Keith Dawson's Analyst Perspectives

We are happy to share some insights about Vonage drawn from our latest Value Index research, which assesses how well vendors’ offerings meet buyers’ requirements.

Earlier this year we published the Ventana Research Value Index: Contact Center in the Cloud 2021, the distillation of a year of market and product research efforts. It is an assessment of how well vendors’ offerings will address buyers’ requirements for contact center software. The index is structured to replicate an RFI/RFP process by incorporating all criteria needed to evaluate, select, utilize and maintain technology, and maintain relationships with vendors.

In all of our Value Indexes we utilize a structured research methodology that includes evaluation categories designed to reflect real-world criteria incorporated in a request for proposal (RFP) and vendor selection process for contact center in the cloud. We evaluated Vonage and 13 other vendors in seven categories, five relevant to the product and experience (adaptability, capability, manageability, reliability and usability) and two related to the customer experience (TCO/ROI and vendor validation). To arrive at the Value Index rating for a given vendor, we weighted each category to reflect its relative importance in an RFP process, with the weightings based on our experience and on data derived from our benchmark research. Vonage’s overall performance rating in the Value Index is at 82%, with customer experience at 79.7% and product experience at 82.5%.

Vonage is a newer entrant to the contact center market with its acquisition of NewVoiceMedia. Vonage ranked 12^th overall and is categorized as a Vendor with Merit, performing its best in Manageability. The Vonage Contact Center platform is part of a portfolio that includes UCaaS and CPaaS components. The company has been growing its investment in the contact center side in recent years, notably in development of a microservices architecture.

Vonage did well in Reliability with its architecture, security and the continuing investment. Vonage also did well in Capability for integrating with unified communications.

Vonage can perform better in many categories including Adaptability and Usability. It could benefit from advancing its customization, support for data integration and in the way it communicates to customers the value and benefits of the platform. It could also improve in analytics for reporting, and advanced metrics and root cause analysis.

This assessment was based on Vonage’s cloud contact center products available at end of March in 2021. In the months since then, Vonage has released an enhanced video capability for its CCaaS product, as well as an AI-powered virtual assistant and updates to the way the platform handles multichannel routing. Vonage also added features to its Microsoft Teams integration.

When cloud contact centers first emerged a decade ago, the focus for many was on finding the lowest cost provider. Today’s organizations should consider a broader range of criteria in their selection process, which we outline in this Value Index. A modern contact center requires technology that provides continuous innovation and a product and customer experience to meet their long-term goals. With this in mind, when organizations begin the process of evaluating their efforts, they might consider Vonage.

This research-based index is the most comprehensive assessment of the value of contact center in the cloud software in the industry. Technology buyers can learn more about how to use our Value Index by clicking here and included vendors that wish to learn more can click here. Read the report here.

Regards,

Keith Dawson