System and method for interactivity testing of text-based customer communications

A system and method for interactivity testing of text-based customer communications which allows for interactivity testing of different forms of text-based communications with a contact center including two-factor authentication testing, multi-modal communication testing, and load testing.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

ApplicationNo.Date FiledTitleCurrentHerewithCASE-BASED AUTOMATED EMAILapplicationTESTINGis a continuation-in-part of:16/389,929Apr. 20, 2019CASE-BASED AUTOMATED EMAILTESTINGwhich is a continuation of:15/374,076Dec. 9, 2016CASE-BASED AUTOMATED EMAILTESTINGthe entire specification of each of which is incorporated herein by reference.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

Field of the Art

The disclosure relates to the field of contact center operations, and more particularly to the field of testing for methods for text communication systems.

Discussion of the State of the Art

In the field of contact center operations, more centers are beginning to accommodate additional, text-based communications commonly found in the art such as email, SMS interactions including two-factor authentication, and tertiary text messaging such as automated online messaging, to better serve customers who may not have access to or desire to utilize a voice connection.

There exist in the art testing methods for individual text-based communications, but no system for integrated testing of all currently used customer-to-business text communications exists. Furthermore, while there are some testing systems implemented in the art currently, such systems require the interaction of a testing agent to operate, which introduces new problems such as additional expense for the time and labor involved in testing, human error factor which may influence reliability of testing protocols, and various inconsistencies associated with human operation. Lastly, no automated testing method exists which may test interactivity and integration of these different text communication methods, such as responding to an SMS message with an email or vice versa, to ensure that a business' automated communications with a potential customer meet or exceed requirements and expectations, including load testing to ensure that large quantities of customer queries may be adequately responded to.

What is needed is a flexible and scalable automated testing solution for text-based communications, that utilizes test cases to configure and execute response and load testing of message sending and receipt, and that produces meaningful test reports for review.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

Accordingly, the inventor has conceived and reduced to practice, in a preferred embodiment of the invention, a system and method for interactivity testing of text-based customer communications.

The invention comprises a system that enables automated interactivity testing of text-based customer communications that bundles multiple configuration parameters and settings into a “test case,” enabling convenient storage and retrieval of testing configuration without having to re-enter information and without the risk of losing any details. The invention also provides a method for case-based email testing that enables time- and interval-based testing using stored test cases, and that compares received email message information against test case configuration to examine the results of operation and determine whether received messages match expected results.

According to a preferred embodiment, a system for interactivity testing of text-based contact center communications is disclosed, comprising: a test database configured to store testing information comprising: one or more text-based communication queries each comprising text simulating a query from a customer to a contact center; and one or more test configurations comprising instructions as to which forms of text-based communication are supported at a contact center; and an interactivity testing engine comprising a plurality of programming instructions stored in the memory of, and operating on a processor of, a computing device, wherein the programming instructions, when operating on the processor, cause the computing device to: retrieve a test configuration and a query from the test database for the contact center; send the query from the test configuration to the contact center in each form of text-based communication supported by the contact center; receive a response from the contact center for each query sent in the same form of text-based communication as the query; compare each query and its response using one or more parameters to determine whether the response was appropriate to the query; and report an outcome of each comparison.

According to another preferred embodiment, a system for interactivity testing of multi-modal text-based contact center communications is disclosed, comprising: a test database configured to store testing information comprising: one or more text-based communication queries each comprising text simulating a query from a customer to a contact center; and one or more test configurations comprising instructions as to which forms of text-based communication are supported at a contact center; and an interactivity testing engine comprising a plurality of programming instructions stored in the memory of, and operating on a processor of, a computing device, wherein the programming instructions, when operating on the processor, cause the computing device to: retrieve a test configuration and a query from the test database for the contact center; send the query from the test configuration to the contact center in each form of text-based communication supported by the contact center; receive a response from the contact center for each query sent in a different form of text-based communication as the query; compare each query and its response using one or more parameters to determine whether the response was appropriate to the query; and report an outcome of each comparison.

