Avatar

Have you ever imaged what your company would look like if you only employed the best and the brightest employees? Midsize business leaders, just like enterprise companies, need to recruit and retain the most capable employees. They recognize that because today’s talent is on the move, the best employees may not be local.

There is a new understanding for midsize organizations: To remain competitive, they need new ways to support engaging face-to-face virtual interactions. Midmarket organizations also recognize that as employees juggle their time to have fulfilling careers, simplifying their ability to maintain a work-life balance is also important. Let’s face it: Connecting people on a very personal level is good for business.

KO12012So how will this help my business be more successful? Collaboration technology can amplify the value of each participant’s talents and contributions. It is this thinking that has led many midsize organizations with which I’ve spoken to use collaboration technologies to engage more personally with their customers, stakeholders, partners, and others (suppliers, consultants, or specialists) regardless of their location.

To put the cherry on top, it is now easier than ever to enable your dynamic workforce wherever they are. I’ve seen midmarket companies use Cisco collaboration technologies such as Sub-Zero and Vital Images to help improve their customer and employee engagements to drive revenue and success.

Here are three tips on using  virtual face-to-face video interaction that can help you drive your top business priorities more cost-effectively and efficiently:

  • Create Engaging Customer User Groups: Use collaboration technologies to facilitate interaction and engagement with customers in user feedback groups. You can have rich interactions with your customers regardless of their device or location with Cisco Collaboration Meeting Rooms or Jabber Guest. These technologies can also help you host special real-time events with guest speakers, without the need for them to preinstall any clients on their collaboration device.
  • Enable Methodologies for Superior Customer Care: Provide customer support and account reviews that enhance customer loyalty and understanding. Technology that lets you record, replay, and forward customer video interactions can help you improve the customer care experience and enhance training for your customer support team. Cisco Collaboration technologies can enable rich delivery of your customer care from smartphones, desktops, or boardroom TelePresence endpoints. This makes customer care more flexible and supports more dynamic training environments.
  • Help Employees Be More Productive: Support the ability of your employees to work from any location at any time. By offering video and content-sharing capabilities through virtual platforms like Cisco WebEx, you can make your employees more effective, engaged and satisfied.  With new anytime, anywhere collaboration tools, employees, partners, and suppliers don’t need to be in the office to “collaborate.” Virtual face-to-face interactions can help speed up decision making to reach quicker outcomes.

Have any other tips for driving your business priorities using virtual face-to-face engagements? Let’s discuss in the comments below.



Authors

Craig Smythe

Manager, Systems Engineering