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April 15, 2015

WebRTC Remains a Promise While Adoption is Uneven by Browsers and Technology Providers


WebRTC offers great promise to the customer support industry. The standard, which allows for real-time browser-to-browser voice and video communications without the need to download any plug-ins or software, could help revolutionize how companies offer multimedia support to customers using browsers (either desktop or mobile) to look for information or resolve issues.

Imagine being able to initiate a short video-conference session with a customer who is browsing the Web to look for technical answers. The customer support rep can view what the customer is doing, and the customer can benefit from hands-on “how to” demonstrations by the technical rep. Customers using mobile browsers can reach out and ask for help right from the browsing session without the need to exit and dial a phone number. For companies seeking to truly bring fluid, channel-independent customer relationships to the forefront, WebRTC remains a great promise.

“WebRTC allows for click-to-call communications, creating a new channel for users to communicate with the enterprise,” wrote Voxbone’s Dries Plasman recently for No Jitter. “This feature streamlines communications and is easily embeddable in any company website or email signature. This means customers do not have to scour the website to find the right number to call, and then have to turn to another channel -- meaning, a landline or mobile phone -- to place the call.”

For many reasons, however, the standard remains a promise. A recent Frost & Sullivan report entitled, “WebRTC in Customer Service: Opportunities and Challenges,” revealed that there are still roadblocks to the wide adoption of WebRTC.

“Customer contact organizations face challenges in fully capitalizing on WebRTC,” wrote the report’s authors. “For example, not all browsers support it. How effectively organizations and vendors respond to these challenges will determine whether WebRTC will become a permanent part of the communications channel mix, and if so in what form.”

This uncertainty is halting the growth of WebRTC as technology vendors are uncertain which browsers and platforms are going to support it, when and to what degree.

“Created through the collaboration of the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) and the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), WebRTC is actively supported by Google and Mozilla,” according to Frost & Sullivan. “But other companies, notably Microsoft, will be adopting it as it evolves.”

The market is currently uncertain whether Microsoft’s new browser, Spartan, which will be unveiled in the second half of this year, will include support for WebRTC. Even if Microsoft does offer support for the standard in Spartan, technical limitations may slow the usability of WebRTC in the near future, according to Plasman.

“As HD audio and video features become available through WebRTC, drop-outs, echoes, and other user experience issues common to using the public Internet will likely continue to limit its use and value,” he said. “Some solutions aim to minimize the impacts of issues on the LAN or traffic congestion in the open Internet. Figuring out how to assure quality of service will be critical in allowing WebRTC to truly take off.”




Edited by Stefania Viscusi
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