An external calling campaign is similar to a preview campaign, except that agents cannot place campaign calls through Genesys Cloud. When a record is presented to an agent, the agent copies the phone number to a third-party desktop dialer and places the call from there.  

If you are located in the United States, or conducting business there, external calling mode offers one way to comply with the Telephone Customer Protection Act (TCPA) regulations that prohibit auto-dialing. 

Before running an external calling campaign, make sure to set up a third-party desktop dialer, such as Gryphon Network’s desktop dialer. 

You can find the Gryphon Network desktop dialer on the Genesys AppFoundry. In the Search box, type Gryphon Network, and the card for the app appears. You are responsible for setting up an account ad plan with Gryphon. After you sign up, you are sent credentials for logging in to the Gryphon portal. If you have any issues with this dialer, contact Gryphon Network.

How it works in Genesys Cloud

Instead of seeing a Begin Call button when presented with a record, agents see the phone number, a copy button, and a warning along the top of the screen advising them to place calls externally.

If the agent decides to place a call, the agent copies the phone number (using the copy button) from Genesys Cloud, pastes it into a third-party desktop dialer, and selects the phone icon to launch the call.

When the call finishes, the agent ends the call on the dialer and returns to Genesys Cloud, where they click Done and enter a wrap-up code. All agent wrap-ups count as an attempt for attempt controls. Therefore, all external calling wrap-ups that are not skipped count as an attempt. 

In external calling mode, agents cannot place a campaign call through Genesys Cloud. Agents can still use their Genesys Cloud call panel to make non-campaign calls to internal or external contacts.

For more information on the agent actions, see Accept or skip a call.

Agent status

Agents do not receive interrupting calls as their status changes from Idle to Interacting when they receive a contact record, unless the queue is otherwise configured. 

The default utilization settings block blended agents from receiving interrupting calls while handling a call on a third-party dialer.

Callbacks and transfers

If a callback is scheduled or transferred, the callback connects to the initial interaction and must be made through the same third-party dialer. 

Agent-scheduled callbacks on these campaigns are not restricted by such things as attempt controls, an uncallable status (from rule or wrap-up mapping), time zone blocking, dnc blocking, or rule do not dial skipping.

Data and analytics

External calling does not track data, import call detail records or recordings related to calls made through your third-party dialer.

1. Add resources required for this campaign mode, or identify existing resources to reuse.

   Resource	Required?	Description
   Agent Script	Yes	Create a script that helps agents interact with each contact. See Scripts page.
   Contact List	Yes	Define the list of persons you want to call or know which existing list to use.
   Do Not Contact List	Optional	Define a list of numbers that this campaign never dials, even if they are in the contact list. See Add a new DNC list.
   Queue	Yes	Add a new queue or identify an existing queue you want to assign to the campaign.
   Contactable Time	Optional	Define when the campaign can place calls to specific time zones. See Create a Contactable Times entry.
   Division	Optional	Know which division to associate with this campaign, or whether to use the Home division by default. See Divisions overview.

2. Click Menu > Digital and Telephony > Outbound > Campaign Management.

3. Click the Voice Campaigns tab.

4. Click Create New.

5. Type a name in the Campaign Name box. The name of a campaign can contain spaces and special characters, but it must be unique.
6. Select a Division or accept the default Home division.

7. Select External Calling from the Dialing Mode list.
   

   Note: Once you select external as the dialing mode and click Save, you can’t change it to another dialing mode.
   Note: Campaigns using a different dialing mode, like predictive and power, can still exist and run in the same org using external calling. Scrub phone numbers to determine records safe to dial in a traditional dialer environment which will be called in existing campaign modes (predictive, power, and agentless) and which need to be dialed with external calling.
8. Select a queue of agents you want to participate in this campaign. To filter the list, type all or part of a name in the Queue filtered box. If you do not type filter text, the Queue box lists all queues.
9. Select a script from the Agent Script list. To see case-sensitive matching selections, type all or part of a script name. To accept a matched item, select it from the list.

   Tip: If you select “Default Outbound Script”, the system creates a contact list form for your campaign. The form allows agents to edit every column in the campaign’s contact list.

