The weather here in La Jolla today is gorgeous and the UC Summit conference sessions were all very active and interesting. Opportunities for Consultants, VARs and SIs seem abundant for moving their business clients into UC-enabled applications, especially with end user mobility and cloud-based applications.

I will be speaking tomorrow on my view of the “UC  Contact Center” as being a great target for the channels to aim at, and this was confirmed at lunch today, when the President/CEO of a New York City-based channel sat down next to me. I asked him about the direction he was seeing from his clients in terms of UC implementation and he indicated the same growing impact of mobility and cloud implementations on traditional telephone usage.

I described to him how the “UC enabled Contact Center” view can cover a lot of functional needs for any business operation, and his reaction was both surprised and very positive. His comment was, ” I never thought about that before and it is very interesting!”

In my discussion with some of the major vendors sponsoring the UC Summit, I also saw similar agreement with that perspective. So, bottom line, expect to see the “UC Contact Center” concept becoming a familiar label for UC implementation planning.

Tags: Unified Communications Information // Add Comment »

The business communications industry is really getting confused by terminology. First, when have to come up with a name that describes new capabilities, then, when they attribute all kinds of implied capabilities to the new label.

This confusion showed up in a Research Brief by Aberdeen Group last year, when they attempted to put a label on key technologies that are changing business communications, notably Social networking, Mobile communications, and “Cloud” based applications. So, they call the combination of technologies “So-Mo-Clo!”  From there, they moved to the role of “unified communications” (UC), which they prefer to call “Integrated Communications.”

http://v1.aberdeen.com/launch/report/benchmark/7193-RA-Business-Communications-Optimization.asp?lan=US

They describe UC as follows;

“Unified Communications refers to a unified technology infrastructure that provides all communications channels to every employee. It can often imply that all of these capabilities are provided by a single vendor, and that every conversation and collaborative workflow is provided seamlessly as part of one enterprise platform. In this idealized Unified Communications world view, all services are standardized throughout the entire company, and the enterprise has fill visibility into how to support every form of communications used by each employee.”

That thinking stems from legacy telecom control of internal voice communications, which is rapidly shifting to more open SIP-based telephony, and thus able to integrate with other forms of communication, including email, messaging, social networking, and mobile communications.

The way I see UC from an end user perspective, is that enables a user to easily switch from one modality of contact to another, while preserving the necessary contextual information about the people they are communicating with.  UC is a concept, not a product, nor even an infrastructure, from an end user perspective. IT is a collection of services that are interoperable and enable the user to exploit the flexibility of multi-modal endpoint devices in terms of the medium for exchanging messages or dynamically switching from messaging to a real-time contact (voice, video, chat) based on contextual, federated presence information.

Not only are the communication applications separate  (but interoperable), but business process applications can also initiate outbound messaging contacts (notifications) to specific end users, and engage them with online applications that can exploit both speech interfaces and/or visual screen interfaces.

UC-enabled applications, both business and communications, can exist in a choice of environments, the latest being “cloud”-based (private, public, hybrid) and managed by internal IT organizations or external third-parties. What is key to understand about UC-enabled applications, is that they must be able to integrate with each other and with the end user endpoint device user interfaces. Integration is the “how” of UC-enablement implementation, while “UC” is the result of such integrations.

Although “UC-enabled applications target benefits to individual end users, those end users don’t really know what is involved in implementing such interoperability, nor do they really care. All that consumers will primarily see is the results of UC flexibility when they communicate with their new mobile smartphones and tablets. At the desktop, business users will see the benefits of screen-based controls, “click-to-contact” contextually, and presence-based real-time connections, rather than “blind” phone call attempts.  What such end users want to call “UC” is not really known, but they will simply see it as a  benefit of “smart” multi-modal endpoint devices (mobile, desktops) that let’s them choose how to easily and intelligently initiate and respond to personal contacts and interact with automated online applications.

So, if you want to mush the user perspectives together with the implementation considerations, then “SoMoClo” might be a valid label for what is going on.

While UC interoperability and flexibility takes care of what end users need and want, how that is actually implemented is another matter. That is where and how those integrations are done. Since communications are becoming more software based, the opportunity to implement them as off-premise software, managed by service providers, is the big change that UC can selectively exploit. Questions of control, secure access, are all manageable without having to put the technologies on premise.

