The modern communications environment is a complex one, says Kevin Hardy, General Manager of Converged Communications at Dimension Data Middle East & Africa.
The more intricate interactions become, however, the easier it is for businesses to lose sight of the associated costs. “Although companies generally understand the importance of catering for mobility and unified communications, they struggle to see the return on investment (ROI),” Hardy explains. “Most organisations don't actually know what they are spending on corporate communications - and therefore don't realise how much they could be saving.”
Engaging with an expert provider that offers a suite of services in the networking as well as the communications and collaboration domain, can help organisations select the most appropriate technologies, integrate them seamlessly into the corporate environment, manage IT support costs, and increase network availability. This will result in reduced costs, increased employee productivity, increased competitive advantage and enhanced customer service.
To successfully optimise a company's communications environment, it is necessary to explore both internal (user-side) and external (carrier-side) channels. Managing the wealth of channels/devices available to end-users will simplify the communication environment, while understanding how carriers work will significantly reduce the high costs associated with them.
Dimension Data's Telecommunications Expense Management (TEM) offerings are expressly designed to manage multiple devices and services. TEM also looks beyond simply assessing direct expenditure and to managing user behaviour within the organisation. Many service providers will offer short term savings, which are generally fairly easy to achieve, but it is the optimisation of that environment in the longer term that is crucial and needs to be sustainable going forward. Dimension Data's TEM services provide a much-needed single view of the organisation's communications environment, and gives businesses complete control of all its communication spend - across multiple sites and communications devices - paving the way to sustainable savings over the long-term.
“A reduction in costs will enable the organisation to re-channel spend to other areas, and replace expensive communication solutions with more cost-effective ones,” explains Hardy. “In other words, empower businesses to 'save to invest'...”
Dimension Data offers three hosted communication solutions, which can be used in combination for maximum effect:
* Surveyor manages and monitors all your telecoms carrier invoices on one platform. It is an assessment service that provides you with insights into your entire communications infrastructure and provides you with a snapshot of your current expenses, allowing you to identify opportunities for additional cost savings.
* AnalyZer is a comprehensive telecommunications management tool that monitors and manages user behaviour, offering you a detailed overview of their total communications costs across all communication devices and helping you to recoup more than just your landline telephony.
* OptimiZer is a fully outsourced service focused on managing and optimising your communications expenditure, from end-to-end. All adds, moves and changes within your user environment become automated processes, and cross referencing reports from your user traffic patterns with invoices from your telecoms service providers then becomes literally a push of a button away! Dimension Data will assist your organisation in right-sizing communication services that best fit your environment and optimise your budget at the same time. Providing you with an accurate view of your telecommunications infrastructure costs and usage statistics now takes the guess work out of all future strategic planning for your organisation's communications environment.
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