The Benefits of Unified Communications for the SMB
1 Mar, 2008
By: Linda Driscoll-DobelAn Interview with Ernie Wallerstein
Contact Professional (CP): What does Zeacom offer the industry and what is its history?
Ernie Wallerstein (EW): Since 1994, Zeacom has been developing solutions that provide unified communications and contact center solutions to small- to medium-sized businesses (SMBs) enterprises for the NEC, Avaya and Cisco telephony platforms. Through our offices in the United States, Australia, New Zealand and the United Kingdom, Zeacom serves more than 2,400 customers in 24 countries. The company''s mission is to provide cost-effective communications solutions that make high-end functionality accessible to small- and medium-sized organizations.
CP: What business communications issues and challenges does the SMB market face?
EW: SMBs have the same requirements as large enterprises – they must be able to respond to and satisfy their customer needs by providing effective communications across the entire enterprise. A breakdown in communications between individuals, departments or locations could see their customer contacting their competitor instead.
Most SMBs have limited personnel and financial resources. Employees often wear several hats and often they don’t have a dedicated IT staff. Many SMBs have remote offices and workers who need to communicate with the main office and each other. Business owners are often focused on the needs of the business and do not have the time or expertise to devote to their communication strategy.
SMBs need to differentiate themselves from their larger competitors by offering personalized and enhanced customer service. How effectively they communicate with customers, suppliers, business partners and employees can be the difference between business won and business lost.
CP: How do unified communications solutions help the SMB?
EW: Unified communications are increasingly about bridging the gap between real-time and asynchronous communications via one, easy-to-manage interface. Individual workers need to be able to simplify, prioritize and manage business calls, cellular calls, and e-mails in both real-time and after-the-fact.
CP: What are the typical business benefits experienced by SMBs that have implemented unified communications?
EW: Contact center agents handle the majority of contacts coming into any business. Customer service, help desk, new business inquires – regardless of their function, a single desktop interface gives them the tools they need to resolve customer inquiries. Console operators are often the first point of contact a caller has with a company – leaving a lasting impression of your business. A single desktop interface gives operators superior call-handling tools – from rich presence to see all employees’ availability, “point and click” telephony functionality speeds up call processing, to sending and receiving faxes from their desktop. Most executives and business owners are strapped for time and are highly mobile and reliant on key members in their organization to provide them with the information they need exactly when they need it. A desktop interface gives executives an easy way to manage calls, voice messages, faxes, e-mails and give VIP callers priority routing based upon their calling line ID all from within Microsoft Outlook. Knowledge workers constantly battle phone tags, interruptions and an overload of messages in their day-to-day demands of their job. UC increases the efficiency and productivity of these workers by allowing them to streamline and intelligently manage all of their communications using a single desktop application.
CP: What enhancements to unified communications do you foresee for 2008?
EW: The ability to provide seamless integration between the desktop and mobile device will be a major driver in 2008. The marketplace will benefit greatly from enterprise presence visibility being available on both the desktop and mobile device. Imagine only calling people you know are available from your cell. The market will look for the ability to manage one voice mailbox and differentiate how the caller is treated if he or she calls your business line versus your cell phone. Additionally, the ability to schedule or initiate a conference call or Web conference from your desktop or mobile device will be a driver in 2008 and beyond.
Perhaps the biggest and most important aspect to UC for 2008 will be the need to cost-effectively implement UC solutions with proven ROIs. As much as the hype exists around UC, many companies have yet to implement a UC solution. Strategies have been developed, but only certain aspects of those strategies have been implemented. The reason in many cases is it seems daunting to implement a lot of different systems and interfaces to meet all the deliverables. The ability to provide one administrative, reporting and user-interface from one communication management application will be critical in 2008 and beyond in terms of actually delivering UC to the marketplace.
