Unified Communication integrates all the enterprise communication services which include instant messaging, present information, voice and IP telephony, desktop sharing, data sharing, call control, speech recognition, audio, web, and video conferencing. With its share of advantages, the market for Unified Communications is expected to grow massively in upcoming years. There’s no denying that Unified Communications is constantly changing the modern workplace environment, and with the introduction of new tools, workplaces are relying more and more on UC platform. So, here we are listing out few trends that we can expect to see shortly.
As the already built IT infrastructure at most of the companies was mainly built for data exchange and processing, not for voice, video or collaboration. So, at first most of the companies will struggle to adopt to the cloud-based Unified Communication. A fully functional a UC requires entirely new and different technology infrastructure, most of the organizations have started to work round the clock to integrate voice communication into the already present IT infrastructure.
For most of the organizations Email is the primary mode of communication. Nevertheless, many of the companies are using instant messaging services for internal communication nowadays for immediate response and real-time team collaboration. However, Email still has its own advantages, and it’s still being used when it comes to outbound messages. So, IM is the next big thing for the organizations to create an efficient and improved work culture.
With each passing day, cloud-based Unified Communication platforms are gaining popularity, thanks to the range of customization and the cost-effective nature that a third-party hosting service provides. The best part is software based applications overtly simplifies overall management, owing to seamless upgrades and customizations without disrupting the users. However, cloud-based solutions always offer better integration of different applications, resulting in developing a UC system which is highly integrated.
Bots and digital assistants will capture the UC market. They often make tasks quite easy for their human counterparts, from stimulating conversations to performing different automated tasks. Additionally, they can help when it comes to the successful use of different UC tools and can look after interactions on UC tools.
With increasing digital communications with clients, most of the organizations nowadays keep the records or those interactions, be it over voice, video or web due to compliance reasons. Storing and managing traditional digital data is much easier than the challenges that come with storing video and voice, as both of these require more storage space and better management. With an increasing interactivity through video and voice, there is an equivalent requirement for storage facilities that enables the data to be searchable and retrievable whenever needed. So, while embracing the UC tools organizations need to sharpen their focuses on compliance.
The enterprise grade video conferencing still has to go a long way to be a key workplace staple. However, according to various reports more than fifty-four percent employees regularly get in touch with each other by using free consumer grade technology, and among them more than seventy percent uses FaceTime or Skype. In 2017, organizations will continue to push for video conferencing adoption; they will also work on making video a completely integral part just to accelerate digital transformation. From virtual training to meetings, video will play a huge role in UC in the near future.
While adopting UC, the traditional choice has always been either on-premise solutions or hosted services. But a large organization can adopt both of the models, however with little or no integration between the UC solutions deployed on-premise and a service hosted by an external provider; they would often be entirely separate from each other. Thanks to the availability of hybrid cloud models now businesses can combine both. Although deployment of hybrid cloud models can be really complicated sometimes rather than simply having them all on premise or delivered as a hosted service. Still, it is more viable for large corporations.
Unified Communication improves customer experience massively. As an example, while a consumer using a banking app that is UC enabled and noticed something unusual on his bank statement, then he can use the click-to-call feature embedded in the app to contact the bank directly, and the customer service advisor will get all the relevant data automatically. More and more consumers are becoming accustomed to this process, and soon most of the app will be UC enabled for better customer satisfaction.
Nowadays, organizations are habituated with complex technologies, and it is quite hard to handle for them. So, by sitting on top of the complex ecosystem UC comes in rescue, as in such ecosystem problems can arise from any direction which is virtually impossible to fix manually. So, MSPs who continue to rely on human labor in offshore locations to manage their Unified Communication offering will have a hard time to survive. That’s why now MSPs need automation to keep their systems ready for any action.
So, here were a few trends that are expected to change the world of UC shortly. Though, Unified Communication is an emerging trend still and needs assistance for proper implementation. Additionally, the stakeholders and executives who want their teams to deliver this technology must remember that an effective resolution is only as viable as the reason behind it and have the proper mechanisms in place to launch and bolster that strategy.
