Traditional Call Center vs. Virtual Call Center

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With the advent of the internet and evolving technologies, the environment for doing business has undergone a change most of us in our late 40s and 50s did not envision. If someone had told us that a time would come when we, as an individual, would have scope and access to tools to do any business with people like us sitting in other countries, we would not have believed it. The field is wide open now, and how! There are platforms to get medical appointments, learn to cook, study, create CVs, take up jobs, and actually start working and receiving real money-real paychecks in our viral wallets. We’ve come a long way. And besides technology, the other tool that has made it possible is communication.

Communication platforms that technology has created have beaten everything. Customer service, which has always been a part of business, has gone from communicating via landline to traditional call centers to now cloud phones! The evolution has just been phenomenal and fast!

No matter which sector your business belongs to, whether it’s health, insurance, real estate, or technical support, the importance of customer relations, customer support, and customer satisfaction can’t be undermined. The survival of any business is dependent on the customer who gives you an opportunity to engage in business with them. When you carry it out successfully and smoothly, it paves a growth path for you. Besides product or service quality and price, what matters a lot is your communication with your customer through this journey.

Cloud communication is the latest buzzword, and owing to all the advantages it offers, traditional call centers are becoming redundant. In this post, we’re going to focus on the difference between traditional call centers and virtual or cloud phones. Cloud communication is also known as Omni-Channel and Unified Communications, among other things.

Investment

The biggest difference between the two is the size of the investment. When we speak of investment, we mean both physical space investment and financial investment. No one needs to explain to us the humongous cost of setting up a traditional call center. There is a requirement for space, infrastructure, and computers or laptops for each customer service executive; a team of engineers to maintain the set-up and smooth running of it all; and so on. When it comes to cloud phones, the entire infrastructure, including servers, is hosted by the service provider, and you access them via the cloud, reaping all of the benefits and conveniences of a call center and much, much more without having to run one yourself.

Monitoring

Monitoring a team physically in a traditional call center does not come easy for the supervisor as it is not possible for him or her to oversee the quality of every communication made by the customer service team individually. Creating executive-wise reports is also a cumbersome task. Unlike when you have a cloud communication system installed, the software allows the supervisors or managers to access the agents’ systems and monitor each and every piece of conversation and other activity. The Omni Channel can generate various reports that can tell you about everything, right from how quickly the agent took the call, what he spoke, how he resolved the issue and how quickly. All the calls are recorded so that the manager can hear them at leisure to identify flaws or plus points and help to make communication more impactful and beneficial for the company.

Flexibility

While in traditional call centers, employees work from an office, unified communication makes working so much easier and more flexible. You can employ people from different countries to work on the project. Omni Channel offers the flexibility of working from remote locations. No matter where you are working from, all you have is a mobile phone with software installed, and you will still be monitored for the hours you put into work, the quality of work you produce, the outcome of your work, etc.

Detailed idea about the agent’s engagement

Cloud communication offers a supervisor or manager a clear view of how a cloud call center agent is using his time; how quickly he takes the call; how efficiently he resolves the query; and how reassured he makes the customer feel with what he communicates. The manager also comes to know if there are pending calls and if the agent is idle but not attending to calls. All these insights give managers an idea about the productive usage of time by Unified Communication agents working from diverse locations.

Team Collaboration

Team interactions and collaborations are far more productive and meaningful with cloud communication.

Final thoughts

If you run an enterprise and are confused about whether to opt for a traditional call center or unified communication because you feel both solutions have their benefits and shortcomings, I suggest you pay attention to the features Omni Channel offers, like end-to-end monitoring, a user-friendly interface, and the ease with which you can generate a variety of reports to improve your team’s performance. This cloud communication software service takes the place of traditional call center solutions and takes it a notch higher.

Implement Cloud Phone for Your Customers

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When the pandemic hit the world unawares, it did not just alter the social and economic landscape, but also the digital backdrop of everything we do. Even though the pandemic seems behind us, the phase has gotten us used to several new ways of doing things in day-to-day life, remote working being one of them. It’s no surprise that most small and large businesses have chosen and are sticking with cloud based phones.

As more and more companies, especially forward-thinking ones, are expanding their presence online, there’s a rise in demand for cloud communication, or Omni Channels. Most organisations understand the importance of communication to survive in the market. They are aware that unified communication technology can meet business needs and customer demands head-on by simplifying the path to interactions. Whether the interaction is between a customer and an OmniChannel agent or amid Omni Channel agents working from diverse remote locations for the same company, implementing Omni Channel brings efficiency to business and cost reduction, both.

