8×8, a front-running integrated cloud and communications platform on March 15, 2021, revealed the launch of the 8×8 Contact Center for Microsoft Teams. The solution is certified to merge with Microsoft Teams seamlessly.

On the functioning front, the 8×8 cloud contact center and communications product offer an easy-to-administer, unified customer engagement, and global telephony direct routing solution that enables the workforce and contact center agents to interact and communicate with customers from any Teams endpoint.

What does 8×8 offer?

8×8 Contact Center for Microsoft Teams delivers an omnichannel contact center feature completely integrated with Teams. The all-new solution simplifies agent performance, adds ease to customer engagement workflows, and ignites collaboration across the enterprise.

8×8 Contact Center for Microsoft Teams enables sales, support, and service agents to instantly connect and collaborate with other Teams-enabled experts and solve customer issues more rapidly.

Dejan Deklich, Chief Product Officer at 8×8, Inc., explained, “Organizations are rapidly adopting Microsoft Teams for all their employee collaboration requirements, and now recognize the importance of integrating it with the contact center to enhance the customer experience.”

He added, “8×8 Contact Center for Microsoft Teams enables IT and service leaders to seamlessly embed customer engagement with global voice communications into Teams workflows to gain deeper insights across all interactions. This helps organizations meet their unique business requirements, allowing employees and customers to stay productive and engaged from anywhere.”

“Organizations have turned to Microsoft Teams to help solve their most critical collaboration and telephony needs, so integrating advanced contact center capabilities into their communication hub is a natural next step,” said Daniel Canning, Director, Microsoft Teams at Microsoft. “We are pleased to see 8×8 successfully complete the contact center certification process, providing their customers with a reliable integration with Teams, empowering their employees and contact center agents to connect with customers and provide a seamless experience.”

“Our digital transformation agenda is about using the very best technology solutions to deliver essential services to the community, responding to changes in how we work and the nature of interactions between our employees and citizens,” said Alison Hughes, Assistant Director ICT of Liverpool City Council. “8×8’s cloud contact center and communications product empowers both our contact center agents and employees to seamlessly collaborate and connect through the certified integration with Microsoft Teams. This enables our staff to work together to provide the vital services our local residents and businesses require while working from anywhere.”

Basis the “Workplace Collaboration 2021-22 Research Study” by Metrigy Research, 70.4% of businesses embracing the goodness of Microsoft Teams are deploying direct routing to connect to PSTN (Public Switched Telephone Network).

The 8×8 Contact Center solution aids agents, supervisors, and knowledge workers receive and make PSTN calls via the Teams apps.

Primary features of 8×8 allow businesses to:

  • Receive incoming contact center calls in Teams, enabling agents to deal with customer interactions, and obtain call details and crucial metrics.
  • Get quality contact center insights with end-to-end reporting and analytics into call quality, activity history, speech analytics, and performance metrics.
  • 8×8 Call Recording for regulatory compliance.
  • Operate globally with global calling plans in 42 countries across six continents, including unlimited calling to 47 countries.
  • Integrate uniquely with 25 plus third-party business apps such as Zendesk, Microsoft Dynamics 365, Salesforce, and NetSuite to automatically log calls with the capability to affix details, recordings, and speech analytics to customer records.