Patent ID: 8270594

Claim:
A method operative in a service provider infrastructure through which business entities create and manage interactive communications campaigns, wherein a given campaign comprises one or more sub-campaigns, the service provider infrastructure including at least one hardware element and being in communication with a contact center having a set of agents, the method comprising: upon a given occurrence, establishing and thereafter maintaining a persistent telephony connection to an agent that has been associated with a given sub-campaign; during the given sub-campaign, initiating outbound calls to one or more customers; during a given call to a first customer, determining whether the first customer should be connected to an agent at the contact center; if the first customer should be connected to the agent at the contact center, connecting the first customer to the agent over the persistent telephony connection that was previously established; and determining whether the first customer has terminated an interaction with the agent; determining whether the first customer has terminated an interaction with the agent; if the first customer has terminated an interaction with the agent, connecting a second customer to the agent over the persistent telephony connection that was previously established; wherein the second customer is connected to the agent after receipt of data indicating that the agent has entered and completed an after call work (ACW) state associated with the first customer call.