Donna Fluss is the founder and President of DMG Consulting LLC, a firm specializing in customer-focused business strategy, operations and technology services for Global 2000 and emerging companies. Ms. Fluss is a recognized thought leader and innovator in CRM, contact center and real-time analytics. For over 25 years, she has helped end users build world-class differentiated contact centers.

The Hosted/Cloud-Based Contact Center Infrastructure Market Hits its Stride

Hosted, software-as-a-service (SaaS) or cloud-based solutions – whatever you’d like to call them – have caught on in the contact center world. This has happened while some of the market leaders continue to look on skeptically and enter the hosted market too slowly to satisfy many of their customers. Given the pace of adoption for hosted/cloud-based solutions in the technology market, it was inevitable that contact center buyers would participate; the only question was timing. This question was answered in 2011, as adoption of these solutions hit its stride.

Cloud-Based Competitors

The contact center infrastructure market remains somewhat unique, due to the mix of competitors. Contact center infrastructure market leaders, too concerned that the cloud-based model would cannibalize their traditional revenue streams, opened the door to a new set of competitors. End users now have more choices than at any time in the past. These competitors include (in alphabetical order): 8 x 8 (which acquired Contactual), Convergys, EchoPass, Enghouse (which acquired CosmoCom), Five9, inContact, Interactive Intelligence, LiveOps, NewVoiceMedia, Transera, USAN, Verizon, VoltDelta, West, and many more. What’s so interesting about this list of vendors is that only one of the 14 vendors that DMG follows closely in this sector is a traditional contact center infrastructure competitor. This won’t last. In the next 18 to 24 months, market leaders who are now losing deal after deal to hosting vendors they consider “inferior upstarts” will make acquisitions to give them a presence in this booming segment. While it will still take them a while to understand the hosted business model, customer demand will ultimately get them to where they need to be.

“Upstarts” Deliver Differentiated Offerings

In the meantime, some of these “upstarts” are coming on strong and delivering differentiated functionality and platforms. End users should look for innovation in the area of adaptive routing and broader suites, for example. Cloud-based providers have the great advantage of being able to deliver new capabilities and functionality without having to worry about backwards compatibility with older versions of their solution or upgrade cycles – major and costly concerns for premise-based providers. Without this baggage, these new competitors can quickly ramp up their R&D capabilities and give end users what they want in time frames that premise-based providers are unlikely to be able to match.

Hosting is Still Not for Everyone

Despite the classic benefits of hosted offerings – no major capital outlays, lower start-up costs, more rapid implementations, ease of scaling up and down, no upgrade fees, no need to have in-house support resources, just to mention a few – hosting is still not the right choice for all companies. DMG recommends that any organization considering an acquisition/replacement of a contact center infrastructure solution add cloud-based solution providers to their mix and then conduct a lease (hosting) vs. buy analysis as well as a total cost of ownership analysis. (Keep in mind that this approach should also get premise-based providers to be more price competitive.)

There are situations where it absolutely makes more sense to purchase a contact center solution rather than host it. Organizations that have the resources to maintain a solution and plan to implement it and keep it in place without making significant upgrades for 5 or more years will probably save money by purchasing their solution, and are ideal candidates for the traditional approach. And, despite the claims being made by the hosted providers, companies that require a significant amount of customization are also better off with a premise-based solution. In general, however, it’s a toss-up, and both solution sets – premise-based and hosted – should be considered.

Final Thoughts

When hosting was first conceived and introduced into the contact center market, its primary mission was to “democratize” the contact center world by making these solutions cost-effective for companies of all sizes. This goal has been achieved in a number of countries. Companies of all sizes that want a hosted contact center solution can now find an affordable solution that meets their needs.

Having achieved its original objective, cloud-based computing is now challenging the market’s status quo. As these vendors are setting their sights on larger implementations with hundreds and possibly even thousands of users, they are making the necessary investments in resources to perform customized integrations, provide experienced professional services and provisioning environments that truly empower their users. In the next five years, the most innovative of the hosted vendors are expected to reach true functional parity and then surpass their premise-based competitors. It’s no longer a question of if this will happen – it’s just a question of when.

Proactive Customer Care: Tips and Trends for Delivering an Extraordinary Customer Experience

Date: November 8th, 2011 12:00 PM – 1:00PM ET
Sponsored by: CSG International
Presented By: Donna Fluss, President, DMG Consulting and Rick Danos, Director, Product Management, CSG International

The concept of Proactive Customer Care (PCC) is nothing new for today’s customer-focused organizations. However, the ability to rapidly adopt a PCC Strategy that efficiently and cost effectively communicates with customers via their preferred channels, including phone, email, SMS, social media, and more – is a new reality.

In this webinar, join Donna Fluss, President, DMG Consulting, and Rick Danos, Director of Product Management, CSG International, as they discuss PCC market research and trends, explore real-world PCC case studies and strategies, and provide actionable tips for how enterprises can effectively leverage a variety of PCC solutions to drive real business results.

Learn how to:

• Leverage PCC to increase revenue and build customer loyalty – while reducing costs of service and support
• Design and deploy a successful multi-channel PCC program: calls (inbound and outbound), email, SMS, chat, social media
• Convince key stakeholders why PCC should be an essential element of your company’s customer experience management strategy
• Integrate PCC into your current customer care strategies

Register here for this complimentary webinar.

NEW! 2011 - 2012 Contact Center Performance Management Benchmark Study and Market Report

The 2011 CCPM report is based upon the results of DMG’s benchmark study, which focused on how end-user organizations are utilizing contact center performance management to enhance their operating environment, drive performance improvements, and support enterprise goals. The Report discusses the significance of each finding from the benchmark survey, as well as its implications for CCPM vendors and the market. It provides a comparative functional analysis showing how each of the leading and contending CCPM vendors addresses the issues most important to end users around the world.

Learn More.

Using Idle Time to Improve Enterprise Performance and Profitability

Question:
I work for an Australasian bank, and have been given the task of writing a business case for Sales Direct (our sales function within our call center) to become a profit center, as opposed to a cost center. I've come across a lot of literature suggesting that this is a good idea. What I don't have is any empirical evidence to support this. I was wondering if: - You could provide me with an approximate percentage increase that we could expect through (a) having effective sales targets and/or (b) having our sales team treated as a profit center, rather than a cost center. - If you have any other anecdotal evidence supporting my business case, then that would be much appreciated.

Answer:
Many companies have succeeded in converting service centers to profit centers; even more have failed because they did not do it properly. Right now, I am pleased to say that one of my clients is succeeding very nicely with just this type of conversion, largely because they were willing to make the necessary investments. (This client is a technical support organization.) However, there are no standard guidelines even within industries. because the steps to success vary according to the particulars of each situation, including products, experience level of staff, supporting systems, number of agents, volume of transactions, margin per sale, etc. The process of converting to a profit center also depends on training and agent compensation. It is based on changing many aspects of the call center, including KPIs, quality assurance programs, agent evaluations, and much more. So, without having the opportunity to assess your operating environment, it would be a mistake for me (or anyone) to try to make any projections.

Since you hopefully know all aspects of your operating environment, I suggest that you do a pilot with a handful of agents to gain an appreciation of the benefits of converting to a profit center, and then do your projections. For the pilot to be successful, you’ll first have to give your agents the support they need to prepare them to sell.

It does not take much to convert a cost center into a profit center, as margins add up quickly.For example, if you have a call center with 300 agents and each agent sells one item per day with a margin of USD 50 ...Read More

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