According to another preferred embodiment, a system for interactivity testing of two-factor authentication in text-based contact center communications, comprising: a test database configured to store testing information comprising: one or more text-based communication queries each comprising text simulating a query from a customer to a contact center; and one or more test configurations comprising instructions as to which forms of text-based communication are supported at a contact center; and an interactivity testing engine comprising a plurality of programming instructions stored in the memory of, and operating on a processor of, a computing device, wherein the programming instructions, when operating on the processor, cause the computing device to: retrieve a test configuration and a query from the test database for the contact center; send the query from the test configuration to the contact center in each form of text-based communication supported by the contact center; receive a response from the contact center for each query in a different form of text-based communication from the form of text-based communication of the query, the response comprising an authentication code; extract the authentication code from the response; enter the authentication code in a text-based field at an authentication code prompt on a first web page; determine whether the login was successful by scanning the contents of a second web page that appears after entering the authentication code on the first web page; and report an outcome of the determination of whether the login was successful.

According to an aspect of an embodiment, the test database and interactivity testing engine are on separate computing devices, communicating over a network.

According to an aspect of an embodiment, the test database and interactivity testing engine are co-located on the same computing device.

According to an aspect of an embodiment, the system further comprises a load testing engine comprising a further plurality of programming instructions stored in the memory of, and operating on a processor of, the computing device, wherein the programming instructions, when operating on the processor, cause the computing device to: send large quantities of a query from the test configuration to the contact center in each form of text-based communication supported by the contact center; receive responses from the contact center for each query sent in the same form of text-based communication as the query; analyze and determine the performance and speed with which responses are sent from the contact center under large or increasing loads; and provide a result of the analysis.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

The inventor has conceived, and reduced to practice, in a preferred embodiment of the invention, a system and method for interactivity testing of text-based customer communications.

In the field of contact center operations, more centers are beginning to accommodate additional, text-based communications forms such as email, SMS interactions including two-factor authentication, and tertiary text messaging such as automated online messaging, to better serve customers who may not have access to or desire to utilize a voice connection. A common example of this would be a customer browsing through an online catalog on a company's website. In such a scenario, a customer might have a question about a product, and may send an email to a customer service account, allowing customers to communicate directly with agents while still browsing the online catalog and from the convenience of their computer. As well, the customer might be able to interact with an automated help chatbot that can parse and respond to basic queries, and some systems allow a user to send SMS messages to certain numbers for uses including product information links, callback scheduling, and two-factor authentication. This allows for convenient, speedy, and flexible communications, such as a customer who may be viewing an online catalog from an Internet café or similar public location, where they may not have access to a telephone or may not desire for their conversations to be overheard by others.

One or more different inventions may be described in the present application. Further, for one or more of the inventions described herein, numerous alternative embodiments may be described; it should be appreciated that these are presented for illustrative purposes only and are not limiting of the inventions contained herein or the claims presented herein in any way. One or more of the inventions may be widely applicable to numerous embodiments, as may be readily apparent from the disclosure. In general, embodiments are described in sufficient detail to enable those skilled in the art to practice one or more of the inventions, and it should be appreciated that other embodiments may be utilized and that structural, logical, software, electrical and other changes may be made without departing from the scope of the particular inventions. Accordingly, one skilled in the art will recognize that one or more of the inventions may be practiced with various modifications and alterations. Particular features of one or more of the inventions described herein may be described with reference to one or more particular embodiments or figures that form a part of the present disclosure, and in which are shown, by way of illustration, specific embodiments of one or more of the inventions. It should be appreciated, however, that such features are not limited to usage in the one or more particular embodiments or figures with reference to which they are described. The present disclosure is neither a literal description of all embodiments of one or more of the inventions nor a listing of features of one or more of the inventions that must be present in all embodiments.

