Last week's Consumer Electronics Show (CES) was a hot news story, but in our corner of the high-tech industry, this week will likely see more interesting news made, because this week is the National Retail Federation Conference and Expo in New York, and several communications vendors are announcing vertically-focused applications for this market.Avaya's announcement is of 2 new retail-focused applications, Avaya In-Store Connect and Avaya Video Assist. The Avaya In-Store Connect application integrates technology from Avaya, Motorola and Indyme Solutions, whose communications apps detect and communicate retail "event triggers" that require attention from store personnel (like price checks, cleanups, etc.). Avaya and Motorola bring IP phone and mobile capabilities to communicate these triggers to store personnel on the appropriate device.
The Video Assist application is a video kiosk that connects to a contact center. When I talked with Avaya about the NRF announcement, Greg Billings, VP of Avaya Global Professional Services, said this type of application is ideal for products such as mobile devices. That's because, whenever a new model of handset is introduced, the provider/manufacturer typically experience a 30-40% increase in call center contacts, from people with questions about their new device. "All of a sudden, the ROI is challenged," Billings said. "It becomes very expensive for them to hire an expert in each store."
By having a video kiosk in the store where the person gets the mobile device, customers can get access to the device manufacturer's experts on that particular model, and can get hands-on training in how to use the device before the leave the store, or when they return to the store after they realize they have a question about the device.
These announcements continue Avaya's leadership when it comes to intetgrating the contact center with on-site retail locations. In past VoiceCon keynotes, Avaya has demo-ed similar capabilities, where the emphasis isn't on making enterprise employees into de facto contact center agents--which is where much of the industry has focused--but instead making contact center agents into de facto on-site retail clerks. Which makes a lot more sense, when you think about it--as the video kiosk/mobile device example shows, it's a lot more cost-effective to centralize high-value knowledge, rather than try to replicate in thousands of individual locations.
I also had the opportunity, while talking with Greg Billings, to get a view of Avaya's efforts around vertical selling in general. Greg said the Professional Services organization has taken steps to beef up its ability to craft solutions for vertical industries. "We're hiring and building out internal expertise--people who have worked in the internal operations of these [end user] companies," or have worked in systems integration--and by systems integration, he means not in the narrow IT sense, but in the broader business process sense.
That's important because it helps Avaya sell targeted solutions in a marketplace that's shunning broad-brush, complex implementations with uncertain return on investment. "Right now it's about how do they achieve a short-term ROI," Billings said. They want "bite-size chunks," not to "jump off a cliff with a big investment."
