Unified Communications (UC) gets good press and rightly so. Many companies are looking to UC to gain efficiencies and cost savings. But, if you use your UC system in the same way as your old phone system, and don’t target the additional functionality your UC system provides, then you’ll only get a small percentage of the returns a UC can give.
We want you to get the most from your UC system, and to show you how easily it can be integrated into your business.
One of the key ways of getting the most out of your UC system is to promote it properly.
Matt McCloskey, Senior Product Manager for Applications & Services at Virgin Media Business explains, “There’s no point in buying a UC system if you work in the same way as you did before, for a UC to work and give you the cost and efficiency savings you want, you need a change of behaviour in your business.”
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Adding, “It’s too easy for an IT department to install UC then just move on to the next subject. When you roll out a UC system you need to make sure everyone has training on the system. And you need to monitor progress, to make sure that you’re getting the cost savings you planned.”
The good news is convincing employees to use a UC system isn’t particularly difficult, as people are rapidly growing accustomed to IP-based communications technologies. Your users are probably already using instant messaging, VoIP and other technologies at home. So, when you take the time to show them that they’ll be using the same tools in an integrated fashion for business benefits, they’ll soon get it.
Ultra efficient
UC systems are extremely efficient and with the addition of third party tools they can be made even more efficient. The UC system works on your computer network so it’s much simpler than adding to a conventional PBX phone system. If you have a Contact Management System (CMS) you can add your UC to your CMS, so that incoming calls give you full details on the customer ringing and outgoing calls can be done with a mouse click. All calls can be automatically billed against an account, or scheduled from your calendaring system.
Internal and external conference and video-conference calls are one of the biggest ways of saving money with UC.
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Internal and external conference and video-conference calls are one of the biggest ways of saving money with UC. By moving to video conferencing you save time on travel, on accommodation and subsistence. Simple voice conference calling also becomes far easier to do with a UC system. Previously setting up conference calls involved time being booked in a diary in advance, with UC you have the facility to start a call with a few instant messages to double-check colleagues’ availability, then it’s just a few clicks of the mouse to conference everyone in.
Share options
But it doesn’t just stop there. UC conferencing also has the technology to share data and applications. If a picture says a thousand words then the ability to share applications must be in the tens of thousands of words. The facility to either add a file to an instant message, or open up an application to share your spreadsheet or PowerPoint presentation on the conference call, and to open up shared whiteboards so that you can work collaboratively is a real bonus of UC. Just make sure that you train your staff up so you all reap the full benefits.
While many of the benefits of a UC system are internal, the option to have a single number to contact you on is a real bonus to anyone trying to reach you from outside of the business. To get the best use out of this feature you have to set it up properly, or all your external caller gets is voicemail. When your users move around you need to make sure that they tell the system where they are, and when they’re out of the building then they need to tell the UC system to direct calls to their mobile.
Foolproof savings
Instant messaging (IM) is an easy way to cut costs. With IM and presence you no longer need to ring a colleague to ask a quick question and you don’t need to spend time fruitlessly wandering the corridors looking for your colleagues. VMB has already learned that by using IM correctly it also helps cut down on expensive mobile phone usage within your business.
Here’s a good example, with IM a Customer Service Representative (CSR) can dramatically quicken the resolution of a critical customer issue that requires expert assistance. Using presence awareness, IM and message routing, the CSR can quickly locate an internal expert and receive an immediate response to their question, all while the customer is still on the phone. Without IM the support representative would be forced to send an email request to multiple experts, or place the customer on hold while attempting to find an available expert over the phone.
Easy homework
Telecommuting has grown rapidly since the 1990s. In 2006, there were an estimated 15 million UK teleworkers working from home at least one day a month. This figure is now on track to double this year. So don’t forget that a UC system is not just an office-based system, if your employees have broadband at home then they can benefit from all of the advantages of their work UC system, including IM, presence, video and audio conferencing.
If your users have UC software installed on their laptops, they can reduce the money spent on hotel phone bills by using cheaper broadband connections to connect to the office UC system to make calls
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Additionally, when your employees do have to travel for face to face meetings, UC can continue making you significant savings. Plus they can access all the standard UC features too.