Organizations of all sizes are finding the cloud full of solutions and new opportunities to grow and compete. Implementing cloud telephones in your system of functioning makes a huge difference. Whether you operate your business from Korea or the Philippines, a cloud phone streamlines your inbound and outbound communication channels, making the traditional telephone obsolete and irrelevant.

What is Cloud Communication or Unified Communication?

Communication is the backbone of survival for any and every business. Whether the communication is internal among employees or external with customers, you can’t undermine the importance of communication with either. And creating a way for effective and uninterrupted communication can make or break a company’s growth and other future plans.

Cloud communication is a tool and solution that meets, serves, and eases your purpose of communication. Traditional telephone systems, which we worked on until a few years ago, have become nearly obsolete as unified communication provides better scalable experiences. It improves business frameworks for the better.

Cloud Telephone, Unified Communication, or Omni Channel technology, as it is commonly referred to, shifts your phone system on to the cloud, doing away with the need to set up a cumbersome infrastructure requiring expensive investment of money and space. In a unified communication system, communication devices are hosted on the cloud phone software service provider’s premises. To avail of the services you pay for these services and access it through the cloud via a web interface.

Benefits for Organizations Planning to Shift to Cloud based Communication

There is no requirement for hosting a private server and paying a cost; there is no need to maintain a separate staff comprising engineers, etc. to maintain the system. The best part is that even if cloud communication is hosted on the cloud and not on our own server, it is a watertight system, with the least risk of security lapse. Our data is secure and protected in the cloud.

Most new organisations who’ve recently upgraded to the digitalization of business fear the risk of data leakage. However, there is nothing to worry about on the security front. Another thing that concerns enterprises is the cost involved. Yes, there is a cost attached to it, but again with an advantage. Unified communication software service providers offer packages based on your usage size. You pay for the amount or size of service you avail of. Omni Channel is a scalable system that can be sized as per the needs of your business.

Cost Reduction

Also, there is no unexpected maintenance while installing the system or later, as the back end is handled by the service provider, and it is their responsibility to make sure your communication is moving smoothly and glitch-free 24X7.

Seamless integration with the existing system

A unified communication system is quick to install and can be seamlessly integrated or merged with your existing system. So there are no interruptions in communication while the new system is being installed. Be it external (customer) or internal (employee) communication, Omni Channel smoothly shifts and upgrades communication effectiveness without causing any interruption to anyone.

Powerful Features

It comes with powerful calling, reporting, and call-recording features. All of them can be customised as per your needs. There are many other features that Omni Channel offers about which you were informed at the time of initial discussions. You can choose features you think are relevant for your industry and will create a better experience for your customers.

Build the best teams with scope for remote working.

When you have installed a unified communication system, you can create a customer service team that doesn’t necessarily work from an office. You can employ people from anywhere in the world, allowing them to work from remote locations to serve you. This means you can employ the best people, have a talented team for the job, and, in some cases and countries, also save money.

Conclusion:

Shifting to Omni Channel is simpler and easier than you think. It does not require hosting extensive and expensive infrastructure and investment. And nobody needs to tell us about the importance of communication as a part of business strategy. Whether it is interacting with employees or engaging with customers, communication is vital. It’s economical and can grow with your business needs. So, go for cloud communication!

Implement Unified Communication for Your Customers

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unified platform image

With growing emphasis laid on the customer experience, businesses need to think about stepping up and optimizing their existing IT ecosystem. In order to stay relevant as well as competitive in the modern complex business environment, they ought to think on a priority to implement or migrate to a better technology. A system of working that can maintain a seamless customer experience which will not only retain existing customers but also add new and increase the number through word of recommendation and other channels.

A System That Meets the Growing Demand of Customer Service & Customer Expectations

Technology is constantly evolving, creating more sophisticated versions of software every day. With digital and artificial intelligence (AI) picking up, traditional call centers and BPOs are also getting drawn towards the advantages of the cloud-based centers. They are trying to explore how the technology can be used for improving their business by creating better customer experience channels and creating multiple interfaces offering conveniences to the customers.

Evolving Need for Unified Communication

Demand for unified communication is continuously rising and more and more businesses are contemplating migrating to it, yet we have hundreds and thousands of them who still maintain their critical data on physical systems. They still use physical infrastructure, maintain bulky communication servers, headsets installed, configured, licensed and made compatible for their industries, and so on. All of these require physical space over other things. It impacts their strategic and budgetary decisions impacting operational costs, restricts mobility of CS Execs and more. The most critical part is the data breach, something that all businesses are very sensitive about. Security and privacy of a large customer data becomes a tedious task for call centers who operate from on a physical premise.

