3 PM on April 20, 2012

“ShoreTel Mobility is simply fantastic. It offers state-of-the-art technology on an already-familiar platform that we like. Everyone at Current TV is impressed with ShoreTel Mobility and what it can do for us.”

- Ray Panahon, Senior Director of IT, Current TV

Founded in 2005 by former U.S. Vice President Al Gore and legal mogul Joel Z. Hyatt, Current TV provides provocative political commentary, insightful news analysis and top-notch programming. Generating a loyal global community of viewers and supporters, Current TV now reaches approximately 60 million households worldwide via cable, satellite, and the Web.

Current TV needed a unified communications platform that would cut pricey long-distance charges, easily scale to meet business demands, and provide pervasive connectivity for its mobile workforce.

Current TV deployed a ShoreTel UC Solution, with ShoreTel Communicator, ShoreTel IP Phones, and more than 557 licenses, to connect sales offices and studio locations around the globe. Several years later, Current TV added ShoreTel Mobility to meet the growing demands of its mobile workforce.

With ShoreTel they have realized benefits including:

• Real cost savings on long-distance usage and cellular phone charges.
• Far-reaching yet seamless connectivity for mobile and desktop users and for customers.
• Reliable, secure VoIP architecture and integrated feature-rich UC tools.

Categories: Customer Experiences, Enterprise Mobility

Tags: cost savings, current tv, IP, UC

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Article source: http://blog.shoretel.com/2012/04/current-tv-broadcasts-big-benefits-with-shoretel-mobility/

10 AM on April 20, 2012

There is no “typical” battery life for a mobile phone due to the wide variety of models. They are all different and usage varies greatly. An older flip-style phone could last days while an iPhone with Wi-Fi and location services may only last hours.

Common best practices for optimizing battery life on smartphones are:

• Reduce screen brightness.
• Reduce time to sleep (shortening the time the phone screen stays lit before blacking out).
• Choose ring/chime over vibrate (a vibrate motor consumes more energy than a chime).
• Choose alerts wisely (every chime, notification display and LED blink consumes energy).
• Reduce the frequency of automatic app updates.
• Turn off Bluetooth when not in use.
• Research a battery booster that automatically manages battery optimization based on usage.

ShoreTel Mobility takes this one step further, with built-in battery-optimizing features allowing users to enjoy the advanced capabilities of smartphones without draining their power. So how can ShoreTel Mobility administrators and users extend the battery life on their smartphones?

Enable U-APSD on the WLAN.

Many WLAN vendors now support the WMM Power Save certification that includes power-save mode targeted at applications such as VoIP. This mode called Unscheduled Automatic Power Save Delivery (U-APSD) allows 802.11 devices to operate in a low power mode anytime voice packets are not being transmitted while maintaining an overall low latency. Our tests show some devices yield about double the talk time as a result of enabling U-APSD.

Select the right Power Save Mode for your usage on the RoamAnywhere Client.

In addition to regular power save options on the device, Advance Settings on the RoamAnywhere Client offer advanced Power Save Mode options that users can select. Options are typically Always On, Enterprise Only and Calls only. (Note: This feature is not available on all devices.)

• Always On: Allows the smartphone to always search for one of the preferred access points and maintains a connection if within the range of the enterprise Wi-Fi network. Selecting this option might reduce battery life.
• Enterprise Only: If the smartphone is in the range of the enterprise, a Wi-Fi connection is maintained. If the device is not in range of the enterprise, no attempts are made to connect to a preferred access point.
• Calls Only: If the smartphone is within range of the preferred access point, a connection to the access point is made only when calls are placed or received.

Categories: Enterprise Mobility

Tags: battery life, optimization, smartphone

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Article source: http://blog.shoretel.com/2012/04/optimizing-smartphone-battery-life/

10 AM on April 19, 2012

“Datamart has been an established ShoreTel partner for over 10 years and we are proud to have them as the first ShoreTel partner to join the channel program for the cloud division. Their reputation for providing a knowledgeable in-house sales, service and support team who take the time to understand the clients’ business, aligns perfectly with our mission to provide phone systems and applications with an experience that businesses love.”
– Bob Maute, ShoreTel Cloud Division vice president of channels and alliances.

