Latest JAA Podcast - Robocalls and Restoring Trust to Telephony

I’ve been remiss about publicly sharing our Watch This Space podcasts after newsletter subscribers get exclusive access, so there’s two things you should know on that front.

First, there is a Current Podcasts archive on my website, where you can access all of our podcasts, except for the most recent one.

Secondly, the most recent one - from the September edition - can be accessed from the landing page of my website (and it will soon be added to the archive. The title is self-explanatory, and if the topic is of interest, I think you’ll enjoy this episode. Just go to the landing page, and scroll down a bit - you can’t miss it.

Following that, if you’d like more timely access to our podcasts, you can subscribe here to my monthly newsletter - JAA’s Communications and Collaboration Review. The October issue goes out next week, including a brand new podcast.

Selling UCaaS: It's Never Been Easier, or Harder - My Latest on No Jitter

UCaaS continues to be a major trend in our space, but with low barriers to entry, it’s crowded. This makes it hard for buyers to make good choices, and just as hard for providers to really stand out. I’ve been doing some research recently - mostly on SMBs - focused on how cloud providers are going to market.

There are many angles to consider, and I’ve put my thoughts together for my latest No Jitter post. I’ve been a regular No Jitter contributor for some time, and here’s the link to the writeup, which is running now on their site.

Mitel Analyst Summit - my Takeaways on BCStrategies

Last week I attended Mitel’s analyst and consultant event, and while time was short, they covered a lot of ground. Probably more wide than deep, but they’re an important player to follow in the cloud collaboration space. We don’t often have just analysts and consultants as the focus of the event, so the messaging was very targeted for us, which was great. I’ve had time to digest all that, and came up with two takeaways for my latest writeup wearing my BCStrategies hat. If you don’t know, I’m a BC Expert with that group, and my post is running now on their portal. Comments and sharing are welcome as always.

Next Stop - San Francisco and RingCentral

Last week was Plano, Texas, and this week, San Francisco. Florida the week after, then back to San Fran the week after that. Focus, focus! Ok, so this week’s stop is San Francisco, where I’ll be attending RingCentral’s analyst day. It’s a long way to go for a day of updates from their leadership team, but they’re pretty core to my coverage, so I’m flying out tomorrow. I’ll be tweeting as time allows, and I’ll have a recap post coming soon after. Not much to else to share detail-wise, but if you ever want to follow my travel plans, just check the Event Calendar on my website.

New Podcast - in Conversation with 2600Hz

I’ve been doing a lot of podcasts lately, and this time around, I’m the one being interviewed. One of the newer companies on my radar is 2600Hz, and I spoke at their recent KAZOOcon event in San Diego. They have a nice mix of resources to help educate SMBs about cloud communications, and one of them is a monthly newsletter called Good News. Included in the current edition is a set of links to a few podcasts, including this one done with me about how UCaaS can help workers be more productive. I hope you like it, and in time, you should see more contributions from me on their site.

My Latest Podcast, With PGi and Frank Paterno

I’m on a good run lately with UK-based Enterprise Management 360, where I’m a contributing analyst, and our latest podcast has now been posted. This time around, I was in conversation with industry veteran Frank Paterno at PGi, and it was great to share views on what defines value for collaboration.

We could go on for hours, but you’ve only got so much time to listen, and I hope you like what’s here. As always, comments are welcome, and if you’d like to explore doing a podcast like this for your business, please drop me a line.

Mitel Analyst and Consultant Summit - Quick Post and Pix

Just back from Mitel’s event in Plano, Texas, and it was time well spent. Event was short, but all the sessions were good, and their team was accessible and keen for our feedback. I’ll have more to say in a post coming a in a few days, and until then, here are some photos.

Below, CEO Rich McBee, CMO Wes Durow, and Katie Kregel’s panel session, Making the Right Cloud Choice.

Some slideware from the session: contact center portfolio summary, CloudLink overview, UCaaS competitive landscape (as defined by Mitel), enterprise architecture framework and key partners

This first photo is a bit cropped, but yeah, now THAT’s a power bar - more proof that everything IS bigger in Texas. Our big social outing, courtesy of Mitel’s box - off to the ballpark to see the Rangers, and - of course - my Red Sox. I came prepared, yup.

