With cloud technology taking over as the new go-to for contact centers, businesses have a more cost-effective way to keep customers happy without breaking the bank. Enter the hosted contact center: it’s a cloud-based alternative to traditional contact centers that rewrites the rulebook for how customer interactions are managed.
But what exactly is it? How does it work? And why are businesses of all sizes flocking to it? Let’s cut through all the tech jargon and see why it’s such a big deal.
What is a Hosted Contact Center?
Think of it this way: where a traditional, on-premise contact center is a clunky old desktop that still runs Windows 1.0, a hosted contact center is a shiny new MacBook Pro 15. Rather than paying for maintenance, fixing it when it inevitably breaks down, and losing time on outdated software, you simply plug-and-play, and someone else handles the updates for you. Simple, right?
A hosted contact center means that all the heavy lifting is done by a third-party provider. Cloud-based platforms are perfectly low maintenance for contact centers, as they don’t require hardware upgrades, complicated setups, server maintenance, or significant long-term expenses. All they need is a solid internet connection and there you have it – a fully functioning contact center at your fingertips.
Hosted contact centers fit in perfectly with today’s constantly scaling, high-demand customer service departments that need flexibility and agility. Hosted centers let you focus on what you do best – serving your customers – while someone else handles the finer details behind the scenes.
Hosted contact center vs. on-premise solutions
Hosted and on-premise solutions differ significantly: they each have very different expenses and provide varying levels of flexibility and scalability. Let’s take a closer look:
- Cost: On-premise setups come with a much heftier upfront investment in hardware, software, installation, and IT staff to keep things running. Hosted solutions, on the other hand, work on a subscription basis, so you only pay for what you need.
- Scalability: It can be a challenge to add extra seats to on-premise solutions during times of growth, whereas hosted centers scale easily. Even if your team doubles in size, adding more users couldn’t be simpler.
- Flexibility: With an on-premise solution, you’re tied down to a physical location. Hosted contact centers let your agents work from anywhere, meaning you can hire remotely, access a larger talent pool, and provide your team with a better work-life balance.
Hosted contact centers are the modern, hassle-free version of traditional office-based systems, and are ideal for businesses that want to stay agile and competitive without the added stress of tech issues.
Key features of hosted contact centers
Hosted contact centers come locked and loaded with all the key features you need to provide excellent customer service. Here are the main ones:
- Omnichannel communication: Customers today use a variety of different channels to reach out to businesses, whether it’s WhatsApp, Messenger, email, phone, web chat, or SMS. Hosted contact centers allow you to handle it all from one platform, maintaining consistency and high quality service for your customers.
- AI-driven tools: From chatbots that automate the handling of FAQs, to AI-powered dialers that optimize calling campaigns, hosted contact centers don’t mess around when it comes to cutting edge technology. AI tools aren’t just efficient, they’re able to provide personalized service at scale – and that’s what keeps customers coming back.
- Advanced reporting and analytics: Hosted contact centers turn raw data into valuable insights, allowing you to identify any issues in your customer interactions, agent performance, or operational efficiency. They give you a window into how your contact center is performing on the whole, so you can see what’s working and what’s not.
These features are more than just bells and whistles, they’re the secret to seamless, modern customer service that keeps your business competitive.
How Do Hosted Contact Centers Work?
A hosted contact center operates like a digital control room – only it’s all in the cloud. Rather than dealing with clunky, on-site hardware setups, everything happens on servers. Managing customer interactions, storing data, or routing calls to different departments? It’s all happening remotely, behind the scenes. Here’s how it works:
Cloud-based technology infrastructure
The core of every hosted contact center is its cloud-based infrastructure. Cloud servers are where all the information and processes live: they take care of the heavy lifting like call routing, queue management, storing customer data and everything else that happens in contact center operations. All businesses need is a reliable internet connection.
Thanks to their remote nature, there’s no need to invest in on-site servers or complicated hardware. They automatically update, can be accessed from anywhere, scale easily with your business, and are flexible enough to adapt to any time zone, which is perfect for remote teams. Cloud-based technology is ready to go when you are – without the delays of traditional, clunky hardware.