Tags: Unified Communications Information // 1 Comment »

By Art Rosenberg, The Unified-View/ UC Strategies Expert

While business organizations are still struggling to understand how best to migrate mobility and UC-enabled, cloud-based capabilities into their legacy telephony and email environments, AT&T is offering cloud-based, multi-modal unified text and voice messaging services to their mobile consumer subscribers. This is being done via their Encore platform, which is open to communication application developers to exploit the ATT cloud for faster access to integrated communications. This move will add greater impetus for organizations to provide similar capabilities for device-independent messaging capabilities, as well as reinforce new BYOD policies for “dual persona” mobile clients.

AT&T Messages, a free mobile app for Android smartphones and tablets, is an initial example that centralizes all subscriber person-to-person text and voice messages in AT&T’s “cloud,” allowing easier message management and “threading” across a variety of endpoint devices, including phones, tablets, and desktop PCs. Voice messages can be transcribed into text for either voice or text retrieval, and all messages can be responded to immediately in text or using new “voice texts.” “Voice texts” let the user record a voice message, which is then transcribed for delivery as a text message.

New message notifications are also provided across different endpoint devices, so that recipients are immediately aware of such messages, regardless of the device they happen to be using. However, AT&T has indicated that end users are currently limited to a maximum of 500 contacts in their address books, which is expected to be remedied in the near future.

While AT&T’s Messages can be used by subscribers for both business and personal contacts, the service is tied to the subscriber’s mobile device identity. That is, all messages sent through Messages will show that mobile device address. That won’t work for those business users who typically want their “office” contact used for responses to their mobile messages, e.g., doctors who don’t want to give out their mobile numbers (“Extension to Cellular”). However, the simple solution of “dual persona” mobile clients will enable Messages to be covered by the personal persona, while the business persona can provide other alternative rules.

Although AT&T’s Messages includes text, voice, pictures, and video messages, they did not (yet) mention social networking messages. Inasmuch as a recent international survey showed that 49% of consumer smartphone users use them on a daily basis for social networking, “social business” will come into play for business users. The bottom line for all mobile smartphone and tablet end users is that the “cloud” will facilitate UC-enabled flexibility for all forms of asynchronous messaging, as well as escalation to real-time contacts including IM, “click-to-call,” voice/video conferencing, and social networking.

Learn more about UC-enabled mobile business by joining unified communications industry leaders at UC Summit 2012, the only channel and consultant-focused event for the Unified Communications and Collaboration industry.

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New forms of business communications with people (Video conferencing, Social Networking) are joining the world of multi-modal, UC-enabled applications. It is becoming very obvious that both the complexity of software applications and the increasing need for dynamic connectivity bandwidth are leading business customers to move to the flexibility of the Internet “cloud.” Unlike traditional, premise based telephony systems, real-time “collaboration” is expanding beyond the domain of the organization and beyond the wired desktop. This includes flexible flavors of voice and video conferencing, messaging, as well as sharing information.

As legacy telephony systems are being replaced by IP Telephony and subsumed by UC, voice connections remain important, but are now being joined by video conferencing options and integrated with business applications (CEBP) and social networking activities. The common denominator for business user endpoint devices is that they are all becoming multi-modal, whether on the desktop as “softphones” or as mobile smartphones and tablets. In the latter case, BYOD policies are quickly opening the end user door to more flexible ways of initiating real-time contacts (like phone calls) with people through “contextual” information and federated presence and availability management. The bottom line is that telephone calls are going to be an option of any UC-enabled contact, which will be more efficient for both callers and recipients.

So, as online software applications become UC-enabled, they will also become device and network independent. That makes them ideal candidates for “cloud” implementation, since the end users will no longer always be on premise. This leads to the obvious shift of IT support not having to be on premise as well, and will be conducive to using third-party expertise and support.

The traditional business telephone system providers have already started moving in this direction by offering hosted and managed services, which can be applied to private, public, and hybrid cloud environments. Taking these concepts a step further, we see wireless carriers like Sprint’s Wholesale Cloud service offerings, and network system provider Cisco’s new Services Partner program, jumping on board, and all catering to application developers and integrators.