The Process of Migrating/ Shifting has begun

With a growing awareness as to how the technology can create an edge and advantage for businesses, on-premise call centers are getting substituted by cloud call centers. Organizations in huge numbers are chalking out plans to migrate to cloud based call center software. As the word is spreading about the kind of advantages the cloud call centers come with, they are becoming an infrastructure choice for majority of organizations.

Primary features driving organizations towards unified communication software or cloud phone is undoubtedly the speed of deployment. Other reasons include improved profitability. It is a scalable technology that can be expanded with growing customer base. It comes with a foolproof security system where all your data related to customer information as well as other information remains secure and protected.

How Unified Communication System Works

Cloud-based unified communication technology is a network-based service that the software service provider offers remotely to businesses via a subscription model. Call center software introduces your businesses to innovative solutions to help you tackle traditional pitfalls of your business.

Organizations that are adopting or shifting to unified communications are experiencing the value that no other technology other than cloud-based platforms can offer. Installing call center software brings out an obvious and rapid improvement in customer interaction, and customer satisfaction. It also helps organizations to pin point the areas within their set-up that can benefit by implementing this model. 

A good unified communication software service provider will also help you to create & integrate business specific functionalities that can help you to give your customer a smooth journey of doing business with you again.

Go for It!

So, if you’re an organization looking to adopt a technology that can help your business grow and expand there’s nothing that can serve you better than considering to install the scall center software.

No matter how good your product or services are, or how long you’ve been in the business, your expertise, your team; or how impressive your professional profile reads on social media, or how active you’re on them; how many likes your posts receive… if you are not able to keep your customer happy, none of all these hold any value and your business may not see the success it deserves to. The most important part of any modern business is how you treat your customer, how does he feel doing business with you, how promptly do you attend and respond to his queries, how quickly and how amicably can you resolve their issues for them. These are the things which go to create an experience for your customer.

One technology that can make it possible for you to offer superior customer service is through unified communication or cloud phone. Do talk to a service provider to get all the details and install cloud call center software.

Choosing the Right Outbound Contact Center Solution

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Choosing the Right Outbound Contact Center Solution

 

Business environment has undergone a tremendous evolution in the recent years. Likewise, the customer behavior has also undergone a change. Now they prefer to reach out to the companies they’re doing business with, through modes other than making a phone call. In the recent years, it has been observed that their focus has shifted from calling to messaging in order to communicate with their service providers.

Unified communications, cloud communications are the most modern systems used by the customers for the business communications. Cloud phones have become a primary mode of communication for the enterprises across the globe. Above everything, omni Channel creates an ease for the customers wanting to reach out to their service providers or sellers for any reason whatsoever. Whether they want to make a general business enquiry or are looking to resolve a complex problem requiring several people to stay in the loop, choosing the right contact center solution can ease the process of doing business for an enterprise.

Rising Demand for Omni Channel Solutions

To keep up with the changing trends, businesses ought to consider upgrading and updating their communication technology to meet the demands of their customer that will improve their experience of doing business with us. No matter where your business originates, where your workshop or warehouse is; whether you operate from Philippines or any other location, cloud phones are designed to integrate seamlessly with the organization’s existing communication system and work towards improving user experience & interface. Thus, driving business towards the growth and success. Because of the benefits and advantages that unified communications offer, all modern call centers are software centric. You don’t get to see the heavy & space occupying hardware in the modern call centers. Hardware and machines have become obsolete now.

 Why Omni Channels Have Become Necessary 

The way business is conducted across the globe today is nothing like it used to be a decade ago. Similarly, the way we communicated with our customers, clients and the business associates, has come a long way. As the technology has evolved, the role and the influence of the social media has grown leaps and bounds; likewise, the way we get in touch with our customers or vice versa has completely changed.

 Inbound & Outbound Contact Center Solutions

These are two major ways a cloud phone center operates. Both types of Omni Channel Communication centers have customers at one end and teams at another. Outbound cloud phone centers are those in which offices or businesses reach out to or get in touch with the customers; it could be for telemarketing, lead generation, telesales, research etc. Whereas the Inbound Call Centers receive calls from the customers to resolve their issues or to answer their queries.

Outbound and inbound call centers simplify your business communication as they’re a cost-effective, secure and reliable virtual communication solutions. An organization may need one or both in-bound as well as outbound cloud call center software, depending upon the nature of their work. However we’re going to focus on how does an organization choose an outbound call center solution.