Communication channels supported
When it comes to communication channels, customers want options. It could be a quick chat, a phone call, an email, a direct message, or text, but customers want to use the platforms that suit them best. Hosted contact centers allow you to manage every channel in one place with omnichannel capabilities.
You can even incorporate SMS to provide instant updates and appointment reminders for customers, preventing any issues before they even arise. Omnichannel means customers can reach you wherever they want, seamlessly and effortlessly, without agents having to constantly switch between different windows and systems.
Integration with other software
Working alongside other software is a hosted contact center’s bread and butter. Most platforms integrate with CRMs like Salesforce or HubSpot, so agents have readily available access to customer histories, preferences, behaviors, and buying patterns, as they happen.
Plus, they can sync with other third-party tools like marketing platforms and helpdesk software, or any other system your contact center needs. Integrations are the catalyst of streamlined workflows and smoother, more personalized service for customers.
Benefits of a Hosted Contact Centers
Switching over from a traditional to a hosted contact center is more than just modernization. It’s about reaping the numerous benefits of cloud-based infrastructure that on-premise solutions simply can’t measure up against. Let’s have a closer look:
Cost efficiency
Hosted contact centers are easier on the wallet as they save money upfront and over time:
- Lower setup and initial investment: No need for expensive hardware or on-site servers, simply plug-and-play.
- Minimal maintenance: The provider handles all the dirty work, like updates, upgrades, and repairs, so you don’t have to.
- Subscription-based payment: Spread the cost throughout the year with pay-as-you-go pricing to avoid unnecessary costs.
Scalability and flexibility
A hosted contact center can easily adapt to changing business demands, whether you’re scaling up or scaling down:
- Easily add or remove agents: Ideal for seasonal spikes and dips, or business growth, hosted centers allow you to seamlessly add or remove agents and channels as you need them.
- No hardware hassle: Scale up (or down) without having to worry about physical limitations like office space.
- Customization: As customer needs evolve, you can easily add or adjust your features and functionalities to suit them.
Remote access for agents
Remote work provides unmatched flexibility for managers and teams, as agents can work from anywhere in the world as long as they have stable internet:
- Work from anywhere: With an internet connection, agents can work from any country, in any time zone.
- Wider talent pool: Access to employees from around the world means a more diverse pool of potential candidates to hire.
- Built-in collaboration tools: Your team can stay connected with shared resources and platforms that give them access to the same information, keeping customer experiences consistent.
Improved customer experience
Happier customers are loyal customers – and hosted contact centers make happiness their main goal:
- Omnichannel support: Interact with your customers across all their favourite platforms, like phone, email, chat, or social media.
- Faster response times: Intelligent call routing and AI-dialers make sure customers are connected with the right agents, quickly and hassle-free.
- Personalized interactions: Integrated CRMs allow agents to access full interaction histories, keeping communication consistent.
Advanced analytics and reporting
Leverage data to improve your service and team performance, and ultimately boost customer satisfaction levels:
- Customer insights: Understand behavior and buying patterns to tailor services based on customer demands.
- Agent performance metrics: Track KPIs like CSAT and first-call resolution to see how effectively your agents are handling customer queries.
- Predictive analytics: Anticipate customer needs with real-time dashboards to optimize your workflows and identify emerging trends.
Reliability and security
The added bonus of hosted contact centers – data security, online storage, and reliability is handled and guaranteed by the provider:
- High uptime guarantees: Providers can ensure that your operations can run smoothly without service interruptions.
- Data encryption: Providers encrypt sensitive customer data to protect it against any potential privacy breaches or hacks.
- Regulatory compliance: Hosted software will always meet industry standards like GDPR, HIPAA, or PCI-DSS with built-in compliance tools.
Key Use Cases for Hosted Contact Centers
Hosted contact centers are the Swiss Army knives of customer service platforms. They can adapt to fit the needs of any sized business, from startups to global enterprises. Let’s dive into some key areas where hosted contact centers excel:
Small and medium-sized businesses
SMBs are the ideal use case for hosted contact centers, as they’re easy to run and budget-friendly. Without the need for hefty upfront investments in IT staff and hardware, hosted systems can provide smaller companies with the stability and reliability they need. Plus, as they grow, the software grows with them: need more agents during peak season? No problem. Expanding into new markets or new social media channels? Easy peasy.
