team collaboration

Epic Web Studios is a full-service marketing agency headquartered in Erie, Pennsylvania. A customer of NEC since 2010, Epic started out using the SV8100 platform but migrated to NEC UNIVERGE BLUE CLOUD SERVICES after seeing the increasing need for more unified communications to support its growing workforce.

I recently met with David Hunter, President and CEO of Epic Web Studios to discuss how UNIVERGE BLUE was able to help his company enable remote work, improve scalability and grow its business.

Marc: Tell me about Epic Web Studios. How did you get started?

Epic Web Studios is a full-service marketing agency that does it all for clients, no matter the size. From Website Design and Development, Social Media, Digital Marketing, and Search Engine Optimization (SEO), our goal is to help clients compete in today’s ever-changing marketplace through a viable digital marketing strategy.

Headquartered in Erie, Pennsylvania, Epic Web Studios started in 2009 as a small, single-client web-site development firm. Today, we are a full-service digital marketing firm with over five hundred clients in North America and more than sixteen full-time employees.

Marc: Wow! That is quite the achievement. In the past decade or so since you started the company, what has changed?

As time and technology progressed, the need for more unified communications features became increasingly apparent. Epic was growing rapidly and needed a system that could keep up. With more clients and the large shift towards remote working, we needed a flexible, cloud solution to allow us to communicate with clients, collaborate cross-functionally and be productive from anywhere, at any time.

Marc: You’re not alone. Now more than ever, businesses need the ability and flexibility to communicate and collaborate from wherever they may be. Can you share further insight into some of the challenges Epic Web Studios was facing?

With our on-premises system, our teams were restricted to only using voice and email to communicate. Unanswered calls were forwarded to one general voicemail, and emailing back-and-forth became inefficient as the primary mode of communication.

Our employees needed greater control over how calls could be made, forwarded, and received; they also needed more flexibility in their business communications and more variety in their communication methods.

In addition, we relied on various communication and collaboration tools, which was inefficient, costly, and difficult to manage. We needed a communications system that was fully-integrated and secure so that we could go from online meetings to instant messages to phone conversations and everything in between very easily and seamlessly.

In short, we needed a solution that would provide reliable, real-time communication with robust and fully-integrated features to support employee productivity. We also needed a solution that would enable employees to work from home, which would have been very difficult with our old on-premises communications system.

Marc: It sounds like you came to the right place. However, I know there are plenty of different vendors in the market. What made you ultimately choose UNIVERGE BLUE?

With other options reviewed, costs were too high, functionality was missing, or the solution just didn’t meet Epic Web Studio’s needs. Luckily, NEC launched UNIVERGE BLUE as I was researching new platforms.

Ultimately, we chose UNIVERGE BLUE CONNECT because the features were the strongest, the transition was going to be easy, and the price point was extremely competitive. We also chose UNIVERGE BLUE because of the local support that NEC provides with a large network of Channel Partners. Our technology partner was instrumental in getting our system set up and is always there to answer provide any support that we need. Most of the larger cloud companies and service providers do not offer this kind of local support.

As technology evolves, NEC is always on the cutting edge of new ways of working to make our communications more convenient and secure. This bevy of new features included with UNIVERGE BLUE offers us new opportunities to become even more efficient and productive with our business communications – all at a reasonable cost.

Another bonus was the ease of deployment. It was pretty much effortless. When we moved from our on-premises solution to UNIVERGE BLUE, we were up and running in a matter of hours. It was incredible.

Marc: Well, we are certainly happy to have Epic Web Studios as a part of the UNIVERGE BLUE family. Here’s my final question – what results have you seen since deployment?

For starters, our employees have been able to communicate with clients more effectively. We have seen a significant decrease in the number of back-and-forth emails thanks to UNIVERGE BLUE. Our clients call us directly and we can have one-click video-conferencing meetings with them. We have also seen a major increase in our productivity because of UNIVERGE BLUE.

As a result of both the streamlined communication and increased productivity, we have also been able to scale our business and grow our client base. Because we were able to provision more users very quickly, we’re able to take on more projects, and that has led to the growth of the company, which has been phenomenal recently thanks to UNIVERGE BLUE. I can’t recommend UNIVERGE BLUE enough!

For more information about UNIVERGE BLUE, NEC’s full portfolio of “As-A-Service” Solutions, visit www.univergeblue.com. For questions about the products or to meet with a UNIVERGE BLUE CLOUD Representative, submit your information to us and we will get back to you shortly.

