How Unified Communications Can Streamline Your Business
As a business grows and evolves into a larger entity and branches out, taking on new and exciting ventures, the myriad of new communication channels that may get added to the company can be overwhelming and hard to keep track of. Communications infrastructure such as this can be incredibly wasteful of time and resources and can be extremely costly too. A solution to this issue has developed over the past few decades into something that is an essential addition to any business, especially those experiencing growth and changes to the way they do things. So, what are the benefits of implemented unified communications (UC) into your company, and how can it streamline your business as a whole?
Reduced Budget Expenses
When adopting a good, unified communications platform, you can see a measured difference in cost, and finding more ways to save money only benefits your business. You might find that you’ve accumulated an unnecessary number of applications and devices over the years, such as different conferencing software or phone systems. Using a unified platform eradicates the need for multiple, unlinked systems and will help you to assess what you need to get rid of, especially unnecessary subscription services, greatly reducing your expenditure.
Increased Productivity
Having a system that merges or links your communication channels and devices is a great way of enabling your employees to increase their productivity. They’ll spend much less time managing communications as a whole and can quickly and easily decide on the best comms method for their tasks. Having a system like this in place improves both in-office and remote working efficiency too, as a good quality unified communications system will incorporate cloud-based tech to keep everyone connected. As well as helping your team complete their tasks, it will also serve to boost the productivity of in-house activities such as meetings and file-sharing. Team chats and video calls, and online file-sharing further strengthens a workplace that has adopted hybrid-working.
Internal And External Comms Improvements
When running a business that is home to a large contact centre, you’ll know that good customer service is key to a successful business strategy. Using a good unified communications system can be fantastic for enhancing your communications with customers and clients, as you’ll find it’s much easier to direct those callers to the correct departments and offer a better overall experience. As well as this, communication between staff members will be greatly improved and can even help you to better connect to remote workers. No longer will you need to rely on people being in the office to handle a particular task or assist you.
Streamlined IT Services
Your IT department is likely going to have been craving UC as they’ll be well aware of the complexities of running multiple technical systems. It will be their job to manage and install this platform for your entire business but having control of one system and not needing to spread their focus and knowledge across multiple different applications will speed up their technical assistance and ensure a better understanding of potential issues that may arise.
Increased Digital Security
Allowing your staff to use whichever platforms they feel comfortable with might seem like a positive and helpful decision, but it can bring with it a number of risks. Staff members sending sensitive information via applications that you don’t have control over for example, can be very risky to the overall security of your business, especially if those applications don’t feature end-to-end encryption. Similarly, untrusted software and apps can be an easier access point for malware and other malicious software. Having your own UC platform which your IT department can have direct control over is the best way to ensure the security of your networks and devices.
Build On Existing Processes
You won’t need to scrap your previous systems when implementing UC, and the tools that a system such as this can provide can be used to enhance or replace parts of your current one to improve current tasks and processes. Collaborative tasks can benefit greatly from unified communications, and you’ll find that your team won’t have to change the way they do things that much, no matter where they’re situated.
In-Built AI And Bots
Additions like chat bots to answer online enquiries and phone AI with high quality voice recognition software are becoming much more popular today. These tech additions help to alleviate the workload of your team by gathering preliminary information and details from customers and clients before they’re then put through to the relevant department. This data gathering eliminates the need for real people to spend time finding account details and confirming people’s identity, and also aids in sending calls to the relevant department straight away, reducing the chances of callers being passed around. This benefits both your team, and your customers, streamlining the process for everyone and hopefully increasing the chance of a first call resolution.