And with the added bonus of having access to enterprise-level features, SMBs can deliver top tier customer service without the heavy budget requirements.
Enterprise-scale customer support
Big business = big responsibility. Juggling high volumes of customer interactions across various platforms can be messy for any company, but especially those with customers from all over the world, across various languages, time zones, and cultures. Omnichannel capabilities allow enterprises to handle all customer communications across all platforms, from one interface.
And it doesn’t matter what time zone the customer is contacting from – thanks to AI chatbots and IVR menus, hosted systems promise 24/7 support without the need for on-premise setups in multiple locations.
Remote and hybrid workforces
Remote work is the new default work model, and hosted contact centers are the ultimate enabler. They provide full flexibility for agents to work fully remote or hybrid by allowing them to log in from anywhere with a stable internet connection.
Supervisors can monitor their performance with centralized dashboards and management tools, coach in real-time, listen in on calls, and track agent metrics without having to be there in person. Remote work ultimately leads to a better work-life balance, as it gives agents stability and flexible schedule options. It’s no secret that happier employees lead to happier customers, so keeping your team engaged and motivated is top of the priority list.
Features to Look for in a Hosted Contact Center Solution
Finding the right solution for your hosted contact center can feel like finding the needle in the haystack. It needs to do everything you need it to do, and maybe a little more, while fitting in with your current tech stack and not making your head spin on your shoulders. To make things eraser, here are some key features we think are the most important to consider when looking for the right software:
Omnichannel communication
Customers today are calling, texting, messaging, tweeting, DM’ing and a million other things that all essentially do the same thing: communicate. What you need is a solid hosting system that can keep up with so much communication chaos. Rather than hopping between tabs and windows, omnichannel capabilities let you keep everything organized and in the same place.
The best solutions can even allow customers to switch channels mid-conversation, like starting a conversation on web chat and moving to WhatsApp to send images or media, without needing to repeat their issue or re-explain their entire story. It’s all about creating a seamless experience for both your team and your customers.
AI and automation tools
Wasting time on repetitive tasks is a thing of the past – AI and automation can handle the boring stuff while your agents save their creativity and critical thinking for the complex tasks. Chatbots are the ideal tool for handling FAQs and account queries, or collecting customer information before handing off to a human agent, giving your team some breathing room to focus and prepare for their next call.
Predictive dialing is another lifesaver – it calls numbers in bulk from a predetermined call list, and only connects agents to live calls answered by humans. They can even detect voicemails and busy signals, which saves your team ample time and resources. Plus, AI speech analytics can actually detect a customer’s tone of voice and score calls based on their sentiment, giving agents real time feedback on how they’re handling the customer’s query. Pretty handy right?
Customization and integration
Every business is different. Your contact center should embrace its unique quirks, not fight against them to fit in with the competition. Your chosen solution needs to tailor perfectly to your needs, allowing you to customize your own workflows, call scripts, and dashboards to match your business’ demands.
And remember: it needs to integrate with your CRM like HubSpot or Salesforce for agents to have access to entire customer histories. Add in third-party support for marketing platforms and helpdesk software, and you’ve got yourself a powerhouse of a system that works together with your current setup to cut your agent’s workloads and streamline your operations.
Performance monitoring and analytics
Without measurements, improvements are impossible. And let’s be honest, you’re in this business to grow and get better every day. Hosted contact centers are the perfect solution for tracking progress in real time, allowing you to keep an eye on live calls and queues, check in on agent performance, and get valuable feedback from customers about how they’re experiencing your customer service. Detailed reports can give you insights into key metrics while advanced analytics can identify trends and patterns, driving data-driven decision making.
Challenges and How to Overcome Them
Hosted contact centers bring a lot to the table, but nothing good comes without a price. Hosted centers come with a few hurdles that need clearing before your team can operate smoothly. But the good news is that with the right approach, they’re all super manageable. Let’s have a look.
Implementation and training
On paper, hosted contact centers are ready-to-use. You simply sign up to a provider and off you go – but how do you make sure your team can use the new solution effectively? There’s a learning curve to every new process, but the key is offering comprehensive training and onboarding to make the transition as smooth as possible.