See announcements at:

http://www.ucstrategies.com/unified-communications-newsroom/sprint-provides-wholesale-cloud-services.aspx

http://www.crn.com/news/networking/232900390/cisco-tees-up-biggest-services-announcement-in-15-years.htm?pgno=2

The UC writing is on the wall - cloud-based, UC enabled applications for person-to-person contacts and CEBP notifications to people, whether those people are at a desktop or using mobile devices. Who will sell and support those UC-enabled applications? The next generation UC channels, Solution Integrators, and VARs.

To gain more VAR insights and make strategic contacts, come to the upcoming UC Summit 2012 in La Jolla, CA. Go to: http://www.ucstrategies.com/ucsummit/2012/

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I was intrigued by a recent announcement of a book by Dona Young, a teacher and writing coach, entitled “Angry E-Mail; How  To Put A Lid On It” because it was focused on business communications. I offered to review  it because I wanted to see how the recommendations fit into a UC enabled environment.

Young’s practical approach to business email begins with making sure to immediately detail the purpose of the message at the start. Recipients of business email don’t have time for socializing small talk. After composing the message, Young recommends spending a few minutes editing it,  to make the purpose very clear to the recipient(s) at a glance. Then cut out all the unnecessary information because “We’re living in a world that’s moving at warp speed. One of the things that irritates people is getting an email and then having to work really hard to figure out how to respond.”

Young’s book focuses heavily on message content, tone, and style that will not offend the recipient and will elicit a positive response. However she does stress the importance of “micromessages,” i.e., things that are unsaid in the message and any excessive delays in the response.  All of these factors can impact the business relationship between the sender and the recipient of the message.

Although the book covers best practices for using email to communicate person-to-person, there is no mention of other forms of messaging technologies, including business social networking, or automated CEBP contacts. However, it does suggest that a phone call for a voice conversation may be more appropriate than an email message when delivering sensitive information. The role of email in a unified communications enabled environment is something that was not addressed, e.g., “click-to-call/chat” in response to an email message. In fact, Young recommends delaying sending an email response in order to insure that the response is well thought out.

So, perhaps Dona Young’s next book should be “Angry Unified Communications!”

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New UC implementation options through cloud-based services will significantly change the metrics for technology costs. This will be particularly true as voice and video communications join automated business applications in becoming more software rather than hardware dependent. The software approach will also facilitate the interoperability and integration of the communication and the business computer applications that must now support both desktop and mobile endpoints.

The transition to hosted services and BYOD mobile devices (smartphones, tablets) will shift the emphasis of technology implementation planning factors from TCO (Total Cost of Ownership), which was applicable to acquisition and maintenance of premise-based hardware and software applications, to hosted and managed application service offerings.

While ROI (Return On Investment) is still an overall practical measure of benefits from any technology investment cost, the costs really should be correlated with different types of benefits that have dollar costs associated with them. Going to separate levels of benefits and related costs will make it easier to determine how applications can be used most cost effectively and how usage needs should be supported cost efficiently.

New analytics are becoming a key tool for tracking application activity that will enable better understanding about who uses what applications, when, and with what results. Analytics can also provide immediate feedback on how well the application is designed from a user interface perspective, as well as indications of workforce performance in using applications by internal staff for their different job responsibilities (“roles”).

Total Cost of Usage (TCU)

Probably the most logical metric that should be applied to any application or combination of applications is what I would call “Total Cost of Usage.” The amount of actual usage for any communication of business application is a measure of value for a particular application. Usage analytics will also provide feedback about who (type of user) may be getting the most value from that application; that information provides further insight into the value that application generates for a particular business process.

Putting those factors together will be particularly useful as online, self-service applications become more mobile and highly focused on particular information needs of individual end users. The number of such “public” applications is already humungous, but they are just starting to make their way into enterprise controlled “app stores.” This is where TCU will become important as such “mobile apps” will require constant updating to meet enterprise BYOD needs, as well as operational business demands.

Another perspective on application TCU will be its UC enablement in terms of immediate access to live assistance, e.g., “click-to-call/chat.” This factor will be a major source of additive labor costs, as well as a measure of end user satisfaction (internal staff, external customers). Mobile apps will become a major activity gateway to the UC Contact Center of the future, as increased access to information will precede the need to access assistance. So, the cost of application usage should include costs of optional related assistance.

