The combination of lower start-up costs, rapid deployment, ease-of-use, limited IT resources needed for implementation and maintenance, and improved functionality have proven to be the right combination for many organizations reviewing hosted software solutions. Moreover, advances in security and processing speeds allow organizations to get the same quality of service from hosted solutions as with the traditional on-premise options.

But before you run off to reap the benefits of hosting for your organization, there are a number of options under the hosted umbrella term that are important to understand.

Standard Hosted (Shared Or Multi-Tenant)
Standard hosted delivery options provide the lowest risk of any delivery model. This "try-it-before-you-buy-it" or "never-buy-it-at-all" offering gives the company the opportunity to take advantage of the solution on a monthly subscription basis with full IT support. The service provider hosts the software on its premises, while the company pays a subscription fee to access the service.

Dedicated Hosted
This subscription allows the organization to purchase a "dedicated" hosted environment versus the shared environment typically offered on the service provider’s premises. Unlike the standard subscription, a dedicated environment enables a company to set up dedicated servers, firewalls, and virtual private networks (VPNs), in effect, segregating the company’s data, configuration, and administrative control from the service provider's other clients. Dedicated environments usually appeal to companies that require the highest levels of security.

Hosted License
If an organization purchases a license, its service provider can host and manage the software on the service provider's premises via what many call a "shared multi-tenant architecture." This way, the client enjoys the lack of maintenance headaches, but the peace of mind of owning the solution. In this scenario, an organization would have a higher upfront investment to purchase the software license, but a lower monthly cost.

Internal Hosted
This delivery option puts a new flair on traditional ownership by bringing all of the multi-tenant, hosting benefits into the organization. By in-house hosting, an organization can become an internal service provider to multiple contact centers, departments, or divisions within the enterprise. Each group can adopt the application for its own specific functions, all the while using a single infrastructure and single application instance.

Named User Subscription
With most hosted solutions, there is an upfront implementation fee and an ongoing monthly fee. The most common monthly subscription type is named user.

Named user subscriptions are less expensive and are issued based on the user's name. The company registers the employees to use the software, and only these users would be provided a password or key to the software. Named users can access the application from any computer, anywhere in the world, and still see all of their customization and settings. All activity and history is tracked and analyzed for each individual.

Knowing these terms and the options available to you will make you a more educated buyer when purchasing hosted contact center software.

This article is an excerpt from the white paper “The Hosted Model: Simplifying Contact Center and Agent Desktop Solutions."