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Voicemail Replacement Featured Article
June 09, 2008
Choosing Unified Messaging for Voicemail Replacement
By Greg Galitzine, Group Editorial DirectorUnified messaging has been one of the big promises of IP
communications for many years. In fact, when I started out in this industry in the late 1990’s unified messaging was being touted as “the next big thing.”
communications for many years. In fact, when I started out in this industry in the late 1990’s unified messaging was being touted as “the next big thing.”It’s been a long time coming, but each year, and with every product revision, enterprises are getting closer and closer to the reality of voicemail replacement with a modern unified messaging solution that allows them to replace disparate products and reap the benefits of a single solution designed to make them more efficient and effective in their professions.
solution that allows them to replace disparate products and reap the benefits of a single solution designed to make them more efficient and effective in their professions.Interactive Intelligence (News - Alert) has long been a proponent of leveraging cutting-edge technology to displace aging legacy solutions. For example, the company’s Messaging Interaction Center (MIC) is designed to enable a wide variety of organizations in various vertical markets (business, education, healthcare,) to deploy a single solution to handle all of that organization’s messaging needs and replace aging systems.
The Interactive Intelligence MIC offers enterprises applications such as voicemail and unified messaging, enhanced messaging, fax and IVR, and it’s all configurable and administered from a single central location. And, Interactive Intelligence allows organizations to scale up one seat license at a time as needs and user requirements change over time.
, and it’s all configurable and administered from a single central location. And, Interactive Intelligence allows organizations to scale up one seat license at a time as needs and user requirements change over time.Three key applications offered by MIC are:
- Voicemail: MIC enables effective voicemail replacement, supplanting outdated legacy system hardware.
- Unified messaging: streamlines e-mails, voicemails and faxes into a user's e-mail inbox, but also integrates disparate systems and administration interfaces onto a single platform.
- Enhanced messaging: Picks up where unified messaging leaves off, integrating e-mail, voicemail and fax, as well as adding Find-me/ Follow-me, personal call rules, real-time presence management, and other advanced features.
According to an April 2007 Osterman Research report, Unified Messaging Market Trends, 2007-2010, approximately 80% of organizations surveyed exhibited a high degree of interest in integrating their e-mail data with other repositories, such as customer relationship management, content management and knowledge management systems.
Furthermore:
- Sixty-eight percent of respondents said they plan on migrating to a new messaging system within the next two years. An additional nine percent that will migrate after two years, a total of 77 percent plan some type of system change.
- More than half of responding organizations indicated that a unifying system is more desirable than separately managed e-mail and telephone systems.
- Nearly three out of five organizations believe that there is value in upgrading to a unified messaging system, and a majority of organizations believe that end users will be more productive by leveraging a unified messaging system.
It is statistics like these that point towards an obvious conclusion. That is organizations are increasingly considering making the switch from legacy systems to new and improved unified messaging solutions like the MIC from Interactive Intelligence.
Interactive Intelligence invites you to visit the Voicemail Replacement channel on TMCnet.com. This channel will serve as a repository of news and information for unified messaging and will feature articles and case studies showcasing the strengths of current solutions and the need for voicemail replacement.
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Greg Galitzine (News - Alert) is editorial director of TMCnet. To read more of Greg’s articles, please visit his columnist page.
