Only a few years ago, studies showed that while many contact centers were interested in moving their operations into the cloud, a significant number felt that there were still significant obstacles. Security concerns, questions about integration with existing systems, and concerns about a loss of investment in current on-premise systems were all reasons that organizations cited for being reluctant about making the switch to cloud services.
Today, those concerns are rapidly shrinking. Contact center solution vendors have been increasing and improving their cloud offerings, focusing strongly on those issues that contact center managers have felt to be barriers to adoption.
The result has been an increase in the number of contact centers recognizing the advantages of cloud-based services, for both customer service and operations. Here are some of the reasons that contact centers are moving into the cloud.
One of the biggest advantages of using cloud-based services as opposed to on-premise systems is startup cost. Instead of purchasing hardware and software, organizations can simply purchase subscriptions. This means there’s no initial capital investment, as there is with an on-premise system.
In addition, cloud services can be canceled without losing much of your investment - other than the time you spent training employees on the system.
According to Fortune magazine, the technology that many contact centers rely on is growing old - about eight to 10 years old, to be precise. This means that many centers are at a point when they need to decide whether to upgrade their systems, or purchase new ones. Executives are faced, therefore, with the complexity and cost of upgrading an on-premise system, both of which can be significant.
Since cloud services don’t require hardware updates, many executives are seeing them as a better option.
One reason that many contact centers wait as long as possible to upgrade old technology - in addition to the capital investment - is that executives don’t want to risk the lengthy downtime that can arise when installing new on-premise systems.
This can be managed well if you have a reliable vendor, but there’s no denying that cloud services can be deployed much faster. Whereas on-premise systems can take a few weeks to a few months to be ready, cloud services can be ready to use in as little as a few days.
With so many contact centers now using remote agents for a percentage of their workforce, cloud services are becoming a necessity. With cloud operations, agents can access all the information and services they need through their own computer, with nothing but a simple login.
As using remote and at-home agents allows contact centers to access wider pools of talent, as well as offer more competitive jobs, there’s every reason to believe that the growth of these types of positions will only grow.
With so many high-profile data security breaches - Target, Yahoo, the Democratic National Committee, and more - in recent years, contact center executives have justifiable concerns about whether their organization’s security would be more at risk by migrating to the cloud.
Cybersecurity is always an issue, and as more organizations move into the cloud, more security breaches will occur. This is simply because there will be more data available, not because the cloud is inherently less secure.
Cloud service providers are consistently improving security and responding to threats as they emerge, but there’s another option for contact centers that have concerns. Many of these organizations are choosing a hybrid model, which allows stored data to be shared between on-premise servers and the cloud. This can alleviate some of the anxiety that IT professionals and executives may have when choosing whether to migrate to the cloud.
In the end, contact centers must choose the solution that’s right for them, be that cloud, on-premise, or a hybrid of the two. If you’re considering changing your data systems, contact us at KOVA - we work closely with contact centers to create custom workforce management and workforce optimization solutions that fit their needs.
