The role of cloud in UC - and the opportunities it presents to the channel

Flexibility would likely be at the centre of the wheel, giving customers individuality, with far more options and control based on their requirements, circumstances, points in time, and place. More rigid room or desk-centric capabilities would be on the outside, and mobility at the heart instead of a traditional PBX environment. 

Communications would also seamlessly blend multiple contact streams, such as voice, chat, video, collaboration tools, CRMs, ERPs, vertical market applications, and more. All these contact streams would work together to create a seamless environment regardless of location, whether in the same room or connecting virtually, available across different devices, networks and apps. That is true unified communications. 

Cloud communications is the enabling consumption model for that ideal world, pivoting in an agile way around customers and the needs of their businesses. Of course, cloud-based UC is nothing new: it has been talked about for many years and successfully deployed by service providers worldwide. However, the market is at an exciting tipping point, where it has the potential to embrace more widely this more customer-centric, flexible approach to business communications. For the channel, it represents massive potential and the technology components are available. While we cannot start from scratch, we can certainly think about and approach the opportunity in a fresh way. 

User scenarios

Also, next-generation, future-facing cloud-based UC can significantly enhance businesses' own customer engagement strategies, such as providing an omnichannel choice of contact methods, like web chat, voice or WhatsApp. 

Imagine a hair salon’s loyal customer who spends an average of 600 Euros annually. The customer has a big event and so needs an appointment quickly. However, they cannot get through to speak to someone directly, only to a basic voice mailbox, with no indication if and when they will get a response. So, acting on a friend’s recommendation, they book with another salon in the same town, have a great experience, and never return to the first salon. 

Conversely, with converged UC, the caller could receive a friendly message saying they will get a response in a couple of minutes and that the salon knows they are waiting. They also have options of a callback or booking immediately via IVR or WhatsApp. 

Team members in the hunt group for missed calls also get an alert on their mobile phones that someone is waiting. Through integration with the salon’s CRM, they see it is regular customer Jill, so when the call is answered, they greet her by name (and may even have time to get her records up on screen). However, head stylist Joe is busy with a tricky hair colouring, so he has set his presence as unavailable and, therefore, temporarily opted out of the hunt group. That said, he is also expecting an urgent call from his wife. By having different personas able to exist on his mobile, her call gets through while others are diverted. Finally, at the end of the month, the salon owner can access missed call reports, average waiting times, and call recordings to monitor and improve the quality of staff and customer interactions. 

Successful implementation

Plus, beyond giving SMBs these benefits, cloud-based UC has enormous potential for resellers to engage with much larger enterprises without necessarily having to invest in additional in-house technical expertise, ideal for IT resellers who want to add comms to their portfolios. 

Even though the Unified Communications as a Service (UCaaS) market is increasingly competitive, especially with hyperscalers like Google and Microsoft getting in on the act, there is a lot of potential, especially by putting some best practices in place. 

For instance, based on what we have seen work across Europe, starting small with the achievable wins and building on those is recommended. After all, while there are some fantastic innovations on the near horizon, many organisations still need to adopt some of the already widely available UC features, such as call queues and recording. 

While PBX replacement is just one element of the broader UCaaS opportunity (and voice is just one of multiple contact streams), it is still a helpful door opener. This might mean a service provider combines traditional PBX telephony features with virtual meeting and collaboration tools and some simple contact centre functions for customer service. Features could include call recording, call back, chat queues, and IVR, plus smart inbound voice routing. Consider integrating mobility so that all those features and services are available on smartphones because helping customers mobilise their businesses is also a massive opportunity for the channel. 

The result? An enhanced customer experience, a more productive workplace, and technology that works around employees, regardless of time or place. However, those SMB customers can continue using legacy services, even if ultimately they tend to migrate away from them, further contributing to near-term ROI. 

Once that foundation is in place, then it becomes possible to build out even more, perhaps integration with more business apps, adding an automated onboarding and provisioning portal, or integration with specialist vertical market solutions. This is where APIs come into play, acting as the intelligent glue bringing everything together into one environment. APIs are also evolving and are becoming easier to access and use, acting as gateways to create larger ecosystems, choice, and reseller differentiation. 

Similarly, we are seeing a move towards having multiple, often competitive technologies available in the same platform, enabled by intelligent API layers, giving both the reseller and its customers far more choice. The days of inflexible, one-size-fits-all UC platforms are numbered. Rightly so: modern UCaaS should be all about delivering business customers access to technology that fits around the way they work (or want to work), helping them to improve productivity, communications and collaboration in one seamless environment with tech that enhances their lives rather than getting in the way. And if that is not a compelling argument for exploring what the latest developments in cloud-based UC have to offer, then I don’t know what is.