Is Cloud Communications Right for Your Business?

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Is Cloud Communications

Right for Your Business?

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The Internet has expanded businesses reach - a small mom-and-pop store, that used to be strictly a hometown favorite, can now compete in a global market. This same small business might now find its main competitor is Amazon.com instead of the shop down the street.

The Internet has also altered our workforce - the mobile worker is now the norm. A Cisco study on the international workplace found that 3 out of 5 workers say they don’t need to be in an office to be productive. Furthermore, [x]cube labs found that smartphone usage for work increased from 69% in 2010 to 91% in 2011.

These major shifts are impacting your business every day. As a leader you can either address these changes head on – or you can ignore them. Your choice will set the stage for your relevancy for years to come.

So the question you need to ask yourself is this:

“What can I do to ensure that my business remains connected, flexible and

competitive?”

Part of that answer needs to be:

Embrace unified communications in the cloud!

Is Cloud Communications what your business needs?

While we believe making the switch to cloud-based business communications solutions benefits all businesses, take a moment to consider the following scenarios. If your business is faced with one or more of the following challenges, you should invest time to see if making the move to a cloud based communication system should be a priority:

• Your business is located in an area where extreme weather (i.e., hurricanes, tornadoes, ice storms and flooding) can impact your employee’s ability to come to work, and can impact your ability to provide customer service and support to your clients during a time of crises. If you do not have a plan in place for disaster recover/business continuity, you have lost the ability to generate sales and to provide customer service and support

• You are a highly dynamic organization that is growing quickly. Cloud based communication systems give you agility. You can ramp up and scale down your operations on the fly. Since you pay as you go, you can also reinvest your capital in areas that provide the greatest return. Put your money into growing – not a soon to be obsolete phone system

• Your workforce is mobile. If your sales team spends a good portion of their time in the field; engaging in relationship building with current clients and cold calling prospective clients – then they need to be able to do these things WHILE still on your communications platform

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• Your goal is to maximize your IT Spend on tools that help you grow your business

• You suspect your customer service isn’t as “best in class” as you hope it is. There is no way for you to know how well you are doing as a service organization without having the ability to “hear the voice of the client.” Cloud Communications enable you to do that – so you know the truth behind your customers’ experience with your team.

Do any of these situations apply to you and your business? If so, here are some of the main reasons other companies have made the switch to a Cloud based communication system.

How Cloud Communications Can Help Your Business

1. Disaster Recovery/Business Continuity. FEMA estimates that 40-60% of business that close due to

natural disaster never reopen. Essentially, a flip of a coin. After all the time, money and effort you have put into your business, why bet its survival on a coin toss?

Simply put, your disaster recovery plan is the first step your business takes during a natural disaster. It includes backing up your info systems, documentation of critical information (computers, account names and passwords, tech support numbers, etc.) and a communications plan to ensure all your employees were evacuated safely. Business continuity goes further and sets forth your plan for your business to remain operational in case of disruption. This plan answers the following questions: Will your employees gather at a second location or work from home? Where will your employees route their calls when working off-site - to landlines at the remote site, at their homes, to their cell phones? How will your employees access important documents and data, and where will this information be stored?

When your communications and business operations are in the cloud, disaster recovery/business continuity is built into every solution. Cloud-based telephone systems have a higher likelihood of maintaining functionality during a natural disaster than a fixed-line, circuit-switched system. When your important documents are stored in the cloud, they have a greater likelihood of being accessible due to redundant servers. When your employees are accustomed to using product such as Remote Office or Telovations Anywhere to conduct business when they are in the field or working from a remote or home office, transitioning work from their office to a different location will be second nature.

2. Pay-as-you-go Model. There was a time, not too long ago, when companies were forced to buy

expensive PBXs to handle their voice traffic. They also had to manage a voice network and a data network. Having two networks adds unnecessary costs and complexity to your business without adding any additional value. The capital investment in a PBX takes money that you can use for growth and puts it into a piece of hardware that can break, needs to be managed by your team, does not have geographic redundancy embedded into it, requires space, power and maintenance - in essence, you become a small phone company that supports your employees. This just doesn’t make sense anymore. Now you can pay as you go and let somebody else handle the complexity of phone service.

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3. Any device, anywhere, anytime. Wrike, an on-line project management platform, conducted a

working habits survey in March 2012. They found that 83% of respondents spend at least a part of their day working from home, and 89% consider having the flexibility to work from home as one of their 3 main job perks. Cloud communications gives you the ability to provide your employees

flexibility and maintain productivity. How? With universal connectivity. The applications they need to do their jobs can be delivered to any device - their computer, laptop, tablet, landline or mobile phone; anywhere - home, remote office, or coffee shop; anytime they chose.

4. IT Cost Savings Benefits. In 2011, Gartner Executive Programs surveyed 2,000 CIOs worldwide and

found that most CIO’s top business priority was increasing growth while decreasing costs. When your communications system is located in- house, it is the main focus of your IT department. They are spending their time maintaining equipment, handling new software installs and updates, and providing tech support. Cloud communications companies provide tech support to your employees, ensure you are operating with updated software and handle installs. Furthermore, you have no equipment to maintain. Your IT department will no longer be a drain on resources, bogged down with the little day- to-day items. They can shift their focus to innovation, to strategic initiatives, and to projects that will positively impact your bottom line.

5. Data (Audio) Mining and Analysis. Every time you call in for customer service or support you hear

that familiar phrase “This call may be recorded or monitored...” Recording is just the tip of the iceberg as it relates to providing a quality customer experience. Data mining is now the de facto standard of what companies need in order to get instant feedback related to the efficacy of their service business. Audio mining can help you determine where weaknesses lie in your customer service department. You will know if your reps are courteous or rude, if they can solve the customer’s problem the first time, or if more training is needed, you will know how long people wait on hold, and how many rings it takes before their call is answered, etc. But, did you know data mining can help you sell your product? With data mining, you can build a profile of your best customer. It can help you understand your customer’s buying habits and what attracts them to your product. It can also help you understand why someone doesn’t buy your product. You can profile your typical customer and why they are attracted to your product. With that information you can tweak your messages.

Jascha Franklin-Hodge of BlueStateDigital, stated that data mining allows “campaigns to be more effective in their messaging. More effective in finding the right people to engage in the right ways, at the right time of day, through the right platforms, to give people experiences that are more tailored to them, and more compelling for them.”

Now you know

Now that you are armed with the facts about Cloud Based Communications, you can make that important determination as to if this is a direction that is right for you and your business.

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About Telovations Inc.

Telovations is a next generation communications company that innovates the way you communicate. Businesses today communicate through many different collaboration efforts, mobility solutions, and numerous applications. Telovations provides unified communication solutions that tie all of these together and allow your business to be more flexible, manageable, and scalable. Our approach, Communication-as-a-Service (CaaS) is an integrated delivery model of hosted business

communications, allowing your company to leverage applications such as hosted voice, unified messaging, hosted call center, hosted recording, CRM integration, along with detailed analytics and statistics.

Corporate Headquarters: 1410 N. West Shore Blvd. Ste. 700

Tampa, FL 33607 Phone: 813-321-1000 Toll Free: 877-934-6668 www.telovations.com

Mid-Atlantic Regional Office: 3467 Apex Peakway

Apex, NC 27502 Phone: 919-459-2300