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Business Communication Stats: 2021

Want a quick run-down of how businesses are communicating in 2021? Here is a comprehensive list of business phone system stats for 2021, including data related to cloud communications and remote working.

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The State of Business Communication in 2021

In this comprehensive post, we compile various business phone system stats and customer-business interaction stats and trends. We specifically look at:

Cloud communication — how businesses are switching to cloud communication tools and software with UCaaS and CCaaS solutions
Contact center — how the industry is doing and what is expected in the future
Customer service and support — what leads to customer retention, what drives customers away, and what do customers expect when contacting a business for support
Remote working and virtual communication — how is remote working stacking up during a pandemic, what benefits and challenges employers and employees are facing, and what technology is used, and what is the future of remote working and virtual communication.

Note: For our business phone system stats post, we have decided to include a section on telecommuting and virtual communication because the COVID-19 pandemic has led to a shift in the way companies are continuing to do business and run operations. More than ever, virtual communication tools and virtual phone systems are sought after as a way to maintain productivity and communication as employees work from home.

Cloud Communications Stats

Adoption of UCaaS and CCaaS

More than two-thirds of service providers will move their contact centers to the cloud in 2020. (Fonolo)

UCaaS is growing more popular. UCaaS currently has a new market growth rate of around 29%. (Synergy Research)

68% of UCaaS buyers claim that having all capabilities in one place is essential to their purchasing decisions. (Frost & Sullivan)

44% of respondents currently use cloud solutions. Whereas 38% plan to invest in cloud solutions in the next two years, of which 76% want to “improve processes and efficiency”. (Front & Sullivan)

While cloud communications have various benefits, 31% of companies use UCaaS to reduce technical and financial debt from legacy systems. (Freshworks)

UCaaS and cloud-based technology continue to benefit from innovative tech solutions. According to a study, the AI market will surpass $100 billion by 2025. (Constellation Research)

One of the top reasons why businesses invest in UCaaS is increased IT flexibility and agility that leads to increased productivity and improved communication quality. (Masergy)

While businesses are switching to the cloud, 70% demonstrate concern about data security, 63% about global service consistency, and 57% are unsure about network performance management. (Masergy)

One of the top factors leading to cloud adoption is a positive perception of cloud security. The result is a 20-30% year-over-year growth in cloud technology adoption. (Cleveland Research)

93% of respondents in Masergy’s research say security and network service bundles are critical are very important for their business. (Masergy)

Along with UCaaS, VoIP has grown increasingly popular over the years. The global mobile VoIP market is set to reach a value of 145.8 billion by 2024. (Grandview Research)

Contact Center Stats 2021

The Market

Importance of Good Customer Experience

The cloud-based contact center market is predicted to reach $24.11 billion by 2023 at a CAGR of 25%. (Market Research Future)

The following industries use call centers the most: financial services (26%), consumer services (24%), services sector (13%), tech, media, and telecom (13%). (Statista)

88% of contact centers claim customer experience and expectations are the driving force of growth. (Deloitte)

57% of customers ranked call support as their first and most comfortable preference for communication. (Accenture)

Call Center Metrics to Watch

Communication Channels Used

95.7% of contact center professionals consider customer satisfaction (CSAT scores) as the most important call center KPI. (Call Centre Helper)

Call centers also consider first call resolution (68.0%) as an important metric. (Call Centre Helper)

57.7% of call centers interact with customers by phone. (Statista)

66% of business-to-business (B2B) and business-to-consumer (B2C) enterprises use live chat for customer support. (Zoho)

Future of Call Centers

Most customers (66%) will try out 3-5 different customer service channels while 88% expect the company to offer online self-service options. (Microsoft)

Businesses with reliable omnichannel customer engagement have a customer retention rate of 89%. (Invesp)

56% of businesses in the technology, media, and telecom sector plan to invest in AI. (Deloitte)

31% of companies expect to use video chat in the next 2 years. (Deloitte)

Even in 2021, while the use of bots and automation rises, traditional communication tech (phone conversations and email) will still account for 81.5% of a call center’s inbound communication. (Call Centre Helper)

