Comparing On-premise and Cloud Contact Center Options

When it’s time to upgrade your contact center, you’ll likely consider both on-premise and cloud options. The two approaches to the delivery of contact center technology have different advantages and drawbacks.

For example, a cloud contact center allows users to access all communication formats through your private data connections or the internet. As long as there is bandwidth to cover user activities in the contact center, employees can access the technology from anywhere. 

By contrast, an on-premise contact center is hardware-based and requires regular updates and maintenance. That means that while a cloud contact center can be completely upgraded and maintained by a managed services provider, your on-premise contact center might require your IT team to handle installation, troubleshooting, and maintenance of the system from end to end.

Let's take a look at other areas of consideration when deciding whether to deploy an on-premise or cloud-based contact center technology:

Set-up and installation: The set-up of an on-premise contact center can take several months as you procure hardware and necessary licenses, get the infrastructure in place, and build out the programming. Some cloud contact center software is as simple to setup as opening an account and selecting a few standard options. Because the infrastructure lives in the cloud and is managed by the service provider, you could start up (or add additional resources in the future) almost instantly. 

Cost: The main differentiation between on-premise and cloud contact centers is how costs are categorized. An on-premise system requires a large cash outlay at implementation, which is categorized as a capital investment. With a cloud contact center, the monthly subscription is treated as operating expenses. At first pass when reviewing pricing, an on-premise system may seem cheaper. But the lifetime cost for a cloud contact center (when a proper total cost analysis is performed) is often lower than that of an on-premise solution. 

Features: Most modern contact center systems, be they cloud or on-prem, come with core features such as: 
- the ability to queue incoming interactions so customers get self-help options and fair treatment of their call, email, or text.
- intelligent distribution of interactions to agents.
- analytics to help you manage your contact center. 

The advantage cloud has in the application game is that cloud providers can deliver continuous upgrades and improvements to all their customers without the need to adhere to rigorous release schedules, force customers to buy upgrades, or leave some customers behind as their systems age. 

Integration options: While it’s possible to integrate on-premise contact centers with certain other software solutions, this category is one of the big advantages that a cloud option has over the on-site contact center. Cloud solutions easily integrate with other technology and provide opportunities for streamlining workflows. In general, cloud-based contact center providers offer wider integration portfolios with the current wave of cloud-based business services (like customer relationship management software and help desk ticketing systems). This cuts down dramatically on cost and friction in getting your contact center and other critical business systems talking to each other.

System reliability: By placing infrastructure in the cloud, contact center providers deliver a more stable, more reliable service that the risk you take running your contact center off a server located in your private office or data center. If you invest in the right data connectivity for your business, cloud contact centers put you in a stronger position to withstand service interruptions and other outages.

Contact us at City Communications to discuss how a cloud contact center could benefit your enterprise or to run a total cost analysis between your on-premise solution and the latest cloud-delivered contact center systems.