It’s no secret that innovation in telecom has been challenging, due to the walls built around telephony resources. Innovating with a traditional telecom carrier is like trying to win a relay race with your grandfather running the anchor leg. It might make for some interesting stories, but it probably isn’t going to lead to success. Fortunately, there is a new wave of service providers that remove the barriers that have long limited innovation in integrating communications with business applications.
These modern communication providers are driving a revolution of smart businesses applications that incorporate valuable human interaction into the user experience. The applications that allow you to call your shared-ride driver, to receive messages from the renter of your vacation home and to get notified by your dentist of an upcoming appointment are raising the bar for customer expectations. This does not bode well for digital businesses that continue to lose valuable time (and money) force-fitting old models to meet the new demands of their customers.
What we have realized is that enlightened carriers are not delivering the new wave of communications, but rather it is being driven by the same force behind the entire digital evolution – software developers. In the past ten years, the number of public APIs has grown from only 350 to over 11,000, and that figure has doubled in just the past 18 months.
APIs are being utilized to expose a range of communications resources to deliver customer satisfaction and build brand loyalty by providing a simpler, seamless consumer experience. So what about communication API integration up-levels one service provider over the other?
Control
Developers now have the ability to directly manage and provision the communications services offered via their application. Giving developers programmatic control via APIs enables innovative ideas that were previously impractical. Now developers can launch their ideas more rapidly, sidestepping the previous barriers of large upfront investments in hardware, custom integration and (most painful of all) time.
This level of control is driven by a new breed of communications service providers – one that focuses on providing a highly accessible, scalable service that can easily be integrated by developers. Ultimately, this will earn a role in the resurgence of telecommunications.
Take, for example, the way companies such as Uber, Rover.com, and Lyft have taken advantage of communication APIs for the routing and masking of phone numbers. This capability helps maintain privacy for the end-user, and protects businesses from fraud while also managing the direction and appearance of inbound and outbound calls and text messages.
Simplicity and faster integration
In hand with added control comes the ease and speed of integration. What used to take months to code can now be developed almost instantaneously with APIs, increasing developers’ productivity and ability to complete product integrations quickly. This automation saves time and company resources, all while improving the user experience and providing greater ease of use.
The benefits of automation offered by API’s does not stop at the speed of integration; it also widens the reach of content. For example, instead of creating and designing an entirely new set of functions, the API can be used in multiple locations on the website and even on third-party sites, further expanding a brand’s reach.
Accessibility
As more and more developers are given the opportunity to experiment, new services and business applications emerge, particularly around in-app communications services. Again, companies such as Airbnb, Uber and others have taken advantage of the availability of communication APIs and successfully incorporated calling and messaging functionalities directly into their mobile applications. The access to innovative communication technology has amplified diversity across all industries, and opened doors for businesses to differentiate their communication capabilities, improve satisfaction, and enhance the user experience.
A new era of communications innovation
Digital businesses are under constant pressure to keep pace with the rapidly evolving competitive landscape. Success often hinges on getting to market quickly to capture demand and cement customer relationships through the delivery of unique value and a seamless experience. This, in turn, requires a communications service provider that can provide direct access to, and control over, telephony resources. Only then will consumers start to see the emergence of innovative communication experiences to help answer market demands that don’t require significant infrastructure or regulatory overhauls.
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