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Customer Service & Support Stats 2021

Modes of Communication

The top two primary sources of customer interaction are voice (phone conversations) and live chat. (Deloitte)

Customers make the most use of knowledge bases compared to other self-service options. (Forrester)

66% of users use at least three different channels to contact a business’s customer support. (Microsoft)

Effects of Bad Caller Experience

61% of customers claim they would stop doing business with a company because of a bad customer service experience. (Microsoft)

83% of callers would avoid a company after a poor experience with the company’s IVR system. (Bob Fernekees, webinar)

About 36% of customers say that the most frustrating aspect of a bad customer service interaction is their inability or lack of knowledge to resolve issues quickly. (Microsoft)

Customer Expectations

43.4% of survey participants said that a business should respond within one business day via phone and within 4 hours via email. (Toister Performance Solutions)

71% of millennials think that customer support and experience can improve by increasing response times such as using live chat. (Comm100)

58% of customers prefer a quick resolution of urgent issues through phone calls over other channels. (Accenture)

75% of users expect a consistent experience across multiple communication channels and 73% will likely change brands without it. (Salesforce)

70% of customers prefer brands that offer proactive customer service notifications. (Microsoft)

76% of consumers expect businesses and customer service contact centers to understand their requirements. (Salesforce)

59% of customers say personalized interaction based on past contact and history is very important in retaining them. (Salesforce)

More than 76% of users contacting customer service expect the representative to know their product and history with the company. (Microsoft)

Remote Working & Telecommuting (Virtual Communication) Stats

Remote Working Trends

More than 26 million Americans (16% of the workforce) work remotely (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics).

52% of employees around the world work from home at least once per week. (Owl Labs)

When asked if participants were interested in making a career transition to a career that lets them work from home permanently, 69.41% said yes. (Virtual Vocations)

97% of workers say a job with flexibility would have a positive effect on their quality of life. (FlexJobs)

About 34% of U.S. employees are willing to accept a pay cut up to 5% to work from home. (Owl Labs)

80% of survey respondents agree that having the option to work remotely would make them happier, feel more trusted, make them less likely to leave, make them less stressed. (Owl Labs)

68% of respondents claim that they were very successful in working from home during the pandemic switch. (Global Workplace Analytics)

70% of the respondents who are managers of employees working remotely said that remote working is the same for their team’s performance and productivity. (Global Workplace Analytics)

Good virtual teammates have the following traits: share information (19%), collaborative (18%), proactively engaged (17%), and organized (14%). (Culture Wizard)

By 2028, one study predicts that 73% of all departments will have remote workers (Fundera)

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Technology & Virtual Communication

The greatest challenges for remote workers during remote meetings include interruptions (67%) and IT issues such as set-up, video and audio quality (59%). (Owl Labs)

When working from home, the most important communication tools needed by employees and employers are email, phone calls, and video meetings. (Virtual Vocations)

Most remote workers consider email as the primary method of communication. This is followed by instant messaging and video chat. (CoSo Cloud)

The most beneficial contact methods between remote teammates include: face-to-face meetings (93%), conference calls (93%), and video conferencing (84%). (Culture Wizard)

14% of remote workers attend more than 10 meetings per week as opposed to only 3% of on-site workers. (Owl Labs)

During the pandemic, 26% of businesses provided employees with access to communication technology. This demonstrates that communication is an important component of the virtual team culture. (Clutch)

Technologies used by virtual teams include: virtual private networks (39%), cloud-based file management tools (36%), instant messaging service (34%), and collaboration software (13%). (Staples)

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Technology requirements needed for remote working include: site-to-site VPN (41%), data security solutions (41%), IP telephony solutions (39%), employee monitoring (33%), and remote cybersecurity systems (19%). (International Workplace Group)

72% of respondents claimed they had everything they needed at home for smoothly working from home. About 86% said that they had technological knowledge, equipment, and the necessary skills (web/video conferencing, team collaboration tools, etc.) to perform effectively while working remotely. (Global Workplace Analytics)

Home » Business Communication Stats: 2021

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