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Take Your Unified Communications to the Cloud

Today’s businesses have customers and employees that expect reliable and secure communications from anywhere at any time. Unfortunately, building and maintaining this infrastructure can be cost-prohibitive. Cloud-based communication services are available but could put businesses in a bind paying for services they don’t use or limiting them to one-type of solution.

Small businesses and large enterprises need flexibility when investing in cloud computing. Enterprise businesses expect scalability that’s available when needed. Small businesses are limited in resources and require the ability to do more with less.

No matter the path: on premise, cloud or hybrid, NEC’s UNIVERGE BLUE offers a dynamic and flexible delivery model that’s tailored to your business needs and built on our award-winning IT infrastructure.

Why Move to Cloud-Based Solutions?

Your customers, whether internal or external, desire an easily accessible, secure and responsive experience. Employees must be able to perform their duties effectively and rely on dependable technology to fully support a positive customer experience.

Organizations are challenged with implementing communication systems and technology that allows their employees to work together from anywhere at any time. The solution typically involves multiple types of software, infrastructure and other platforms across many locations. Complex system integrations and management can raise IT costs and limit the IT staff from enjoying a productive and efficient employee experience. With IT employees in reaction mode, the customer experience falters due to downtime or unavailable data.

Cloud-based solutions and unified communications streamline the employee experience while reducing costs and simplifying management. Employees have access to their data and systems via the internet or anywhere they have cell data coverage.

The challenge becomes deployment of these new solutions (legacy systems, reliability, security and cost) and choosing a technology that will continue to grow with the organization.

NEC UNIVERGE BLUE: Unified Communications as a Service (UCaaS)

UCaaS provides tools for organizations choosing to move voice, mobility, messaging, chat, video collaboration and more into the cloud. Employee teams can communicate anywhere, at any time, on any device. As an enterprise-grade communications solution, UNIVERGE BLUE is cost-effective, built with the latest UC tools at the cost of a standard user license. Best of all, this solution is fully customizable so any business can scale up or down as needed. UCaaS replaces outdated communication systems and reduces the need for extended disaster recovery planning and resources.

NEC’s UNIVERGE BLUE delivers this solution while shouldering the burden of maintenance and upgrades, freeing your staff to focus on other business needs.

NEC UNIVERGE BLUE: Contact Center as a Service (CCaaS)

Meet your customer where they are by implementing a cloud-based contact center solution that can be accessed from anywhere. Empower agents to use social media, SMS, webchat, phone, video and more to provide an elevated customer experience. Customers speak to a real human, specifically chosen through CCaaS skills-based routing and, if needed, moves your high-priority customers to the front of the queue. Any size business can benefit from this solution that scales from 5 agents to 20,000.

Again, NEC manages and maintains the system 24/7/365 and business continuity and disaster recovery is built into the solution.

NEC UNIVERGE BLUE: Team Collaboration

Team Collaboration creates a digital workplace in the cloud by improving workforce and remote communications and cooperation. Voice, video, screen sharing, messaging, meetings and file sharing is accessed through a single dashboard on multiple devices at any location. Either used in real time, or off-line, all team members are kept connected and up to date as communications follows them to whatever device they’re using.

Simplifying collaboration and reducing the cost and complexity of multiple applications improves the employee experience and employee retention.

What Makes NEC UNIVERGE BLUE Better?

NEC UNIVERGE BLUE enables a phased approach to organizations moving to cloud as well as a flexible delivery model. Built on highly secure JITC-certified encryption technology and offering two layers of support, NEC’s innovative solutions and customizable approach to communications allows businesses to:

Improve the customer experience
Improve the employee experience
Reduce IT costs
Reduce risk
Simplify technology management
Improve productivity

NEC also has extensive expertise in the market with more than 120 years of experience across all environments. Our solutions integrate into your current environment and scale to where you want to be in the future. Our dynamic delivery model gives you the options of on premises, cloud, hybrid, public or private environments. Payment options are just as flexible, with capex, op-ex or a combination of both.

NEC’s Cloud services allows your organization to grow and deliver a unified, reliable and secure experience with minimal investment. Customize the solution that’s perfect for your organization. Contact an NEC Solutions Expert to learn more or download the UNIVERGE BLUE ebook.

Free Ebook

Reach Sky-High Communications

This ebook will help you understand how UNIVERGE BLUE can support your communications system while allowing your team to remain focused on what matters most—your business.