Eco System Specialism

How much thought do you give to the Eco system of your specialism?

Fear not this isn’t a twist on the Darwinist argument; more the opportunity to raise awareness on just how broad your speciality probably is.

Let’s run with an obvious one first which is the Microsoft Voice product range.  This is typically the hardest item to deliver to any reseller who’s first question is; “How do we make money out of it?”  The answer in all likelihood is that you don’t.  Obviously this is a fantastic business proposition then…(!)  What you do make money from is the Eco-system and the services in providing it.

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Unified Comms; information overload or organised chaos?

Last week I went on a time management course; ignoring the irony that I had to cancel two appointments to make it and subsequently worked until 2am Friday morning to catch up, it was a worthwhile experience.

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Avaya IP Office 7.0 opens up massive SME upgrade potential

Avaya has announced that all legacy Nortel phones will now function on the new version of Avaya IP Office and all existing data – including customer records, voicemail and system configurations – can be migrated to the new platform easily using a migration wizard. This opens up massive potential in the SME market, as it provides a clear and affordable migration path to Avaya IP Office from legacy systems such as Meridian and Norstar, as well as the more recent BCM offerings. There is a large installed base of these systems in the UK.

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Power to I – the power of a connected enterprise or individual

Today I set out the simple objective to get from point A to point B and back whilst meeting with a customer and upgrading some hardware.

Sounds simple and by all accounts it should have been.

So what really happened; well I arrived at the train station to find my train had left early, yes, early.  You literally couldn’t make it up, so out comes the smartphone and two minutes later I’ve found an alternative route and I’m on the way to the customer thankfully still on time.

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Secure SIP Elephants…

Any ideas what SIP stands for? Actually never mind that, any ideas about my title at the top?? Hmmmm deafening silence at the front and a few eager hands at the back… 

Well SIP stands for Session Initiation Protocol but for the less technically savvy amongst you I’m guessing this only serves to complicate this introduction to one of the most important protocols on the internet since HTTP.

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There’s a fly in my soup…

There’s a fly in my soup… To quote Fawlty Towers: A satisfied customer. We should have him stuffed!

Service is apparently an optional extra these days and one that proffers no guarantees as to whether you will receive the product let alone the service should it be ordered online… (Sometimes).

Despite long term traditional bricks and mortar businesses becoming ever rarer it is apparent that they do still have the upper hand in one area over online businesses; face to face customer service.

So what can be done? Well with Video calling becoming ever more common in the consumer and enterprise market, the 2D face to face intricacies that have previously put people off this as a medium of choice are slowly diminishing.

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Happy Days for Unified Communications?

We are all used to unfounded dramatic predictions; on everything from the downfall of society to the proliferation of 3D TV. However, latest figures from market research firm IDC predict that the Unified Communications (UC) market will double by 2014 as outlined in a recent Microscope article by Alex Scroxton.

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Finger Pointing

Just imagine if the world’s economy were managed in such a way that it would be possible for it to spend and loan monies without ensuring it would get it back; I mean that could never happen.

Mmmm well, ok, but it’s not – or shouldn’t be – such an unreasonable assumption that we should have learnt from a previous crises.  So surely the distributors and resellers behind Unified Communications (UC) based technologies would ensure their solutions are designed with previous lessons learnt?

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Lights, Camera, errrr nice buns…

So, you’ve won the deal, A.N.Other company is ditching their external conference bridge, they’re creating their on-premise audio/video collaboration (VC) system and the first thing they’re presented with is a high definition picture of your crotch…

Take this as a word of warning, for yes, you can spend umpteen amounts of cash on the very best quality audio and visual kit and make a pretty penny from a customer eager to enter the high definition experience that today’s infrastructure will allow.  Yet the aesthetics of a conference room makes a world of difference, more importantly so does the lighting and placement of devices, whether they are video or audio.

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Little People – This is the year for video!

I’ve decide to resign. I want to spend more time with the little people who live with the woman in the photo on my desk.

Ok, (stop cheering!) I’m not actually going anywhere (stop booing at the back!) but how often do you get to see your family, friends, loved ones, even your pets?  As often as you would like? Thought not.

Whilst going green is almost certainly one of the key drivers for Video Collaboration, the second is allowing people to actually benefit from less travelling by spending more time at home and achieving the 37.5 hours you swear you originally signed up for instead of the misprint of 87.5 hours you actually do…

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