By Richard Conn, Senior Director, Demand Generation, 8×8
For B2C and B2B ecommerce businesses, sustainable success is highly dependent upon the effectiveness of your digital communication strategy. In a world where roughly 50% of customers will leave you for your competitor after just one bad experience, continuously optimizing your communication methods to suit consumer needs has never been more important.
CPaaS solutions empower businesses to deliver a fast, personalized, and omnichannel service to their customers through real-time communication features like instant messaging, video, and VoIP.
So, what exactly is CPaaS and why should you be using it?
What Is CPaaS?
To get a clear understanding of CPaaS meaning, features, and functionality, it helps to define PaaS first.
PaaS refers to a cloud-based model where businesses can develop and deploy applications via the platform of a third-party provider. The provider is responsible for the backend infrastructure, development tools, and operating system, while the business simply handles the data.
CPaaS is essentially PaaS with a focus on communication applications like SMS and video. The communications infrastructure is handled by the third-party provider, while the business uses this infrastructure to build and improve upon their communication applications.
Some of the key CPaaS functions that you can integrate into your communications stack include:
- SMS messaging (including two-way SMS messaging)
- MMS
- Voice and VoIP solutions
- Video
- Social media messaging (like Whatsapp or Facebook Messenger)
- On-demand SIP trunking
- Rich communication services (RCS)
- WebRTC-based calling
- Chatbot messaging
How CPaaS Works
CPaaS services negate the need for businesses to use a predefined communication platform. Instead, they allow developers to incorporate a mix of communication features into their pre-existing applications through the provision of APIs, software development kits, and code snippets, making it a much more flexible solution.
An API (application programming interface) is a type of programming code that acts almost like an intermediary between your existing application and an external application. It defines how the two endpoints communicate with each other, requesting, sending, and receiving information to provide your app with new features and increased capabilities.
Enterprises can cherry-pick the APIs that they wish to embed in their business applications. A utility company might use SMS APIs to remind customers of upcoming bills, or a VR system to permit 24/7 payment capabilities. A business in the medical industry might use APIs to provide patients with mobile appointment-scheduling capabilities or SMS test results.
Why You Should Use CPaaS
CPaaS enriches the way that businesses and customers communicate while increasing internal productivity and enterprise longevity. Here are some of the main benefits of CPaaS and why you should choose to migrate to the cloud.
It’s Integratable and Easy-to-Implement
CPaaS is an easy-to-integrate solution for hassle-free deployment. While it still takes some coding knowledge to create a custom application successfully, it no longer takes a specialized developer. CPaaS services also commonly include comprehensive online guides, forums, and live support to ease the process even further.
CPaaS platforms support a variety of programming languages, meaning that developers can operate in the language they prefer. Some CPaaS services even support a drag-and-drop model for professionals with limited coding knowledge, granting a higher degree of agency and flexibility.
CpaaS Reduces Costs
Because CPaaS is cloud-based, you don’t incur the significant fees that come with building, maintaining, and upgrading your own backend infrastructure. Instead, you simply pay for what you use on a pay-as-you-go billing model, all with the agility to add and remove APIs to consistently experiment, optimize and innovate your communication apps.
Not having to upgrade an infrastructure also has the economical benefit of faster deployment, allowing you to enjoy the monetary rewards of your changes quicker.
Offers Scalability and Future-Proofing
With CPaaS, there’s no need to undergo drastic infrastructure overhauls if you decide to scale up or down. The pay-as-you-go billing model and cloud-based storage system fully supports seamless scaling even to global production capacity, making it an agile solution for startups adopting business growth strategies.
Improves Customer Service Experience
According to Hubspot, 93% of consumers make repeat purchases with brands that provide excellent customer service. Not only do they want quick, authentic responses, but they want 24/7 support across an increasingly wide range of channels.
CPaaS revolutionizes customer service by offering each individual target consumer profile a personalized, optimized, and omnichannel customer service experience. You can gather the analytics to adhere to preferences and desires, implementing a mixture of APIs to service each customer segment fairly.
Some of the ways CPaaS benefits customer service include:
- Live-chat assistance
- 24/7 support
- Shipping updates
- Reduced data silos
- Omnichannel capabilities
- Automated customer interactions
- Shorter wait times and faster resolutions
It Strengthens Security
For companies who handle sensitive data, employing CPaaS can instill customer trust, increase brand credibility, and minimize data risks. CPaaS for security purposes typically utilizes email or SMS APIs, although voice and video are quickly becoming common for omnichannel authentication purposes.
Some uses for companies that handle sensitive data include:
- Transactional alerts
- Password updates
- Two-factor authentication (2FA)
- Instant fraud alerts
- Reminders, updates, and confirmations
CPaaS Increases Customer Reach and Engagement
You want to make it as easy as possible for consumers to find and communicate with you. Just as you would use country-specific domains for your different geographics (like a .com domain for US consumers and a .ae domain for UAE customers), you should also ensure that your market segments are serviced on their preferred communication channels.
For example, you might discover that a certain segment of your audience engages consistently with social media within a certain timeframe. A different segment might respond better to promotional SMS offers related to products that they were recently browsing. CPaaS grants you the ability to reach the right customers on the right devices and tailor your messages to maximize engagement.
Is CPaaS Right for Your Enterprise?
Businesses who embrace digital transformation and value the customer experience can utilize CPaaS to continuously meet consumer demands.
By leveraging the cloud to provide an omnichannel experience, increased security, and real-time communication, you can glean the benefits of brand trust, loyalty, customer satisfaction, and higher conversion rates.
Even for teams who don’t deal with customers directly, CPaaS can play a vital role in the optimization of your internal communication processes. As a VoiP solution, it can be used to improve communication capabilities with remote employees as well as send company-wide updates via SMS, and enhance your pre-existing applications to support employee collaboration.
Whether you use CPaaS for customer or employee interaction, it’s a low-cost and agile solution to the sustainable improvement of your digital communication strategy.
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Richard Conn – Senior Director, Demand Generation, 8×8
Richard Conn is the Senior Director for Demand Generation at 8×8, a leading small business phone services and communication platform that offers VoIP call center solutions with integrated contact center, voice, video, and chat functionality. Richard is an analytical & results-driven digital marketing leader with a track record of achieving major ROI improvements in fast-paced, competitive B2B environments. Here is his LinkedIn.