 

Choosing the Right Outbound Contact Center Solution

Once you’ve figured out that your business needs an outbound cloud call center, the next thing you need to pay attention to is to look for the functions your call center is supposed to perform. Based on it, you have to choose features for your outbound cloud phone software.

Integration with Multiple Channels

An outbound call center software solution ought to integrate multiple channels such as SMS, social media messaging, video, web chat into the existing systems in order to keep a track of all their customers.

Reliable With Least Downtime

While choosing an outbound Cloud phone, Philippines or Philadelphia the software solution should be able to maintain 99.99 % uptime. Every business wants to grow and expand hence a downtime while communicating with the customers is unaffordable.

Collect Data & Generate Report

The outbound cloud call center solution you choose should be equipped to monitor daily activities, collect relevant data, and also be able to generate various reports. 

Secure

The unified communications or Omni Channel you choose must provide tight security. It should also be designed to detect any intrusion in the server. One is advised to thoroughly analyze the security measures provided by the software before making a final decision to buy and install it.

Integrating your contact center with a software solution that will work for your team and business is a big decision for any organization. The information shared above will hopefully help you choose an outbound cloud phone system or software that is best suited for your industry or business and its peculiar requirement. Because, if for the lack of information, you end up choosing software that does not match your expectations or doesn’t do enough for your business, then it could seriously cost your business money and several lost business hours for your team.

So, take your time to research, analyze, and only then shortlist and choose the best cloud call center software solution for your business.

Cloud Computing Platform for Call Centers

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Cloud Computing Platform for Call Centers

Customer service is a defining factor in the customer experience that influences customer’s action at every stage of business right from the customer’s purchasing decisions to sticking to your brand, referring to their friends and family, and of course revisiting to buy again. Hence, to offer top-notch seamless customer service is not possible without setting up a system that enables your customer service representatives to engage with your client in a positive environment. This is where cloud contact center comes in picture. It is a simple, reliable technology that takes performance of your customer service team many levels higher and offers the customers with a great experience of doing business with you. Cloud call center software or platform is an easy to use, simple to install, and a complete, unified, cloud communication system designed to support multichannel or Omni-channel communication between customers and agents. It optimizes customer experience as well as customer service staff experience.

 Call Center VS Contact Centers

Before taking the discussion further, let us understand the difference between call center and contact center. While call centers and contact centers provide the same customer service and enable us to connect with our customer and vice versa; the difference lies in the kind of communication channels they use. Call centers use a single channel, a single tool, i.e. the phone to connect with the audience. Contact centers on the other hand, uses several communication channels to communicate with the customers. Call centers were the norm before digitalization. Contact centers emerged post digitalization. Digitalization revolutionized the experience of communication, infusing ease, seamlessness, and continuity like never before. Defining Cloud Software Call Center Cloud Contact Center is a web-based software solution or platform that enables an organization to handle its inbound and outbound communication with the clients and other associates. As it is clear from its name, this software is based on the cloud, and there’s no need for a physical space to set up or install this technology. Gone are the days of traditional call centers where entire floors would be dedicated to wired machineries, complex circuits, electrical connections, hardware, and so on; and a set of engineers always on alert, looking for red flag. This is not the case with cloud call center software. This technology being cloud-based can be accessed from anywhere, anytime. This gives an organization flexibility to employ customer service team from across the world to scale workforce in order to meet demands as and when they feel the need.

Functioning of Cloud Call Center Software

Whether you decide to set up cloud-based contact center platform in Philippines or Philadelphia, the technology and its deployment process remains the same. It is built around the main technologies of the automatic call distributor (ACD) and the interactive voice response commonly referred to as IVR system. However, this set-up is not limited to communicating with clients or customers just over voice calls. When an organization sets up cloud call center technology, it empowers them to integrate and sync a wide range of communication channels that include email, SMS, live chat, and social media. Syncing of various communication platforms simply means that when a service executive sits on the system, and customer calls, the executive while attending the call can also view all the different actions taken by the customer so far. In a scenario, where a customer had called earlier and had spoken to a customer service agent, and he sent an email and was issued a ticket. Now if the same customer calls and a new agent answers the call, all the previous communication lands on the screen of this new executive and the conversation automatically becomes much more effective and precise. This in turn helps in better coordination in the customer service department. The outcome is quicker resolution of the customer’s problem, and the working experience goes on a new higher level. A happy and a satisfied customer is good for company’s growth. The system also has built-in workforce optimization capabilities that helps the company or an organization to manage the staffing; also facilitates reporting tools through which one can identify the most potent opportunities for the growth, that have not been handled well. It allows the manager to draw the attention of the agent who was unable to handle the customer query in a satisfactory manner and to discuss an alternate way to effectively handle the same.