Conceptual Architecture

FIG. 1is a block diagram illustrating an exemplary system architecture100for case-based automated email testing, according to a preferred embodiment of the invention. According to the embodiment, a case-based email testing system110may comprise a testing database111that stores and provides case- and test-related information such as test case configuration and execution results, a case management server112that creates, stores, retrieves, and executes test cases, and that operates an administration interface113that comprises an interactive interface for configuring and directing email test cases via a network101, for example from an administrator's computing device103such as a personal computer or mobile device. In this manner, an administrator may configure and execute test cases remotely and may monitor the operation or results of test case execution. Test case configuration may comprise a variety of email information such as (for example) including text information for message fields (such as the “subject” and “body” fields commonly used in email messages), “to” and “from” email addresses that may be used to verify the operation of specific email addresses or the routing of messages to and from those addresses, specific email server information such as a server to be used for sending a message or a server to be targeted for message receipt, network information such as specific connections, addresses, or bandwidth to be used during test case execution, timing information such as a specific minimum or maximum time to respond to a request or for overall execution of a test case or a “pulse” interval to determine test execution frequency and timing, or other message, system, or case-specific information. In this manner, the configuration and execution of a test case may be managed as precisely as needed to adequately test the desired features or components, and may be stored and retrieved as a complete test case for future use without having to repeat configuration and without the risk of any details being lost.

A reporting server114may be used to monitor test case execution and produce reports from execution results, for example including email message fields (such as sender address, recipient addresses, header, body, and other email data fields), test case execution time (for example, tracking min/max time thresholds during test execution), what email systems were tested, or other data that may be useful for future review. Test case reports may be stored in testing database111and presented for review via an administration interface113. Email server115may be used to send and receive email messages as directed by case management server112, and may optionally be the same email server used in contact center operations (that is, the email server responsible for sending and receiving messages between agents and customers) or may be a separate email server used for testing purposes, such as to test the effects of a particular server or message configuration prior to implementing the configuration on production systems. Plurality of network servers116may operate an interactive interface accessible using a web browser application via network101, for example to present test case reports or an administration interface113.

According to some arrangements, more than one email server may be utilized, such as (for example) to send an email message from email server115to an external email server102operated by a remote host such as an email service provider or a private email server (for example, operated by an administrator or other user), as well as to enable the testing of multiple email servers for redundancy, as is often utilized in corporate environments to prevent downtime should any single email server experience difficulties.

FIG. 8is a diagram of an exemplary text-based communication interactivity testing system for interactivity testing of email, SMS, chats, and messaging services. An integration testing system810exists which contains several components, namely an interactivity testing engine811, a testing database812, a plurality of network servers813, an administrative interface814, and a reporting server815. The integration testing system810communicates across a plurality of networks820with a contact center830, which has a variety of servers for various modes of communication, for example, an email server831, an SMS server832, a chat server833, and a messaging server834. The particular network of the plurality of networks820through which a given communication will occur will depend on the type of communication being sent (e.g., typically the Internet for email communications, a cellular telephone network for SMS communications, etc.). A synthetic agent workstation manager835is installed at the contact center830to receive and respond to communications sent by the integration testing system810to the contact center830through the various modes of communication. Communications are either tagged by the integration testing system810for routing to the synthetic agent workstation manager835, or rules are set up at each of the various servers of the contact center830to route messages received from the integration testing system810to the synthetic agent workstation manager835. The synthetic agent workstation manager835operates a plurality of virtual agent workstations which are configured to receive communications of a given type and provide context-appropriate responses, which are sent back to the integration testing system810for analysis. Further, in some embodiments, the synthetic agent workstation manager835can initiate communications from the contact center830without first receiving communications from the integration testing system810. An integration testing system810specifically communicates over a network820with a contact center830by sending textual communications, such as emails, SMS text messages, or other forms of text messages such as online chats or third-party messaging system formats, and listening for a response message from the contact center830. A plurality of network servers813act as interfaces between the network of the plurality of networks820and the rest of the integration testing system810, relaying these messages to and from an interactivity testing engine811, which is responsible for the final creation of the outgoing messages, processing of incoming responses, and communicating with other components in an integration testing system810. A testing database812exists in the integration testing system810which may be queried by an interactivity testing engine811to provide templates of messages in various forms which may be used by an interactivity testing engine811for forming an outgoing message, or for comparison with a received response to determine if the response matches the expected template. A reporting server815communicates with an administrative interface814and an interactivity testing engine811to receive, store, format, and potentially analyze reports on performance by an interactivity testing engine811, such as errors in the function of the testing engine, or when a received response from a contact center830is either delayed, missing, or not formatted appropriately compared to what the template indicates. An administrative interface814communicates with both the reporting server815and the interactivity testing engine811, querying reports from a reporting server815to allow a user to view them, while also allowing a user of the interface814to interact with the interactivity testing engine811, allowing them to view the progress of current ongoing tests, manually alter tests, set new tests to begin if necessary, pause ongoing tests, and any other administrative task that may be required for the operation of the testing engine811.