Next Stop - Plano, TX and Mitel

I’ve had a good run of staying close to home, but starting Monday, travel season kicks in for me. The road begins with Mitel’s Analyst and Consultant Summit in Plano, Texas. Definitely looking forward to that, and as luck would have it, they’re taking us to the ball game on Tuesday night, and yes, the Rangers are playing my Red Sox. I will be appropriately attired, so planning for baseball will loom large in my packing plans.

Unless plans change - and they always do - starting with Mitel, I will have travel in my schedule for every week through til December 1, with only two weeks in that stretch that I’ll be home. Good thing I just bought a new roller bag. Awayyyyyy we go…..

EX + CX: My Latest Podcast and Article with RingCentral

Thought leadership comes in many forms, and while I do a LOT of writing for my clients, I also do my share of podcasting. This won’t be news to my blog followers, so if you’re a more recent arrival, these are some of the ways I help vendors and cloud providers drive adoption of their technologies with end customers.

My latest update comes via the work I’ve been doing with RingCentral, where I’ve been a guest blogger off and on for some time. There are two new thought leadership offerings to share; namely an article of mine, and a podcast with me in conversation with RingCentral’s Robert Murphy and his Connection podcast series.

These pieces build on recent research done about the combined value of EX and CX - employee experience and customer experience. Each is important on its own, but they complement each other, which leads to greater agility, better productivity and happier customers.

The companion piece is our podcast, which covers this ground, but quite a bit more thanks to Robert Murphy’s thoughtful narrative. If the EX + CX equation piques your interest, I think you’ll find both of interest, and the starting point is here for the article. From there, you won’t have to look far for the podcast, but if you want to start with that, here’s the link.

Newsletter Time Again - September Issue

Just thought I’d share this before the week is out. The current edition of my newsletter - JAA’s Communications and Collaboraiton Review - went out to subscribers yesterday. If you’ve had a chance to check it out yet, I’d love to hear your thoughts, and for everyone else, subscribing is real easy - just go here.

Aside from the regular content recapping highlights from my research and industry activities, is our monthly podcast - Watch This Space. I do these in conversation with long-term colleague, Chris Fine, and this time around, our focus was on robocalling, which has been in the news lately on several fronts. The core issue is what I view as “restoring trust in telephony”, and it has major implications in our space, especially around customer care.

If that piques your interest to listen to our podcast right now, then the sooner you subscribe, the sooner you can do that. Otherwise, I’ll be postiing it publicly in a couple of weeks, where you can find it along with our earlier podcasts in the Podcast Archive on my website.

Also, if you’re new to our podcasts, I’ve recently added real-time transcription (shout-out to Otter.ai), where you have the option to read along if not convenient to listen. What’s really cool here is that by clicking on the transcript page, the words are highlighted in blue, so you can follow along in real time, word-by-word, both reading and listening.

The transcription isn’t perfect, but it’s pretty good, and I love doing this to showcase how good AI speech-to-text is getting. I don’t mind you seeing the typos - warts and all - since there will always to be tricky words and phrases that AI doesn’t quite catch - but once corrected, the learning gets hard-wired, and those errors don’t come back again.

Finally - I know, I know - we’ll soon be publishing our podcasts on public platforms like iTunes - it’s very much on the to-do list!

New Podcast Series with NewVoiceMedia and Vonage for Cloud Contact Center

Cloud is the dominant trend these days in the contact center, so there’s a lot to talk about. As a regular contributor to UK-based Enterprise Management 360, I get involved in various projects, including podcasts. My latest was a 3-part podcast series, where I was in conversation with Vonage CMO Rishi Dave about various trends driving cloud-based contact center, as well as how IT needs to be thinking about embracing all that comes with that.

Our discussion was mainly through the lens of NewVoiceMedia, which forms the basis of Vonage’s contact center offering, but also the broader value proposition that comes from integrating this with the other two big cloud pillars, UCaaS and CPaaS.

