Evolution of CCaaS – What’s Next?

Want to know what’s happening in the CCaaS world right now and what the future might hold? Here, Nerys Corfield of Injection Consulting explains all.

Where Is the CCaaS World Right Now?

CCaaS Vendors Are Facing a Myriad of Challenges

It is a noisy complicated landscape of vendors. They are servicing a marketplace that is trying to navigate its way through a world full of generative AI potential and generative AI threat.

All whilst they themselves are silently battling their own navigation path to relevance in a world where their revenue potential could slowly diminish (as licences are predominantly based on live agent headcount) and CRM sharks are circling to eat their lunch.

Buying a new CCaaS solution has also become more protracted, as the buying team has become more democratized (a very positive thing as the people reliant on the solutions every day are more involved) and more complicated, as the demarcation of vendor roles and responsibilities across the customer service tech stack is becoming opaque.

Until About 10 Years Ago the Lanes Had More Definition

With a strong foothold in the contact centre operation’s performance, they extended their proposition to include workforce engagement functionality – like workforce management, gamification, and performance management.

This top-line perspective makes their modules look simple, but these items alone can create a shopping list with 400 functional requirements (lived experience = silly).

Add on top of this the complexities of integrating with a suite of business applications and point solutions and it can get super-complicated.

The CCaaS Players Had a Coalition Decision to Make

Back in the early to mid-2000s, the CRM vendors (whose historic lane was to manage customer data) were already stealing a march by insisting the email and digital channels were best placed to route directly via their application.

The CCaaS players therefore had a coalition decision to make, and most decided that with the objective of having their part of the pie, they had better get deeply embedded with their CRM buddies and hope they weren’t interested in encroaching further into their lane.

This gamble doesn’t look to have paid off as, in the last few years, the CRM vendors, in most deals, are taking more and more functionality as they hold the data, they own the desktop, and they are building their voice propositions.

Combination Players Have Been Around for a While – But Their Message Is Only Just Starting to Resonate

To make life trickier for the traditional CCaaS vendors, a new momentum has got behind the combination vendors who offer one single solution for CCaaS and UCaaS (not just a CCaaS solution which will sit over the top of any ‘PBX/Call Controller/Voice Platform).

These combination players have been around for quite a while, but their message is only just starting to resonate.

These combination players (nobody has come up with a universally adopted nomenclature) have been around for quite a while, but their message is only just starting to resonate.

For various reasons, players in this combined space have fallen short, but new entrants and heavy investment in the last 18 months means the contact centre functionality side is comparable to their CCaaS-only competitors, and overall security and availability is finally meeting the needs of many buyers.

Which CCaaS Vendors Are Leading the Market?

CCaaS Solutions Are Unique in People, Process, and Technology Factor Combinations

Depending on the criteria applied, the answer to ‘which CCaaS vendors are leading?’ could have several different answers. Having been in about 200 contact centres over 26 years, they have many commonalities, but each is unique because of people, process and technology factor combinations.

Most people would give you the obvious answer to this question and defer to the vendors who are sitting in the coveted positions in the global analyst firms. I don’t subscribe to this approach for 90% of buyers.

If you are a global buyer who needs points of presence and resources in every continent, then the 9 vendors who meet these criteria to earn themselves a position in the Gartner CCaaS Magic Quadrant will be your starting point.

No Analysts Have Enough Depth of Understanding of All Viable CCaaS Solutions

The reality is that with a vendor market so broad, with players who service specific geographies or specific verticals, there are no analysts on the planet who have enough depth of understanding of all viable CCaaS solutions.

Use them for guidance, but their insights should be overlaid with a broader more personalized and practical lens.

The focus on asking the right questions in the right way is particularly important as it is surprising what assumptions buyers make.

Having worked under the bonnet of some highly lauded vendor solutions, whilst helping buyers navigate this critical investment path, there are functionality gaps vendors don’t expose because buyers don’t ask the right questions.

The focus on asking the right questions in the right way is particularly important as it is surprising what assumptions buyers make.

Start With Your Current, Mid-Term and Future Needs

If you want to find a solution that is right for you, then you will start with your current, mid-term and future needs.

