UCaaS & CCaaS: Finding the Right Platform for Your Remote Workforce
As offices across the country remain closed, some businesses have inevitably adapted to the disruption of remote working better than others. There could many reasons for this discrepancy: it could be industry or budget-related, how companies structure themselves internally, or it could be a product of the individual workers themselves.
Sometimes, when one business succeeds where another does not, it’s simply related to whether or not leadership provides their employees with the right tools for the task(s) at hand. Communication – both internal and external – is critical to remote working success, and we’re seeing a rapid convergence of UCaaS and CCaaS technology as vendors begin to pick up on market trends.
Don’t get caught in the shuffle – partner with an accredited, vendor-neutral consultancy like Shamrock to find the best comms platform for your business. Our services are free and we guarantee the best price on any product or service from any of our 400+ service provider partners.
6 Degrees of CCaaS & UCaaS: Here’s What Makes a Good Comms Platform
To help make sense of the different UCaaS and CCaaS platforms available, we’ve broken them down into six main areas: features, mobility, scalability, integration, security and reputation.
Features
The sheer number and variety of features available in today’s UCaaS and CCaS offerings can be overwhelming, ever for the most seasoned IT vets. Before you dive into your research on the different options (and even before you engage a 3rd party consultant like Shamrock), it’s helpful to create a priority list of your of ‘must-have’ and ‘nice-to-have’ features.
Some of the possibilities include:
Auto Attendant
Team Messaging
Hunt Groups (a pool system for taking incoming calls)
Call Recording
Interactive Voice Response (IVR)
WebRTC
Switchboard
Call Waiting
Video Conferencing
Screen Sharing
Three Way Calling
Call Forwarding
Co-Browsing
This is something you can put together yourself as an IT leader, but it’s also beneficial to have your team weigh in on what features will bring the most value. After all, these are the people who will be most likely using these platforms the most day-to-day, and with so many features to sift through already, it can be easy to miss or forget about an add-on that could bring potentially bring a huge ROI to the organization.
Mobility
For compatibility with remote working, your unified communication and call center solutions will have to work with mobile devices as well as laptops and desktop computers. For example, a good platform will enable you to converge mobile devices via a central portal so your team can make and receive video calls via their mobile devices.
Scalability
Even if your comms platform is perfect for your team’s workflows today, innovation trends suggest that it won’t be able to continue to serve their needs within the next five years, or even within the next year. You have to make sure that your platform can scale alongside your business strategy, hopefully for years to come.
Many UCaaS and CCaaS providers operate a tiered pricing structure, unlocking additional features as your usage needs grow. Make sure that this dovetails with your business plans!
Integration
The coming together of UCaaS and CCaS was as inevitable as it’s been exciting. Platforms are now being released which integrate with G Suite, Salesforce, Zendesk and a host of other CRM and business platforms.
If you have a strong development team, be sure to look out for services offering an open API so you can develop your own custom integrations.
Security
Like pretty much anything else related to your corporate network, you can be sure that hackers are looking for ways to compromise communications platforms. Make sure that the vendor you choose deploys enterprise-grade security software which is compliant with the standards of your particular industry (e.g. GDPR, PCI DSS, HIPAA, ISO 27001, etc.).
Reputation
Do you know any other businesses with positive experience of a specific UCaaS or CCaaS provider? Pay them a visit and ask some questions. Some providers have an impressive client list featuring Fortune 100 companies. Give those clients a call and see for yourself how well they would serve you if you became a client. If you speak to someone in sales or customer service, try asking them directly about their experiences with the provider.
Need Guidance? Shamrock’s Got Your Back
Even one hour spent researching the myriad of different UCaaS and CCaaS platforms is enough to give anyone paralysis by analysis. But it doesn’t have to be this way.
Shamrock’s globally recognized team of consultants have decades of collective experience in connecting businesses of all shapes and sizes with high quality UCaaS and CCaS providers.
We are completely vendor-neutral and have negotiated industry-leading deals with all of our 400+ partners, so we give you the freedom of choice when it comes to service providers and we guarantee the lowest prices in the industry with any of them.
Best of all, our in-depth UCaaS/CCaaS audits and analysis are completely free, so there’s nothing to lose by reaching out to us. We’re here to help.
Find out why companies like Amazon, Disney, Hulu, DuPont, General Electric and 2500 more trust Shamrock with their IT budgets (and their sanity).