Am catching up from being away last week, and all three episodes can be accessed from EM 360’s website now. Here’s the link to Episode 1, and you can follow the links from there for Episodes 2 and 3. We cover a lot of ground, but I think you’ll find it informative. As always, comments and sharing are welcome.

August Writing Roundup

Aside from attending two industry events in August, it’s summer, and I was on vacation and largely offline for the last week of the month. This made for lighter-than-normal output on the writing front, but there was still a fair bit of activity, especially with some things that were in the works earlier, and found their way to being published in August.

State of the Smart Speaker Market, Part 1, Toolbox.com, Aug. 21

4 UC Benefits that Improve Productivity, Tech Target, Aug. 20

What SMBs Really Want with Collaboration, Toolbox.com, Aug. 20

Owning Customer Engagement, the Twilio Way, No Jitter, Aug. 19

3 Trends in Mobile Collaboration, Toolbox.com, Aug. 16

Adtran Connect - Quick Take and Photos, my blog, Aug. 14

How UC Technology Works and Why You Need it, Tech Target, Aug. 12

My Q&A with Mavenir - Wireless Challenges for Security and Fraud, EM360, Aug. 9

Twilio SIGNAL - My 2 Main Takeaways on No Jitter

I attended my second Twilio SIGNAL event earlier this month in San Francisco, and as good at my first one was, this was even better. Bigger too, but also full of many updates that shows how far and wide their capabilities keep evolving.

For the collaboration space, I focused on two in particular, and they are addressed in my latest No Jitter post, which is running now. The conference also had lots of strong visual elements, and if you didn’t see my earlier post here with some photos, here’s the link. As always, comments and sharing are welcome.

Adtran Connect - Quick Take and Photos

Another week, another industry event. This time it’s for Adtran Connect, a company I have some good history with. Not my core focus, but enough pieces that touch on things I follow, so it’s definitely time well-spent. I’ll have more to say soon, and for now, here’s my usual quick-take post with photos before I move on to the next thing.

Day 1 keynotes from Curtis Knittle of CableLabs, and Matthew Hare of UK-based Zzoomm. Adtran’s Gary Bolton keeping things moving along.

Fireside chat just with analysts and press with CEO/Chairman Tom Stanton. Here’s an updated photo that I’ve posted in recent years - their wall of patents - pretty impressive. After the sessions, you do what one does in Alabama - blues and bbq. My kinda town.

Day 2 keynote - my highlight - Dr. Deborah Barnhart of the US Space and Rocket Center. What a great time to be in Huntsville, on the 50th anniversary of the moon landing, and of course how the space program came to Huntsville. She told the story well, and had some pretty strong messages about how space exploration can help us save the planet - more on that later.

Next Stop - Huntsville, AL and Adtran

Got home from Twilio’s event late Thursday, and didn’t even bother to unpack. Barely home two days, and back out again, this time to Huntsville, AL and Adtran’s Connect event. Haven’t been to an Adtran event for a few years, and am glad to be back in the loop with them. Basic details are here on my Event Calendar page, but I’ll have more to share here and on social media over the next few days.

My Q&A with Mavenir - Wireless Challenges for Security and Fraud

I contribute occasionally to UK-based Enterprise Management 360, and am on their roster of analysts. My latest piece was a Q&A I did with Mavenir, with a focus on security and fraud for wireless operators. This is problematic on many fronts, and having seen them talk about this at their recent analyst event, it turns out Mavenir is quite strong in this area.

To address these challenges, my interview was done with two experts at Mavenir - Marie Casey and Ilia Abramov - and it’s running now on EM360’s site. If the topic is of interest, I think you’ll find this a good read, and if you like it, by all means share it with others.

Twilio SIGNAL 2019 - Quick Take and Pix

Last year was my first SIGNAL event, and impressive as it was, this year’s was bigger and better. Twilio is on a roll for sure (transparency alert - I’m a happy shareholder - but that doesn’t color my take here), and being on home soil, this was a loud and proud gathering in San Francisco. It’s an understatement to say that things are just different here - for better or worse - and if you were going to build a successful business at scale from the bottom-up for today’s digital economy, it would look a lot like Twilio.