10. To allow the agent to bypass a preview contact, enable Allow Skipping of Preview Calls. When disabled, a preview telephone number cannot be skipped by the agent.

11. Use the Contact List box to select a list of contacts for this campaign to dial. To filter the list, type all or part of a name. If you select an unassignable list, an error message indicates why. A contact list is invalid if:

    • No defined phone number types exist for the list.
    • The list has no records.
    • The list failed to import.
    • An import that created the list is still running.
    Tip: If you have not created a contact list, you can do so without leaving the current page:

    1. Click the Contact List box and then click Create a New Contact List.

       A dialog box prompts for the contact list name and a .csv file to upload. For external calling campaigns, a contact record should contain only one phone number field. If there is more than one phone number for a single record, run a separate campaign for each number. If there is more than one phone number attached to a record, the wrap-up code may not be applied to the dialed number.

    2. Type a name in the Contact List Name box and click Browse to select a contact file to upload. For more information, see Create a new contact list.

    3. Click Save.

    Note:

    You can share a single contact list between multiple active campaigns. If you use the same contact list for multiple campaigns, Genesys recommends that you create contact list filters to avoid contact overlaps. Campaigns that share the same contact list can run at the same time.

    If you run multiple campaigns that share a contact list and do not assign contact list filters, as a fallback behavior, a campaign can only take ownership of a contact (that is, dial a contact) if the contact has not been dialed for four hours. When a voice campaign takes ownership of a contact, another voice campaign cannot dial it within four hours of an attempt, or unless the owner campaign is off.

    Columns in the contact list that contain telephone numbers appear below the Contact List Numbers heading. To exclude a phone number column from dialing, click x next to a phone number type. If you remove a contact column and want to add it back, click outside the boxes. Then type all or part of the phone number type name. For example, type C to display Cell. To accept a matched item, select it from the list.

    Define closing wrap-up code mappings

    A terminating wrap-up code is any wrap-up defined for a queue, whose wrap-up code mapping is one of the uncallable indicators (Contact Uncallable or Number Uncallable). “Right Party Contact” is not applicable in external calling mode as it is limited to one phone number per contact. For more information, see Wrap-up code mappings page.

12. From the Contact List Filter box, optionally select the contact list filter that this campaign should use to limit the dialing to contacts that match the filter. For more information, see Contact list filters view. Click View Filtered Contacts to see the contact list editor with the selected filter applied.

13. From the DNC Lists box, optionally select a table of phone numbers that this campaign should never dial. To filter the list, type all or part of a name. When this campaign selects records to dial from its contact list, it excludes numbers that match entries in this DNC list. If you select an unassignable list, an error message appears. A Do Not Contact list is invalid if:

    • All or part of the list contains no records.
    • All or part of the list failed to import.

    Tip: If you have not created a DNC list, you can do so without leaving the current page:

    1. Click the Do Not Contact Lists box and then click Create a New DNC List.

       A dialog box prompts for the DNC list name and for a .csv file to upload.

    2. Type a name in the DNC List Name box and to select a DNC file, click Browse. At minimum, the .csv file can contain a single column of telephone numbers. A DNC file may contain multiple phone number columns and redundant information, such as contact names.

       Example:

       Last Name, First Name,DNC_Home,DNC_Cell,DNC_Work
       Smith,Bill,317-153-4777,317-981-6233,317-333-2174
       Thomas,Terry,424-999-2334,424-384-9993,424-973-8828

       As a best practice, put only phone number columns in your .csv file.

    3. Click Save.

14. Optionally select a Contactable Time Set file containing time zone names and when calling can occur for each. In external calling mode, this will only apply to when the record is delivered to an agent and does not block the agent from dialing outside the set time. For more information, see Contactable Times page.

    Notes: To use the contactable times feature, the contact list assigned to the campaign must contain at least one timezone column. If it does not, and you assign a set of contactable times to the campaign, then the configuration is invalid and you cannot save changes to the campaign.