Shifting from Legacy to Modern Cloud – based Call Centers

When an organization decides to replace its traditional legacy call center technology with the modern cloud-based software, you can be sure of reducing costs, expanding service capacity, improving your service levels, and boost customer satisfaction ratings dramatically. Not to forget this technology offers convenience of being easily accessible; can generate real time reports to offer the process manager a new perspective on its team’s performance from remote location. Cloud call center software or unified communication has a far-reaching impact on a company’s ability to meet customers’ needs and exceed expectations, scale service capacity based on demand, and protect your business data as you walk on the path of growth.

What are the Benefits of Unified Communications?

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What are the Benefits of Unified Communications?

Unified Communication (UC) – A Future Perfect Communication Solution

 

Unified Communication is a solution for businesses and offices to overcome communication barriers caused by the distance. Installing this system saves companies from employing diverse communication channels.

Unified Communication is growing at a rapid speed. It syncs all the communication channels that a business uses for its day-to-day functioning. It creates a common interface for email, SMS, instant messaging, voice, video conferencing and audio to give business, a continuity.

Unified Communication is part of digital infrastructure that offers seamless inter-office & intra office communication. It keeps employees and clients connected and on the same page.

In different parts of the world, from Pennsylvania to Philippines, Unified communication is referred to by several other names like cloud phone, cloud communication, OmniChannel etc.

Who can benefit from Unified Communication ?

Omni Channel Communications strategy is proving to be beneficial for organizations that (i) employ global workforce, (ii) employ work from home staff (iii) need to stay in constant touch with employees working on the field, and/or (iv) employees who work in odd shifts and (v) growing businesses. Unified Communication is also vital for IT professionals responsible for streamlining communication within business operating from multiple locations.

Bringing all the communication channels on a common platform improves productivity of a business. It enables employees to collaborate from any device, anywhere via this platform.

The first and foremost advantage of Unified Communication is that it facilitates remote working.

It retains the employee efficiency by gauging their performance remotely.

People can work from home without having any technical knowledge or setting up infrastructure.

Employees can communicate via their laptops and mobile phones by logging in to their company’s UC platform. They can connect with fellow employees via videos, calls, text messages, etc.

Improves Efficiency

According to a report published by Forester, Unified Communication can help your teams to operate more efficiently.

  • It reduces weekly downtime by about one to eight man-hours.

  • As unified communication makes all the communication channels easily accessible and information is handy, the decision making is also quicker.

The above two benefits, i.e. saving time and improving productivity not only improves operational efficiency but also helps management to arrive at a consensus and make important business decisions faster.

UC Streamlines Business Communication

Unified Communication creates a single interface for your business. The entire communication trail is visible to user, no matter which interface has been used by client to communicate the message. When complete message appears in front of the user, it makes better sense. There are fewer possibilities of lapse in understanding.

Customers on the other hand are saved from the harrowing experience of repeating themselves each time. UC is a powerful tool for business with multiple features that streamlines communication.

Saves Cost – Local to Global Business Communication

At first, switching to UC may sound expensive. Synching all communication channels and brining it on one integrated platform may feel extravagant. However, the fact is that it reduces cost. As UC is cloud based, there is no need for the servers. UC makes it simpler to run a business with branches in different corners of the world. With cloud phones, you are not going to require that many services and equipment. All this brings down the costs significantly.

High Speed Video Calls Create Better Connect

Unified Communication platforms facilitate high-speed video conferencing & chats which create an instant human connect and take the experience of doing business at a different level. It minimizes the need (and hence the cost) of business travel. Employee collaboration becomes far simpler and more effective.

Organizations can upscale or downscale usage with a click

Unified communication facilitates a growing business scope to upscale instantly with a click of a button. Likewise, if one of the branches of the office is shutting down, you can reduce usage instantly without having to unplug or dismantle infrastructure etc. Unified communication also enables you to carry office with you on your personal mobile wherever you go without having to carry office laptop. All you have to do is download the app on your mobile and you are sorted.

The evolving communication trends have changed the face of the business. As IT continues to evolve, it will come up with better ways of doing businesses. Unified Communications solutions will continue to reign supreme and drive digital transformation. Unified communication creates higher operational efficiency for businesses, improves user experience and businesses scale with ease in UC environment.