Consider broader systemic risks when contemplating a contact centre migration

October 21, 2022

by: Ingrid Green

Risk and uncertainty currently characterise global markets. Both businesses and consumers find themselves under financial pressure as interest rates rise amid a global economic slowdown.

Faced with the potential threat of higher customer attrition due to these economic factors and shifting consumer trends, it has never been more important for businesses to focus on maintaining customer loyalty and retention, especially as wallets tighten.

As business grapple with these market dynamics, a modernised omnichannel contact centre will play an indispensable role in executing any customer retention strategy while helping to drive revenue growth in an increasingly constrained market environment.

Supply chain constraints and rising input costs are also making it more difficult for companies to compete on price. In this environment, customer experience will become increasingly important as a market differentiator and deliver an outsized competitive advantage.

Discerning modern customers already expect the best customer experience with every interaction and will punish companies that fail to deliver on these expectations by shifting their considered spend to competitors that meet their standards and expectations.

From an operational standpoint, companies need to optimise resources and reduce costs, with the agility and adaptability to respond quickly to changes in the market. The right contact centre solution can help tick all of these boxes.

In this regard, contact centre operators need modern technology built to handle constant change and disruption, and deliver customer experiences and omnichannel engagements that modern digitally-savvy customers demand.

Legacy on-premise architectures make it difficult to balance value creation with business continuity due to the high maintenance costs and resource requirements, and a lack of access to new innovation to maintain a competitive edge.

When businesses evaluate new contact centre solutions against their current capabilities and future needs, it is also vital to determine whether their preferred vendor is resilient enough to survive the current economic climate to ensure the business is not left stranded.

Recent news reports regarding financial difficulties at a major global unified communications (UC) provider have highlighted this potential risk factor and should prompt contact centre operators to carefully assess their preferred vendor, regardless of their track record and incumbency in the market.

According to reports from ChannelFutures and Bloomberg, a once magic quadrant leader is currently facing financial uncertainty after reporting a 20% year-on-year loss in revenue in Q3 2022 and shares plunged 21% as tougher trading conditions and a subsequent drop in earnings have compounded the risk associated with the company's leveraged debt.

As a company that supports 90,000 customers in 190 countries and 6 million contact centre seats (as of September 2021), the potential implications to its customers should the company close are substantial. Understandably, its customers worldwide are feeling uncertain about the future.

The potential loss in business continuity puts businesses at risk due to the loss of tech support and an inability to access the solution upgrades and new developments needed to maintain a competitive edge with their customer experience capabilities.

To ensure business continuity through these challenging times and future relevance as markets rebound, businesses must consider their contact centre migration options.

Ultimately, survival hinges on choosing a resilient and future-ready technology partner that can offer a tried, tested, smooth and seamless contact centre migration path to a contact centre solution that provides system agility, process and resource efficiencies, and a future-proofed approach to deliver sustainable differentiated customer experiences.