FIG. 9is a diagram of a interactivity testing engine as used in a text-based communication interactivity testing system. An interactivity testing engine interactivity testing engine811at least comprises internal components including an authentication tester910, text processor920, and a load tester930. A text processor is a component capable of automatically interpreting communications test configurations from a database, receiving any text-based communications or files, and applying data processing techniques such as regular expressions, heuristic text analysis, and other software techniques for analyzing textual data. An authentication tester910may be specially designed to analyze any received messages for authentication codes sent in two-factor authentication techniques, and may process such authentication by communicating with a plurality of network servers to access a web page where the authentication code must be entered, or forming a response to a communication in a form noted by a testing database, and sending said communication to a contact center's textual communication provider. The purpose of such authentication testing is to ensure that when a contact center provides a user with two-factor authentication options, these automated authentication options function as-expected and in a secure fashion, as reported by an authentication tester910. A load tester930is responsible for generating load-testing messages, whether email, SMS, or some other messaging format, determining the amount and frequency of these messages to be sent to a contact center, and analyzing any results including response time, response quality, errors in responses, any associated drops in response time during peak load times, and associated load balancing tasks.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF EXEMPLARY EMBODIMENTS

FIG. 2is a flow diagram illustrating an exemplary method200for creating and saving an email test case, according to a preferred embodiment of the invention. In an initial step201, a user may access an administration interface113via their device (for example, using a web browser on a personal computer or mobile device), and may authenticate in a next step202so they can interact as an administrator. In a next step203, the authenticated user may configure a new test case using plain text, facilitating an easy-to-use means for designing email test cases without the need for specialized training or advanced programming knowledge. For example, administration interface113may present a number of prompts or fields to configure specific features of an email test case, such as to fill out “to” and “from” fields for messages sent during execution, or to configure monitoring or reporting settings for a reporting server114to track execution of the test case. In a next case204, the user may save the new test case and it is stored in testing database111for future reference, and in a next step205the saved test case may be retrieved and executed according to the configuration (for example, if the test case is configured to execute at a specific time or in response to a trigger such as a change in email server115configuration, as well as time-based execution parameters such as using response time thresholds to determine the success or failure of a test step). In some arrangements, a user may be able to manually execute a test case, such as for one-time testing of a specific feature or configuration.

