To meet customer expectations in a modern and highly digitised world, customer service functions have been developed to handle customer interactions through a variety of channels. These include the traditional phone method, email, live chat, SMS messaging, and even social media. The integration of all these communication platforms is what's known as the modern omnichannel contact centre. It is designed to offer more choice and convenience to well-connected, tech-savvy customers who have their own preferences when it comes to how and when they need support.
As you can imagine, the omnichannel contact centre relies on a complex web of sophisticated technologies. These are all integrated to deliver customers with fast and seamless experiences as they move and interact across different channels. But there’s no need to feel intimidated by consumers’ expectations, especially if you're a small business owner.
Fortunately, contact centres have become so much more technologically advanced behind the scenes. Businesses of all sizes can now offer their customers the advantages of an omnichannel contact centre experience without having to invest large amounts of money or develop the in-house technical expertise to build and manage systems and infrastructure.
A cloud contact centre is where all the core contact centre technologies are delivered by a third-party provider using cloud computing capabilities. The global cloud contact centre market is anticipated to grow from AU$8.9 billion in 2017 to AU$33.2 billion by 2023 with a compound annual growth rate of 25% during this period. Cloud contact centre solutions are internet-based facilities offering immediate access to a range of tools, no on-premise technology requirements, easy scaling and applications designed to deliver exceptional customer experiences across multiple channels.
How the cloud contact centre compares to traditional infrastructures
The traditional in-house contact centre infrastructure is extremely limiting, and many companies still relying on legacy systems are quickly realising that they can't keep up with the pace of change. Like trying to steer a ship around a corner, updating your traditional call routing system, or even adding new channels to the environment, can involve costly IT projects. These projects can take months to roll out from the moment a business case is put forward to the planning and implementation phases.
By migrating to a cloud contact centre solution, your software is maintained as evergreen - this means you are always automatically on the latest and greatest version and features are continuously added with zero downtime on the platform. This leaves your business with a sophisticated and up-to-date contact centre operation without the common pain points and expense of building and managing traditional infrastructures. Around 75% of contact centres are cloud-based; 44% are fully integrated and 31% are a hybrid form. Designed for plug and play, all you’ll need to do is configure your tools for your individual business and customers. Crucially, the costs of operating and owning a cloud contact centre are much less than developing and maintaining your own.
Conclusion
Contact centres today are under pressure to do more for customers with the same resources, but with speed and cost a critical factor, traditional contact centre infrastructures are simply not cutting it when it comes to evolving with the times. Cloud contact centre solutions are changing the game. By offering fast and flexible access to the most up-to-date technologies, a cloud contact centre solution promises to deliver the more personalised experiences your customers expect without the time, effort, cost, commitment, and rigidity of developing systems in-house.