Total Cost of Application and User Support

Although there may appear to be overlap with the above described usage costs, I am suggesting that support costs here will fall into the more traditional roles of IT for application software maintenance, associated hardware and infrastructure maintenance, new integrations, end user training, and “Help Desk” functions. Again, by applying analytics to application support activities, the value of individual application usage can then be matched to direct support costs for those applications.

CIO Collaboration Network

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Most discussions about UC enabled applications are rightly focused on implementing and integrating communication and business application technologies. Such concerns include exploiting public and private “cloud” based services, as well as integrating legacy telephony systems and business applications. Clearly, the complexities involved will demand external expertise on an ongoing basis as software based changes constantly evolve and BYOD policies allow business users to utilize mobile devices of their own choosing.

I have noticed that many articles on the new responsibilities of traditional telephony VARs will have to be expanded to extend their old roles in training users for desktop phones to using desktop “softphones” and a variety of UC enabled smartphones and tablets. But it is not just person-to-person contacts that are involved, but also communication enabled business process (CEBP) applications that will come into the picture. This will be particularly true for desktop applications that are adapted to mobility or “mobile apps.”

As organizations cross over into UC enabled mobility, end users will have to be guided into the interface options that they will encounter with a variety of applications. The question is how will that be done and who will have what responsibility is supporting such education?

Obviously, from an end user’s perspective,  there are two sides of the coin here. There is the basic, person-to-person communication usage, including all forms of communication that UC enables, and then there are the business applications that are UC enabled. As has been pointed out by many, the experts in communication integration will be the most likely candidates to educate end users, especially when “cloud” services are involved. Such education should not require manual training classes, because it can be handled via online applications and “help desk” services.

When it comes to mobile and desktop UC enabled business applications that have been integrated by solution channels, the education of end users can be accomplished in the same manner, except that more responsibility will fall to the the business application developers who design the user interfaces. This is where partnerships will come into play between channels and application developers.

Because UC enabled business applications will become a huge opportunity for hosted service providers, channels, and application developers, the question of how and who will be responsible for supporting end users is very important. The technology vendors are relying on both their own resources for consultative and managed services, as well as using channel expertise. This will be an issue that will be on the table for discussion at UC Strategies annual conference for consultants and VAR channels.

Check it out to qualify for an invitation to this unique event:

UC Summit

You might want to follow the posts of the UC team on this website for more details on what is involved with implementing UC enabled applications.

Tags: Mobility, Unified Communications Information // Add Comment »

I have constantly been looking for a term that would be understandable to consumers and end users who don’t really understand or care about technology and infrastructures, just what it does for them (UC-U). So, while it is the “user experience” and user interfaces that come into play here, that doesn’t explain anything about the flexibility that UC-enabled applications gain from the technology.

As I have mentioned in the past, the “smart phone” became the flagship for UC in many ways. Not only did it bring greater convenience and contact accessibility to end users, but because it was multi-media, it also supported UC-enabled integrations for both communications and automated business applications (including “mobile apps”).  I thought that if consumers already understand what a smartphone does, they could then readily identify  that with UC capabilities. So, if we use terms like “smart communications” or “smart applications,” users would immediately recognize them as something that smartphones enabled and identify the benefits they get from UC-enablement.

So, I started Googling the Web for the term “smart communications” and found that most of the announcements came from a leading wireless services in the Philippines that calls itself “Smart Communications.” Needless to say, they sell a lot of smartphones and associated mobile services.

We can use the “smart” adjective at the application levels that UC-enablement can be applied to, e.g., CEBP and “mobile apps.” In particular, we can describe contact centers as being “smart”  when they handle any form of contact, inbound and outbound, and use contextual information to simplify the end user interface and minimize manual effort. For self-service online applications, voice commands can be used when desired, rather than error-prone keyed inputs, and application outputs can be visual rather than speech. Addresses for messaging or call initiation can come from online directory look ups or contextually from any document or message being viewed, rather than the contact initiator having to know this information beforehand.

