The number of professional tools and applications available on the market for small businesses has grown considerably over recent years. However, the abundance of digital tools used on a daily basis is becoming a hindrance to employee productivity. This is also increasing the risk of errors and security breaches. Integrating your communications tools with your business tools can help to limit these risks significantly. In this video, Adam explains in just under three minutes why this is, and outlines how standard and customisable integrations can help employees save time.
Today, nearly all tasks and business processes can be carried out with the help of software or mobile applications, on site or through the cloud. However, these tools don’t guarantee productivity. In a recent RingCentral survey, more than half of Australian workers use six or more workplace apps each week; and 43% are spending at least one hour a day checking or responding to notifications from these apps.
When it comes to business communications, the number of new interactive channels that are now available means several systems are needed to manage the phone, instant messaging, video meetings, and all other means of communication.
The sheer number of apps impacts productivity
Unfortunately, many of these tools are unable to communicate with each other. As a result, employees are required to re-enter data as they move from one tool to the next – negatively impacting productivity and increasing the risk of errors. Another time sap is the fact that 43% are spending at least one hour a day checking or responding to notifications from these apps.
What’s more, using several tools also adds to the risk of security breaches, as IT teams are unable to implement the necessary procedures to secure the data passing through all these tools (some of which are used by employees without the IT department having been informed – a phenomenon known as Shadow IT).
All these drawbacks can be reduced by using tools which are better integrated with each other. Integration should begin with your communications tools, as new modes of working – particularly mobile and remote working – have significantly increased dependence on these applications.
How small businesses benefit from an integrated communications solution
With unified communications solutions (UCaaS) such as RingCentral, businesses benefit, first and foremost, from a complete and integrated solution for managing all business communications. This, of course, includes phone (which remains the preferred channel for maintaining strong relationships) but also extends to team messaging, video meetings, fax, and even webinars.
In addition, unified communications solutions can also support the integration of various processes with other business tools – something which really helps to make employees’ lives that bit easier. This is straightforward to implement, provided you take full advantage of the capabilities of the latest generation of cloud-based solutions offering open APIs. This native integration enables links with other office tools (Office 365, Google Workspace, etc.) and business systems (CRM, ERP, etc.).
One simple example of how integration works is being able to make a call directly from the contact record in your CRM (e.g. Salesforce). It’s also possible, when receiving a call, to pull up this contact record so you can find out which customer is calling and access their previous logs and information immediately. You can then link the call recording to this record so you can keep track of it.
Employees want simplified communications
This use case clearly demonstrates what benefits unified communications can bring for employees – from greater simplicity and less time wasted through to improved data archiving. Moreover, individuals have developed sophisticated expectations when it comes to digital technologies. They want as much fluidity and simplicity at their workspace as they have become accustomed to in their personal lives.
It’s therefore very much in companies’ interests to offer their employees a modern, connected and integrated workplace that allows them to save time by automating their workflows via business applications and communications tools.
Don’t miss the next episode!
- Episode #5: How to manage your communications platform more effectively with advanced analytics
Originally published 13 Mar, 2024, updated 19 Mar, 2024