You will take a critical eye to every single thing you do now and consider ‘is this something we want to continue with or something we could change?’ as you consider what you need from a new CCaaS vendor.

This clarity will help you decide which vendors make your long list – simple Request for Information / RFI knock-out questions, and which make your short list – demos on your exacting use cases.

What Does the Future Hold for the CCaaS World?

Delivering Year-on-Year Growth in a Competitive Market Is Tough

To earn a coveted dot on the CCaaS Garnter Magic Quadrant, vendors have some binary requirements they have to meet. One of these is to deliver year-on-year growth and another is to demonstrate developments in functionality.

The focus on securing this dot shapes the market and it shapes decisions taken. I have concluded it does not consider the needs of the average buyer and the day-to-day realities of managing these solutions.

To deliver year-on-year growth in a competitive market that is not delivering the growth trajectory it once was is tough.

Vendors are deciding to secure growth through acquisition, which also serves the requirement to deliver additional functionality.

Vendors are therefore deciding to secure that growth through acquisition. Acquisition of another solution also serves the requirement to deliver additional functionality. Great for meeting the analysts’ requirements!

The reality of this decision, especially when it’s done without the users’ needs prioritized, is that it leads to a buggers muddle in the back end that is a challenge to navigate in design, build, deployment, and management.

The Vendors Focusing on the Needs of Their Customers Will Survive

It’s going to get ugly, hot, and great for buyers.

The vendors who are playing the long game and focusing on the needs of their customers and their customers’ customers are the ones who will survive.

The vendors who are clear on their differentiated value and ability to deliver to practical requirements are the ones who will survive.

The vendors who are more focused on putting dollars into a marketing engine to gain market share – rather than dollars into an R&D engine to deliver value to customers – hopefully won’t.

There Will Be Consolidation and Vendors Who Fold

The threats to the CCaaS vendors have been outlined.

These threats will mean that there will be consolidation in and across the marketplace and there will be vendors who fold.

As more focus comes onto the need for data security and sovereignty, players who offer true sovereignty of their CCaaS architecture, or who will deploy into private cloud instances, will start to be looked at more seriously.

As more focus comes onto the need for data security and sovereignty (of data and resources) due to high-profile ransomware attacks and digital terrorism threats, players who offer true sovereignty of their CCaaS architecture, or who will deploy into private cloud instances, will start to be looked at more seriously (cloud repatriation is on the move).

Combination Vendors Will Continue to Win Deals

Combination vendors will continue to win deals that service the contact centre and the broader business, so CCaaS vendors are likely to acquire or build UC capabilities or embed further into Teams (another frenemy capable of cutting their legs off!).

CRM vendors (and I include the heritage marketing vendors in this) will continue to take more and more of the licence stack.

CCaaS Vendors Must Avoid Playing Out of Position in a World They Don’t Understand

I have worked with some great CCaaS vendors. Some find themselves in a strong position because they are recognized by global analysts, others have a harder fight because they aren’t.

Some of the vendors on the analysts’ quadrants fully deserve their place. Others, in my opinion, fall short on some basics and therefore, don’t.

I could be shocked – but not surprised – by any announcement in this ever-changing market

I understand the race to include genAI and be seen as an ‘all things to all people option’ but their lane focus should stay front and centre and they should make sure the market understands this.

The CCaaS vendors are the ones who have a depth and breadth of experience in managing interactions effectively and providing insights to the contact centre teams to drive improvements in performance.

Start playing out of position in a world they frankly don’t really understand (CMOs not keen on hearing how to create digital journeys from a random CCaaS vendor) and they will get eaten by the Goliaths.

I could be shocked – but not surprised – by any announcement in this ever-changing market

It’s going to be interesting, and I could be shocked, but not surprised by any announcement in this ever-changing market.

Written by: Nerys Corfield of Injection Consulting

If you are looking to get a CCaaS solution (or change your current supplier), then read these articles next to help you get sign-off:

• What to Include in a Business Case for New Technology
• Proven Ways to Get More Budget for Your Contact Centre
• 17 Signs Your Contact Centre Technology Is Ageing Badly

Author: Nerys Corfield
Reviewed by: Xander Freeman