  illustrates an embodiment of system operations; 
         FIG. 3  illustrates an embodiment of demographics operation; and 
         FIG. 4  illustrates an embodiment of customer resource management system. 
     
    
    
     DETAILED DESCRIPTION 
     One embodiment is responsive to an incoming video call to a customer relations management (CRM) system to extract the visual characteristics of a caller and to utilize the extracted characteristics to route the call to the proper agent. The characteristics of the caller may be demographic or personal preference information of the caller. The demographic information may include, but is not limited to, presence of facial hair, age, sex, body size, visual aids such as eye glasses, national origin, etc. The personal preference may include, but is not limited to, jewelry, clothing, hair style, hair coloring, body piercings, etc. For example, in a CRM system providing service for an Internet clothing site, the dress style and age could be utilized to route trendy teenagers to younger agents, and older, more sophisticated dressers could be routed to more professional agents. Similarly, body size, such as slim, athletic, fat, etc. could be utilized by a CRM system servicing a clothing Internet site to route a caller to the proper agent or to inform the agent ahead of time to the body size of the caller. Indeed, in such a CRM system, certain agents would always handle a certain type of body size. 
       FIG. 1  illustrates an embodiment of a system for the extraction and utilization of visual characteristics concerning a caller to CRM system  104 . Video information is obtained from the caller utilizing a video camera such as camera  112  at station  102 . The video information is then transmitted along with the call via switching system  101  to CRM system  104 . The demographic and/or personal preference information can be extracted by either CRM system  104  or server  108 . After the demographic and/or personal preference information is extracted, CRM system  104  utilizes this information to route the call to one of the agent positions  106 - 107 . The agent at the selected agent position then assists the caller who is utilizing station  102 . 
       FIG. 2  illustrates an embodiment of a process for extracting and utilizing visual demographic and/or personal preference information for routing incoming calls to a CRM system. After being started in block  201 , decision block  202  determines if the incoming call has visual information. If the answer is no, control is transferred to block  207 , and the call is routed using another method before returning control back to decision block  202 . 
     If the answer is yes in decision block  202 , block  203  receives the caller visual information, and block  204  attempts to extract the demographics and/or personal preference from the visual image for the caller. Note, that the visual image may be video or a single visual image. 
     After execution of block  204 , decision block  206  determines if usable demographics and/or personal preference information was extracted. If the answer is no, control is transferred to block  207 . If the answer is yes, control is transferred to block  208  which routes the call utilizing the extracted demographic and/or personal preference information before returning control back to decision block  202 . 
       FIG. 3  illustrates in great detail operation of block  204  of  FIG. 2 . Block  301  determines the presence of eye glasses so that this information can be used to remove the eye glasses in block  304  and to be returned as part of the demographics information. 
     After execution of block  302 , decision block  303  determines if eye glasses are present in the image. If the answer is yes, block  304  removes the eye glasses from the image before transfer control to block  306 . If the answer is no in decision block  303 , control is transferred to block  306 . The detection and removal of eye glasses from an image is well known. See for example: “Automatic Eyeglasses Removal from Face Images”, AccV2002: The 5 th  Asian Conference on Computer Vision, 23-25 Jan. 2002, Melbourne, Australia. 
     Block  306  extracts face and facial features from the image, and block  307  uses this information to search a database of faces that are arranged by demographic categories using rule-based automaton techniques. Block  307  determines the category that best fits the image if one exists before transfer control to decision block  308 . Such techniques are well known in the see for example: U.S. Patent Application Publication 20050147292, U.S. Pat. No. 6,816,611, U.S. Pat. No. 6,804,684, U.S. Pat. No. 6,804,391, and U.S. Pat. No. 6,826,300. 
     Decision block  308  determines if a category match has been found. If the answer is yes, block  309  returns the demographics of the matched category to decision bock  206  of  FIG. 2 . If the answer is no, block  309  returns a no useable demographics indication to decision bock  206   
       FIG. 4  illustrates, in block diagram form, one embodiment of CRM  104 . Processor  402  provides the overall control for the functions of CRM  104  by executing programs and storing and retrieving data from memory  401 . Processor  402  connects to data network via interface  403 . Processor  402  interfaces to user interface  418  via interface  407 . Processor  402  interfaces to switching network  101  via interface  403 . Processor  402  interfaces to agent positions  106 - 107  via interface  419 . Processor  402  interfaces to server  108  via interface  421 . Processor  402  performs the operations of CRM  104  by executing the routines illustrated in memory  401 . 
     Operating system  412  provides the overall control and the necessary protocol operations. The communication and control of the various interfaces illustrated in  FIG. 4  is provided by interfaces routine  417 . CRM processing  408  provides overall control of CRM  104 . Imaging processing  416  provides image processing operations with images being stored in database  411 . 
     When the operations of the stations, servers, or systems are implemented in software, it should be noted that the software can be stored on any computer-readable medium for use by or in connection with any computer related system or method. In the context of this document, a computer-readable medium is an electronic, magnetic, optical, or other physical device or means that can contain or store a computer program for use by or in connection with a computer related system or method. The software can be embodied in any computer-readable medium for use by or in connection with an instruction execution system, apparatus, or device such as a computer-based system, processor-containing system, or other system that can fetch the instructions from the instruction execution system, apparatus, or device and execute the instructions. In the context of this document, a “computer-readable medium” can be any means that can store, communicate, propagate, or transport the program for use by or in connection with the instruction execution system, apparatus, or device. For example, the computer-readable medium can be, but is not limited to, an electronic, magnetic, optical, electromagnetic, infrared, or semiconductor system, apparatus, device, or propagation medium. More specific examples (a non-exhaustive list) of the computer-readable medium would include the following: an electrical connection (electronic) having one or more wires, a portable computer diskette (magnetic), a random access memory (RAM) (electronic), a read-only memory (ROM) (electronic), an erasable programmable read-only memory (EPROM, EEPROM, or Flash memory) (electronic), an optical fiber (optical), and a portable compact disc read-only memory (CDROM) (optical). Note that the computer-readable medium could even be paper or another suitable medium upon which the program is printed, as the program can be electronically captured via optical scanning of the paper or other medium and then compiled, interpreted or otherwise processed in a suitable manner, if necessary, and stored in a computer memory. 
     In an alternative embodiment, where the stations, servers, or systems is implemented in hardware, the stations, servers, or systems can be implemented with any or a combination of the following technologies, which are each well known in the art: a discrete logic circuit(s) having logic gates for implementing logic functions upon data signals, an application specific integrated circuit (ASIC) having appropriate combinational logic gates, a programmable gate array(s) (PGA), a field programmable gate array (FPGA), etc. 
     Of course, various changes and modifications to the illustrated embodiments described above would be apparent to those skilled in the art. Such changes and modifications can be made without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention and without diminishing its intended advantages. It is therefore intended that such changes and modifications be covered by the following claims except in so far as limited by the prior art.