I guess the bottom line for “smart” applications is that it lets end users do things easier, faster, and in any mode of user interface that a multi-modal mobile device provides. It lets applications be more responsive to the end users “on the go” who can’t spend much time doing things interactively. The desktop user interfaces for the same applications don’t really have to change much to meet the new demands of mobility, they just need mobile UI front ends for the different mobile devices being used.

However you look at UC flexibility, it is most useful for “smart” users who are getting more mobile all the time!

Tags: Contact Center, Mobile UC, Mobility, Speech Technologies, Unified Communications // 1 Comment »

UBM TechWeb, the producers of a leading conference for enterprise UC deployment, Enterprise Connect, have just announced another enterprise-oriented conference that focuses on mobility, Mobile Connect 2012.

http://www.mobileconnectevent.com/?itc=footer

I have always viewed mobility as one of the biggest drivers for UC, so it is puzzling that they would try to separate the two. In particular, the Mobile Connect 2012 agenda seems to avoid any mention of the role that UC-enabled applications will play for mobility.

In all fairness, the program will cover many aspects of UC-enabled technologies  from a mobile perspective such as:

• Mobile apps
• Analytics
• Business processes
• BYOD policies
• Security and governance

However, the concept of UC is to integrate all forms of communication and foster interoperability between the desktop and mobile endpoint devices. The fact that many end users will use their mobile smartphones or tablets for all their communications, only reinforces the need to “keep all the pieces in one box” from both a technology and management perspective.

So, while mobility is indeed a hot and increasingly important topic, I am surprised that it is being separated from the rest of UC-enabled applications. “UC” is not even mentioned once in the announcement, when it is absolutely foundational for mobility. The old wireless voice mobility (cellphones) is like the old desktop telephony which is being subsumed by more flexible, multi-modal smartphones and UC-enabled applications (including social networking).

We don’t really need to create new technology silos, but should be encouraging greater interoperability and consistency  between all forms of contact with any type of endpoint device. This will be particularly important as hosted/cloud-based services will be taking over business technology responsibilities in many ways.

Don’t separate them, join them! OK?

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I recently attended a local presentation and roundtable discussion of a Frost & Sullivan study of “Total Cost of Ownership” and best practices for premise-based contact center solutions compared to those in the cloud. The roundtable was hosted by InContact, a global provider of hosted contact center technology, who also sponsored the TCO study. (http://www.incontact.com/)

The conclusions of the study, not surprisingly, showed significantly lower TCO for the hosted, contact centers than comparable premise-based systems. Furthermore, TCO analysis showed that the cost savings from a hosted model increases with both the size of a contact center organization, as well as the number of contact center applications delivered as a hosted service.

A few days after the conference, I met with one of the attendees, who talked about his business, which he described as (outsourced) “telephone answering” services. He offers highly educated and well trained staff, speaking several languages, to answer real-time phone calls, for professional clients such as doctors, lawyers, consultants, SMBs, etc. Because his service personnel are located in Armenia, the costs are very low and highly competitive world-wide. He attended the conference because he was very interested in basing his services on hosted contact center technology, rather than owning it on his premises. However, he said that leading contact center technology vendors seem to be still very focused on dedicated business operations and ownership.

Having gotten started in the early days of call centers and voice messaging with Delphi Communications that offered “telephone answering” services to small and large businesses, I was very familiar and sympathetic to his interests. There is indeed great potential for UCaaS to merge with staff outsourcing in the “cloud” to maximize operational benefits and minimize costs for any type of business operation. In addition to considering InContact offerings, Interactive Intelligence was another candidate he was talking to.

As more business technology moves into the “cloud,” IT responsibilities (and costs) will be shifting to on-demand service providers. This is already being reflected in recent announcements by  leading carriers who are also supporting Mobile UC and access to “mobile apps” So, it seems obvious that the next step for cloud-based UCaaS will be to inter-operate with outsourced contact center agents for call answering assistance on demand. That combination will still be able to exploit interactions with other enterprise resources, e.g., subject matter experts, field service personnel, business partners, etc., while also providing real-time management visibility and control over business process activities.

So, I look forward to seeing “cloud” services enabling  “UC Contact Centers” to evolve more quickly, piece by piece, for both small and large organizations.

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