Analyst Perspectives

We are happy to share some insights about Amazon drawn from our latest Value Index research, which assesses how well vendors’ offerings meet buyers’ requirements.

We published the Ventana Research Value Index: Contact Center in the Cloud 2021, the distillation of a year of market and product research efforts. It is an assessment of how well vendors’ offerings will address buyers’ requirements for contact center software. The index is structured to replicate an RFI/RFP process by incorporating all criteria needed to evaluate, select, utilize and maintain technology, and maintain relationships with vendors.

In all of our Value Indexes we utilize a structured research methodology that includes evaluation categories designed to reflect real-world criteria incorporated in a request for proposal (RFP) and vendor selection process for contact center in the cloud. We evaluated Amazon and 13 other vendors in seven categories, five relevant to the product and experience (adaptability, capability, manageability, reliability and usability) and two related to the customer experience (TCO/ROI and vendor validation). To arrive at the Value Index rating for a given vendor, we weighted each category to reflect its relative importance in an RFP process, with the weightings based on our experience and on data derived from our benchmark research. AWS’s overall performance rating in the Value Index is at 74.7%, with customer experience at 68.8% and product experience at 75.9%.

Amazon, a worldwide provider of cloud-based services with AWS, was categorized as a Vendor with Merit for its Amazon Connect platform. The company was ranked 13^th overall and its best performance was in the Reliability category.

Amazon Connect benefits from the strong architectural foundation in the Amazon Web Services (AWS) platform on which it operates. The product has had significant attention in the market; the offering has been built organically, with its own domain expertise and experience with limited resources.

Amazon needs to improve in every category. For example, its Capability score would improve with support for agent workforce optimization, and support for interaction handling. Usability needs improvement, as does the material required for developers in Adaptability. Amazon needs to improve what it provides for TCO/ROI, and provide more clarity in its commitment to this software market.

This assessment was based on Amazon’s cloud contact center products available at end of March in 2021. Since then, Amazon has made several updates to its platform, including to its Contact Control Panel and identity resolution features. The latter is to make it easier to remove duplicate customer profiles.

When cloud contact centers first emerged a decade ago, the focus for many was on finding the lowest cost provider. Today’s organizations should consider a broader range of criteria in their selection process, which we outline in this Value Index. A modern contact center requires technology that provides continuous innovation and a product and customer experience to meet their long-term goals. With this in mind, when organizations begin the process of evaluating their efforts, they might consider Amazon.

This research-based index is the most comprehensive assessment of the value of contact center in the cloud software in the industry. Technology buyers can learn more about how to use our Value Index by clicking here and included vendors that wish to learn more can click here. Read the report here.

Regards,

Keith Dawson