FIG. 3is a flow diagram illustrating an exemplary method300for case-based email testing, according to a preferred embodiment of the invention. In an initial step301, a test case management server112may retrieve a stored test case configuration for execution from a testing database111, for example configured synthetic email information for generating emails during testing, or stored testing parameters. In next step302, test case management server112may direct a plurality of email servers115based on the loaded case configuration, for example to send email messages with specific information or configuration, such as using specific email addresses or servers for sending or to check specific email servers or addresses for receipt. In a next step303, an email server115may send a plurality of email messages according to the loaded case configuration, and operation may be monitored and logged by a reporting server114in a reporting step304. In this manner, a number of synthetic emails may be produced and sent via standard communication channels during testing, wherein synthetic emails are sent for normal handling wherein they may be received at the destination, where they may then be classified and routed according to the destination's handling configuration. Synthetic emails may be routed separately from actual customer interaction emails, for example to be sent to synthetic agent workstations that may then perform automated handling and response according to configured test execution information. In a next step305, an email server115may receive a plurality of email messages (optionally messages sent as part of a test case, or messages received that were not generated by a test case, for example to test receipt-only functionality using incoming email messages), and received messages may be provided306to test case management server112and compared against anticipated results according to the loaded test case configuration. For example, if email messages are received that were sent according to a test case configuration, specific message information may be anticipated such as “to” and “from” fields or text content within various information fields of the message, and when a message is received it may be compared against this predicted result to examine the execution of the test case and the operation of systems used during execution. Additionally, this comparison may be used to determine if a particular email message is part of a test case, and if so which specific test case as multiple test cases may be executed or pending during a given span of time. Reporting server114may continue to monitor and log operation304and produce a report for a test case or a system that was tested, that may then be stored for future reference. For example, multiple test cases with varying configurations may be executed to thoroughly test a particular email server or network connection, and the execution of these test cases may be logged as a testing report on the operation of the system(s) in question, optionally in addition to a plurality of testing reports for the specific test cases that were executed. In this manner, email testing comprises an end-to-end testing operation that comprises each step of an email interaction from the creation of an initial email, through each step of email routing and handling, and a response from the destination.

FIG. 10is a method diagram for combined text communications testing including email, SMS, and messaging testing of a contact center's automated responses. Stored case configurations must first be retrieved if they are available1010, from a testing database812, by a text processor920component of a interactivity testing engine811. Such testing configurations represent forms of text-based communications that are known and able to be automatically tested with, for example specific email or SMS forms which may be analyzed for specific contents if their general configuration is known, for processing and formulating automatic replies to test a contact center's system1020. In this embodiment, the initial message to a contact center and the response from the contact center, are in the same form of text-based communication, either email, SMS, or some other messaging form such as online chat messages or a messaging service such as WhatsApp. After an initial message is sent to a contact center1020, response messages may be received from the contact center by a interactivity testing engine811,1040, after which a text processor920compares the received response to the expected response as stored in the testing database1050,812. Continuously after sending an initial communication to a contact center1020and at every progressive step in the method, a reporting server815monitors the execution and progress of the integration testing1030, reporting to an administrative interface814any software errors, errors in the testing itself, errors in received responses from a contact center, or even successful testing results and the configurations used in such tests, for a human user to examine if necessary.

FIG. 11is a method diagram for testing a contact center's automated responses using two-factor authentication. Stored case configurations must first be retrieved if they are available1110, from a testing database812, by a text processor920component of a interactivity testing engine811. Such testing configurations represent forms of text-based communications that are known and able to be automatically tested with, for example specific email or SMS forms which may be analyzed for specific contents if their general configuration is known, for processing and formulating automatic replies to test a contact center's system1120. In this embodiment, the initial message to a contact center is in one form of text-based communication, and the response from the contact center is either in the same form or in a different form from the initial message, either email, SMS, or some other messaging form such as online chat messages or a messaging service such as WhatsApp. After an initial message is sent to a contact center1120, response messages may be received from the contact center by a interactivity testing engine811,1130, after which a text processor920finds an authentication code typically sent by SMS message1140, at which point the message and authentication code may be sent to an authentication tester910,1140. Upon an authentication tester910receiving a message with an authentication code for two-factor authentication requests, it may attempt to use the authentication code in whatever manner is configured according to a testing database812,1150, such as sending the code in a message, SMS, or email response, or sending web data to fill out an online form with the code through some API or POST request, attempting to automate the process of a user filling out a form in a web-browser and submitting the code for authentication. The authentication tester will then analyze whatever response is given by the contact center according to the loaded configuration, and report either a success or failure of the attempted two-factor authentication request1160, which may be sent to a reporting server815for viewing in an administrative interface814.

