Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) has reached a new level of maturity in the contact center industry. We can now shift the conversation from “Why should I do VoIP?” to “When and how should I move to VoIP?”
Because VoIP is such a rich, deep and complex topic, defining best practices for planning, implementation and support requires more than one article. Therefore, this article is the first in a series to help those that are on their way to VoIP — or anticipate they soon will be — to prepare for a successful transition that has lasting business value for the company and the center. Start a VoIP Planning Process
VoIP offers many opportunities for delivering business value. While the multisite is the “killer application” for VoIP, single-site environments can also find business value in this new system, including pseudo-multisite configurations for remote agents in satellite offices or homes, and business continuity and multimedia contact center operations.
TAGS: Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP), Transitioning to VoIP, Vs traditional phone systems, New Technology Evaluation, Customization, Ease of implementation, Integration issues, Scalability, Calculating ROI for application/system, Impact of application.

The word on the street is that call center professionals no longer want or need to hear why they should implement Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) solutions. They have heard enough about the benefits for multi-site centers, and the resiliency VoIP Call Center offers for disaster recovery. Most people can see how VoIP Call Center can accelerate and simplify multimedia routing and reporting for their center and their customers. They now understand that VoIP can help their center get long wishedfor functionality such as screen pops -- at a lower cost and with less hassle. And they see that VoIP Call Center can help them change their customer care paradigms: tap into reserve resources for peaks and expert resources for escalation; expand their labor pool to home agents and satellite offices; and do it all at a lower cost and with more agility then they ever could before.
People get VoIP Call Center. They know that VoIP Call Center is where the market is going, what the vendors are offering, and what they will inevitably have to implement. So as more and more centers plan for and implement VoIP Call Center, it is time to shift the focus to how to ensure success. This article presents ten important tips that start with the planning process and proceed through selection and implementation to postimplementation success.
TAGS: Transitioning to VoIP Call Center, Vs traditional phone systems, Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP), Call Center Technology Applications/Offerings, New Technology Evaluation, Technology Implementation/Maintenance, Technology

Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) has reached a new level of maturity in the contact center industry. We can now shift the conversation from “Why should I do VoIP?” and “When and how should I move to VoIP?” to “How do I successfully use it?”
Changing Support Roles For Voip Call center Independent of Voip Call center, contact centers require many support roles to operate and use technology effectively. Figure 1 shows a functional view of the roles included in best-practices operations. The number of people involved in these roles, how they are combined, and where they report vary tremendously based on contact Voip Call centersize, structure, focus and complexity. For example, a small Voip Call center may have no contact Voip Call center operations support organization or dedicated roles. Rather, managers and supervisors wear some of these hats, while working closely with HR and IT to fill other roles. A large, multisite, multiple business unit contact Voip Call center operation may have a shared services function that provides most or all of these functions, with many people involved and collaborating across functions. In a perfect world, as companies move to Voip Call center, these support roles are part of some sort of centralized organization (centralized logically, not necessarily physically) to support a virtualized operation (with technology based at a hub or data center(s) and distributed resources).
TAGS: Technology, Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP), Transitioning to VoIP, Vs traditional phone systems, New Technology Evaluation, Implementation/Functionality Analysis, Needs analysis, Vendor selection, Technology Implementation/Maintenance, System Monitoring/Testing, Vendor Support, Working with IT, E-support, Web calls