Provide your agents with constant support to build their confidence in using the new tool. Run training workshops, Q&A sessions, and set a dedicated champion to be the go-to helper for anyone struggling. The goal is to make everyone feel comfortable and capable using it – after all, it’s there to make their lives easier, not complicate it further.
Ensuring security and compliance
A data breach or compliance violation can be the end of your business quicker than you can say ‘oops.’ Hosted contact centers in particular have to prioritize security at all costs, as one little slip could have everything tumbling down.
The best way to cover all your bases is to partner up with security providers who take it as seriously as you do – think encryption, 2FA, industry compliance standards like GDPR and HIPAA, and robust access controls. You’ll sleep easier knowing your customer data is kept safe, and your customers will thank you for the added peace of mind.
Managing remote teams
Keeping a distributed workforce on the same page can be a challenge, especially when different time zones come into the mix. Maintaining consistent and clear remote communication hinges on collaboration tools like Slack and Microsoft Teams that allow you to send instant messages and enable fully remote access.
When your team is all over the place, regular communication is the only way you can keep track of how everyone is doing. Schedule regular check-ins and one-to-ones, a virtual coffee break here and there, or even an online team building exercise to keep the team spirit alive. Remember: happy agents = happy customers, so make sure to keep a supportive and connected environment as much as possible.
How to Choose the Right Hosted Contact Center Provider
The right provider for your business needs to fit in perfectly with your current setup. It needs to be in sync with your business needs, and requires a few considerations before getting started:
Evaluate features and pricing
First and foremost – what’s your budget, and what exactly do you need to fix? How much are you willing to pay for the features you need? Establish this from the start to find only solutions that align with your business goals, whether they’re omnichannel support, AI-driven tools, or detailed analytics. Try not to get distracted by a bunch of shiny extras you’ll never use: stay focused, and only invest in what you need. And don’t forget to compare pricing models; subscription plans can vary drastically, and you want something that fits your budget without compromising on quality.
Assess reliability and uptime
A hosted contact center is only as good as its reliability: if it’s constantly experiencing outages and downtime, then what’s the point? You’re not only losing calls, you’re losing customer trust. When considering providers, look out for service level agreements (SLA) that give specific uptime commitments, like 99.9%, for example.
And take it even further – look into customer reviews and testimonials from current customers to get a realistic viewpoint of how people experience the software. A good track record means they’re consistent, which is invaluable when it comes to customer service.
Consider scalability and future growth
It’s important to always keep in mind where your business is heading: are you planning on expanding to new markets? Adding more team members? Growing your communication channels? The chosen solution should be able to grow with you, not box you in. The new tool needs to scale with busy periods, work across borders, and allow you to easily add or remove agents as needed.
Customer support and training
Your team needs to know how to use the tool properly in order to put its value to proper use. Without decent training and support, they won’t be able to offer customers the support they deserve. Look for a tool that offers a dedicated account manager who’s responsive, knowledgeable, and readily available when you need them. If the system ever goes down, you need to know that someone will be there to solve the problem ASAP. And bonus points for any provider that offers onboarding and continuous training resources.
FAQs
What is the difference between hosted and cloud-based contact centers?
Hosted contact centers are a type of cloud-based solution that are managed by a provider, while ‘cloud-based’ broadly refers to any system accessed over the internet.
How secure are hosted contact center solutions?
When provided by vendors with encryption, 2FA, and compliance certifications like GDPR and PCI-DSS, hosted contact centers are highly secure.
Can hosted contact centers handle both inbound and outbound calls?
Yes, most hosted contact centers are designed to manage both inbound and outbound seamlessly.
Hosted contact centers as a solution
Hosted contact centers are scalable, cost-effective, flexible, and low maintenance alternatives to traditional on-premise contact centers. They meet the demands of modern communications and businesses without the hassle or overheads that come with an office.
By offering powerful features like Omnichannel support, AI-powered tools, advanced analytics, and scalability, they fit in perfectly at businesses of any size. Whether you’re a startup or enterprise, the right hosted contact center solution can give you the competitive edge you need to thrive in a quickly changing market.
Speak to us today to see how Voiso can help you scale your contact center operations.