As I often do when these events wrap up and I’m about to fly home, I just have time now for some photo highlights while everything is still fresh. There’s lots more to talk about, and over the next few days, I’ll have a more reflective set of takeaways, so check back here soon.

If you believe bigger is better, this was the place to be. The event planning team clearly had a mandate to spend and make sure you couldn’t miss SIGNAL. But in this case, I think Twilio lived up to the buzz.

The seating area for analysts was off to the left, so not great for getting photos during the keynotes. Above, CEO Jeff Lawson bringing vision, energy and passion. This sure sounds like a guy you’d want to work for, esp if you get behind their mantra of “we can’t wait to see you build”. Jessica Popp updating us on Flex, and Christine Roberts talking about Verified by Twilio. I’ll have more to say on both of these soon.

“Papa Vic” - Jeff really nailed the importance of personal relationships talking about his grandfather, and connecting that to Twilio’s vision to create the same at scale with their technology. Erin Reilly, as she did last year, showcased Twilio’s commitment to social good, with great examples of how they bring communications to vulnerable people and make a big difference in their lives. Boost - Jeff giving yet another example of pervasive messaging has become, and clearly, Twilio is on to something here. Final picture - a really good panel session on email - and the risks around spoofing, spam, etc. The acquisition of SendGrid for email was very strategic, and it’s an important part of Twilio’s story.

Sensoneo demo - yet another layer to Twilio - IoT. This was a smart city application, mapping out all the waste bins across San Francisco, and thanks to sensors placed inside all the lids, the sanitation department gets a birds-eye view of which bins are full and need pickup. This helps optimize their routes, and they’ve 30% cost savings as a result - that’s a great use case. Later, a session on blocking robocalls - Twilio has a fix for that now. Then some fun onstage with rapper Macklemore, the performer for the big party last night. The hash #freemacklemore” quickly became a thing, but I think we’ve moved on now. Last shot - yes, it’s what you think. The party was held in a parking garage, retrofitted to an event space. Seemed strange at first, but very cool, and very Twilio. Can’t wait to see what they build for the next SIGNAL!

Newsletter Time - August Issue Published Now

It’s that time again, and there was a lot going on in July. If you follow me, you’ll know I was busy recently at Voice Summit 2019, and if you liked that, you’ll want to subscribe ASAP, as our featured podcast is a recap of the event. That content is exclusive for subscribers for the next couple of weeks, so subscribe here if you want it now, along with all the updates I have to share for July - and ther'e’s a lot. Otherwise, check the podcast archive on my website later to access it there.

Next Stop - San Francisco and Twilio

About to head to the airport for San Fran and Twilio’s SIGNAL event. This will be my second time going, and this time around, I know more what to expect. Of all the events I attend in my ongoing travels, this one is the most developer-centric, and it’s a different crowd - or maybe I’m just getting older. :-)

Anyhow, there will be lots to catch up on, and am looking forward to getting updates on Flex, their contact center offering, especially for how AI is fitting into all this. I’ll be tweeting and blogging as time allows, and you can follow me @arnoldjon, and the event directly using the #SIGNALconf hash.

July Writing Roundup

I only had to travel to one event in July, but otherwise, I’ve never had a busier month fulfilling client work. Some of that will show up here in my July writing digest, and otherwise, you’ll have check my blog posts or get my newsletter - and I hope you do both!

Brave New World - Voice Summit 2019, July 29, BCStrategies

What’s Your Sense of Urgency for Cloud-Based Collaboration?, July 23, Toolbox.com

How Can IT Approach a Cloud-Based UC Migration?, July 23, Tech Target

Why Executive Engagement Matters for Collaboration, July 22, Toolbox.com

Jon Arnold - Voice and AI in the Enterprise, July 19, Voice Summit Blog

Standalone vs. Integrated Collaboration: 3 Factors, July 18, Tech Target

June Redux - Perspectives from 4 Events, July 9, No Jitter

Why Email Holds Back Collaboration, Part 1, July 8, Toolbox.com