By Patrick Barnard, Group Managing Editor, Call Center Management

Are you still using 'legacy' on-premises workforce management software to schedule the agents in your call center?

 

What's holding you back from discovering the advantages today's Web-based workforce management solutions bring?

 

Do you have 'concerns' about migrating to a Web-based solution?

 

Is one of them that you'll end up sacrificing features and capabilities that only on-premises systems can deliver?

There are a lot of misconceptions out there about software-as-a-service or cloud-based software for the caller center - and one of them is that these solutions don't offer as many features and capabilities compared to on-premises systems.

 

A recent study from DMG Consulting, sponsored by Interactive Intelligence (News - Alert), dispels some of these myths and misconceptions.

 

Last week we learned that you don't have to be a small to medium-sized business to benefit from the advantages cloud-based call center software brings - and we explored several of the advantages today's cloud-based systems deliver for larger businesses, including increased scalability, flexible deployment options, automatic access to the latest versions of the software and the ability to shift responsibility for application performance, including monitoring and troubleshooting of hardware and infrastructure, from the internal IT department to the software vendor.

 

Another common misconception, the white paper states, is that cloud-based call center solutions are 'functionally inadequate.'

 

This misconception more than likely stems from the days of the traditional 'hosted' model of software delivery, where the customer still had to host some of the software 'client-side' on their own servers.

 

This early hosted (or ASP) model of a few years ago had its limitations - not the least of which was that the software could only be accessed through the company network (unlike today's Web-based applications, which can be accessed from any computer with a high speed Internet connection). What's more, many of these offerings had severe security problems because they were in fact on-premises software systems that had simply been 'repurposed' to reside of a host machine in a data center (i.e. they were not designed as Web applications).

 

Today we have call center software solutions that are delivered via a range of architectures - coming under the banners of 'Software-as-a-Service (SaaS (News - Alert)),' 'Cloud-based,' and 'Web-based.' Even the term 'Hosted' lives on - however today it more often means Web-based, as opposed to the traditional hosted model of the past.

 

The key is to not get hung up on which term the software vendor is using to market their service. Ultimately most companies select a cloud-based solution based on the same basic factors: cost, ease of deployment, features and capabilities, scalability, flexibility, and ease of integration among the main ones - NOT based on whether the vendor called it SaaS or Cloud or Web.

 

'There are many hosted contact center infrastructure solutions available in the market, each with its own unique design, architecture and functionality,' the white paper states. 'Just as no two premise-based solutions are alike, neither are the hosted contact center solutions.'

 

While the white paper is mainly focused on all-in-one call center software suites, where all the core call center applications reside on a shared platform, the same 'misconceptions' also apply for companies considering best-of-breed, standalone call center applications including workforce management.

 

The white paper concludes that although there is a wide range of offerings currently available, today's SaaS vendors 'offer some of the most competitive and functionally rich solutions in the contact center market.'

 

'This is one of the most exciting aspects of this sector; the range of choices available to users has never been greater,' the white paper states. The key is to choose the solution that best meets your call center's needs - and to not be afraid to dive under the hood and learn more about the provider's specific architecture for delivery and service guarantees. Once you find the one that's the right fit, you'll see an almost immediate improvement in your call center management.

 

Next week we'll look at another misconception covered in the white paper, 'Hosted contact centers solutions are inflexible and not customizable.'