FIG. 12is a method diagram for multi-modal text communications testing including email, SMS, and messaging testing of a contact center's automated responses, where a query and received response are of different communication formats. Stored case configurations must first be retrieved if they are available1210, from a testing database812, by a text processor920component of a interactivity testing engine811. Such testing configurations represent forms of text-based communications that are known and able to be automatically tested with, for example specific email or SMS forms which may be analyzed for specific contents if their general configuration is known, for processing and formulating automatic replies to test a contact center's system1220. In this embodiment, the initial message to a contact center is in one form of text-based communication, and the response from the contact center is in a different form than the initial message (for example, a contact center replying to an email from a simulated or real customer with an SMS response containing a link to a solution) may be received from the contact center by a interactivity testing engine811,1240, after which a text processor920compares the received response to the expected response as stored in the testing database1250,812. According to this method, a link may be sent containing helpful information or a solution, or some other response to a customer, by a contact center, at which point a text processor will attempt to validate the link and ensure it follows the tested configuration of automated responses from the contact center1260. It is not necessarily required that the text processor analyze the actual contents of the link fully or even partially, provided the link merely is properly formatted and is expected in the first place in the tested configuration. Continuously after sending an initial communication to a contact center1220and at every progressive step in the method, a reporting server815monitors the execution and progress of the integration testing1230, reporting to an administrative interface814any software errors, errors in the testing itself, errors in received responses from a contact center, or even successful testing results and the configurations used in such tests, for a human user to examine if necessary.

FIG. 13is a method diagram for load testing of a contact center using a large load of text communications such as email queries. A load tester may receive data from either a testing database812or a contact center directly, regarding the contact center's text communications peak hours, and how active the communications channels are during these times1310. A load tester930may then determine with a testing database812, whether to test email capacity, SMS capacity, or some other text communications capacity of a contact center1320, or it may be determined by a user of an administrative interface814manually. The chosen form of communication, following a configuration stored in a testing database812which should be properly received and responded to by a contact center, may then be sent in large quantities matching or exceeding those of the center's peak hours1330, depending on whether the center is being tested for current peak times or being stress tested for volumes exceeding current peak times. During the sending of such large numbers of communications1330, the load tester examines the response time, response quality and accuracy, changes in response times, and other relevant data, from a contact center during and after the testing1340, such data being available through a reporting server to an administrative interface814for examination by a system user.

Hardware Architecture

Although the system shown inFIG. 4illustrates one specific architecture for a computing device10for implementing one or more of the inventions described herein, it is by no means the only device architecture on which at least a portion of the features and techniques described herein may be implemented. For example, architectures having one or any number of processors13may be used, and such processors13may be present in a single device or distributed among any number of devices. In one embodiment, a single processor13handles communications as well as routing computations, while in other embodiments a separate dedicated communications processor may be provided. In various embodiments, different types of features or functionalities may be implemented in a system according to the invention that includes a client device (such as a tablet device or smartphone running client software) and server systems (such as a server system described in more detail below).

In addition, in some embodiments, servers32may call external services37when needed to obtain additional information, or to refer to additional data concerning a particular call.

Communications with external services37may take place, for example, via one or more networks31. In various embodiments, external services37may comprise web-enabled services or functionality related to or installed on the hardware device itself. For example, in an embodiment where client applications24are implemented on a smartphone or other electronic device, client applications24may obtain information stored in a server system32in the cloud or on an external service37deployed on one or more of a particular enterprise's or user's premises.