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The fact that the contact center industry has been irrevocably changed since the dawn of digital communications is well-tread territory at this point. However, in light of a recent report from Dimension Data (News - Alert) that claims the number of voice interactions will be overtaken by the total number of all other interactions—namely email, Web chat and social media—before the end of the year, makes it a topic worth revisiting. Add to this the fact that more channels are on their way to further disrupt the contact center status quo and you have a topic begging to be revisited.

Fortunately, a recent post on CSIWorld.com does just this, focusing in on how apps like Facebook (News - Alert) Messenger and WhatsApp are on their way to becoming consumers’ new first point of contact. It may seem strange to think of these primary communication channels for interacting with companies, but Facebook (News - Alert) Messenger and WhatsApp alone have nearly two billion combined users. As such, it’s very likely that people will prefer to handle as much communication as possible via these platforms.

Besides, it’s not as though this isn’t already happening to some extent as Facebook itself recently introduced new APIs to enhance the customer service capabilities of its Messenger app.

For individual companies, and the contact center industry as a whole, the challenge becomes learning to adapt and embrace this change. Like any major technology shift, though, this is more easily said than done as there are challenges associated with adopting messaging platforms. First and foremost is the fact that contact centers currently have to use separate software or devices for each platform.

“Think of how little sense it makes to force (and train) users to use one software for calls, another for web chats, another for internal IMs, a separate desk phone for internal calling, and then something else for email or social media or video routing,” said Jeremy Puent, product manager for Clarity (News - Alert) Connect.  “This pulls agents in many directions—which makes them less effective at customer service.  It also can lead to agents being overwhelmed, which can lead to high turnover.”

There are businesses stepping in to address this issue, however, with Clarity being a prime example. The company recently integrated Facebook Messenger into its contact center product, Clarity Connect, which is native to Skype (News - Alert) for Business. As such, businesses are able to add Messenger as a new channel that’s accessible via Skype for Business, a popular choice for business communications.