ShoreTel’s Cloud Division, M5 Networks, has added Datamart, Inc. as an Alliance partner. As a ShoreTel Cloud Division channel partner, Datamart will now offer customers cloud-based voice, unified communications, and contact center solutions, in addition to on-premise systems.

Datamart, a current ShoreTel Gold Champion Partner for premise-based solutions, has helped New England businesses design, install and support cutting-edge unified communications solutions for more than 35 years. Datamart and ShoreTel share a passion to deliver the highest level of customer satisfaction and ensure customers are delighted with their on-premise or in the cloud communications solutions and services. Datamart has won every customer satisfaction award that ShoreTel offers.

ShoreTel’s M5 Channel Partner Program is designed for value-added resellers and systems integrators who want to provide world-class cloud-based phone systems and unified communications services to their customers. To learn more about ShoreTel’s M5 partner programs visit http://www.m5.net/partners/.

“Datamart is thrilled to feature ShoreTel’s cloud services as a new offering. Our customers have been vocal about their need for a state-of-the art, cloud-based business phone solution that can also support their need for unified communications. M5, ShoreTel’s Cloud Division, has a proven track record of reliability and outstanding customer service that makes them an excellent choice. We couldn’t be happier about the ability to offer both on-premise and cloud-based solutions backed by a company like ShoreTel. ”
- Scott St. Clair, Datamart president

Categories: Channel Partners, Cloud Division

Tags: champion partner, datamart, M5, value added resellers

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Article source: http://blog.shoretel.com/2012/04/shoretels-cloud-division-and-datamart-announce-partnership/

12 PM on April 16, 2012

There is no question that email marketing is on a growth trajectory. The current total spend of over $1 billion dollars is projected to double in the next few years alone. This includes emails of all major categories – advertisements, solicitations, as well informational emails.

Email marketing is attractive because it can be deployed quickly and cost-effectively. It is also very measureable. With many database segmentation tools available, part of the creativity in email marketing is the effective segmentation of the target and the personalization of the email message.

Other important nuances of a successful email marketing program include the use of opt-in emails so as not to violate privacy/SPAM concerns. There must also be a strategy of persistence and getting a feel for how many emails to drip in order to get a desired impression. Continuing on that theme, it is also important to know when to stop emailing to prospects/cold lists when a number of non-response messages have been delivered.

There has been talk that the advent of social media would eventually kill email, but the likelihood is that it would be a symbiotic relationship and not necessarily having a deterrent or synergistic effect.

How have you most successfully communicated with prospective customers?

Categories: Customer Experiences

Tags: email marketing

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Article source: http://blog.shoretel.com/2012/04/email-marketing/

12 PM on April 13, 2012

What happens when you invite about 100 consultants to the Canadian Telecommunications Consultants Association conference in Ontario, and ask which is better – cloud or premise?

As the host Steve Leaden points out, it’s not a black or white answer.

I was pleased to present several case studies on Mobile UC, plus be a member on a panel on Cloud versus Premise. The only thing that is clear is the opportunity for consultants to help their clients understand the differences. Joining me on the panel were representatives from Cisco and Avaya.

It’s quite clear many vendors do not have the experience that M5 Networks has in building a customer service oriented business, that is more than throwing racks of gear in a collocated facility and try to roll out a service. The consultants were in full agreement that the organization that can address the service problem at 2 p.m. in 5 minutes not 5 hours is going to be the organization that wins.

So if service is the differentiator, is service in the cloud the answer for everyone?

Based on the consultant dialog, the answer is not necessarily. The reality is the CIO is usually the cloud master, whether a company system runs in a third-party service office, or in the closet via a private cloud. And for businesses that just prefer to have someone else manage it for them, a hosted offer make sense – if the service if focused on delivering world-class service.

ShoreTel is fortunate to now offer both solutions. The legacy guys paid the price by taking complexity and making an IP version of complexity, which still result in those five hours of troubleshooting when things go sideways during a WAN outage.

It’s nice to know ShoreTel customers don’t face that problem. Probably because they shouldn’t have to in the first place.

Categories: Event, Hosted, Unified Communications

Tags: cloud, CTCA, mobile, on-premise

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Article source: http://blog.shoretel.com/2012/04/which-is-better-cloud-or-on-premise/