15. Prioritize this campaign. Under Advanced, use the Priority setting to assign an integer between 1 and 5 inclusive. Priority indicates the importance of this campaign relative to any others. This setting helps outbound dialing determine how many calls to place for each campaign for each agent.

    1 is lowest priority. 5 is highest. The default is 5.

    For more information, see Prioritizing campaigns.

16. Optional. Enable Always Running if you want the campaign to continue running even if there are currently no contacts in the contact list. The campaign does not complete when it runs out of records, and instead sits idle waiting for more records to be added. This option is useful if the contact list is dynamically updated from another source.

17. Optionally sort the contact list by column before dialing begins. For example, if your contact list has an Amount_Owed column, you could sort the list to call people who owe the highest amount first. Under Advanced > Contact Sorting, select a contact list column in Sort by. Select a Sort order: ascending (default) or descending. If the sort column contains numeric information such as a telephone number or monetary amount, enable Field is Numeric. Contact list sorting takes place at campaign start or campaign recycle. If you add a contact while a campaign is running, the new contact is dialed but is not included in contact list sorting until the next campaign recycle. Click the plus sign to sort by additional columns. You can sort up to four contact list columns, with the first sort taking the highest precedence.

    Note: Special considerations apply when sorting a date column. The system does not sort a contact column that represents a date formatted mm/dd/yy as a date. It sorts the column as a string since the system does not recognize that format as a date. To work around this limitation, format dates using ISO 8601 format (yyyy-mm-dd). That format sorts in the same order whether considered a string or a date. To denote Christmas Day for example, enter 2017-12-25 instead of 12/25/17.

18. To add a new contact to a running campaign and re-sort the contact list while the campaign runs, turn on Dynamic Queueing sorting. Be sure to select a Sort By column by which to re-sort the contact list when the new contact is added to the running campaign. 

    Before you configure dynamic sorting, consider these actions:

    • If you do not configure Contact Sorting, contacts sort in the order that they appear in the contact list.
    • If you configure Contact Sorting, contacts sort when you run a campaign based on campaign configuration settings.
    • When you enable Dynamic Queueing Sorting, contacts re-sort at the time of the contact attempt during a running campaign.

    Configure Dynamic Queueing sorting for a campaign:

    • When you configure a campaign, the Contact Sorting Sort By column data type Field is Numeric must match the Data Type in Column Data Type Specifications, in the contact list.
    • When you enable Dynamic Queueing sorting for a campaign, you must also define the selected Sort By column in the campaign's contact list Column Data Type Specifications.
    Notes:

    • If you receive more than two contact list validation errors when you create or edit a campaign with Dynamic Queueing, you must select a new contact list without errors.
    • You can have up to five active Dynamic Queueing sorting campaigns per organization that run concurrently.
    • You can have a total of 10 active and inactive Dynamic Queueing sorting campaigns per organization. Make sure to delete your inactive campaigns. 
    • You cannot enable the Dynamic Queueing Sorting feature after you create a campaign. Create a new campaign and a new contact list to enable the Dynamic Queueing sorting toggle.

19. To ensure that your campaign honors Contact List Filters changes at any time, for example, while a campaign is running, then when you create the campaign, switch the Dynamic Queueing filtering toggle to On. 

    Notes:

    • If a contact is filtered out because it does not match filter conditions, you can adjust conditions of the filter to re-evaluate the contact and match it.

    • If a contact matches the filter when the queue is built, the contact is added to the queue, and later the contact is updated in a way that it does not match the filter anymore, then the contact is removed from the queue if it is not dialed or in flight.

    • If a contact is filtered when the queue is built, the contact is not in the queue, and later the contact is updated to match the filter, then the contact is added to the queue.

    • Dynamic filtering allows the filter to be changed while the campaign is running. Changing the filter or recycling the campaign triggers the re-evaluation of contacts.
    • You cannot enable the Dynamic Queueing filtering after you create a campaign. Create a new campaign to enable the Dynamic Queueing filtering toggle.
20. Click Save. The new campaign is available on the Campaign Management page.
    
    Note: An error message appears if the new campaign exceeds the maximum limit count of 1000. Delete old or obsolete campaigns as needed and click Save again to complete the new campaign configuration.