Genesys Cloud CX vs. HCL Sametime

Starting a contact center to handle large volume of customers per day - For promoting the business for outbound campaigns - With the Genesys architect you can design complex post Agent esclation flows - You can use Genesys to forward a call to any external IVR(Automation) bot - There is integration of Genesys adapter with Salesforce, in case some enterprise want to utilize the same Genesys license for Salesforce, they can do it.

Incentivized

Overall, Sametime is a great feature for global teams to communicate, since you can chat quickly and efficiently with Sametime. Also, the file transfer is really fast and it downloads to any folder you choose. The chat history is easy to use and it is easy to find keywords. The feature of creating "emoticons" sometimes can jeopardize the team's efficiency.

Incentivized

• Standard omnichannel routing - multiple-media interactions are handled well.
• WFM - agent scheduled, workload balancing, forecasting, etc.
• 3rd Party Integrations - Easy integration with CRMs, DBs. ADs etc.
• We are exploring Predictive Routing & finding is useful so far.
• Reporting is also very useful & informative.

• The license cost is comparatively low so almost all staff have it installed in our company. We can use it to contact all internal staff.
• It’s light and fast with almost no downtime. It also provides easy to use APIs for the user to build automation process on it. We have an internally built robot running on Sametime to answer frequently asked questions and do some repetitive tasks.
• Chat history can be saved as per user’s preference and it is easy to be searched.

Incentivized

• Updates can come quickly and release notes can be missed
• We use a large number of queues. It's hard to keep track as reporting seems to be limited to around 500 at a time
• Dashboards aren't as adaptable as they could be

Incentivized

• The mobile app is not that great for anything outside of straight up messaging.
• We tried video chatting within Sametime without any real success. There were connection issues and the app would crash quite often. We switched to another product and had no problems.
• IBM Sametime just looks outdated. The menus and contact list are not up to date from a UX perspective compared to many other popular chat apps.

Incentivized

The upcoming upgrades working with Genesys Cloud and Salesforce are very exciting. Even though we don't use Genesys Cloud to the fullest extent it can be used (we just migrated a year ago), when these upgrades roll out, I am very excited to see what it can do to for our agents. I think they are going to be very impressed

Incentivized

Sametime is now an embedded experience for our users. They know it, they like it, they use it, and they expect it to be wherever they are. Because it is pretty easy to use and NEVER goes down, users know they can rely on it and won't be frustrated by it. Sametime is right up with there with Microsoft Office in terms of user adoption and appreciation.

Incentivized

Everything is very good. It is very useful, friendly to users and it makes our work easier than what we expected. I think that I don't need any help from someone on how to use Genesys coz basically they will directly feed it to you without any hassle on using it.

Incentivized

Just about everything works the way you expect it would and it's relatively easy for users to figure out. Sametime was one of those things that we started with only a few people as a "test" and before the test period was done we discovered a few hundred people had figured out how to log in and most got it working all on their own. Many of our users want to use Sametime and do so regularly; we do not have to create policies enforcing its usage. Users find it practical to use Sametime to do things like chat, transfer files, share their screen, and so forth.

Incentivized

The platform is highly reliable, with minimal downtime or outages, and is generally available when needed. Over the course of using it, unplanned outages or application errors have been rare, and any issues that did arise were quickly resolved. Genesys provides robust support and maintenance, ensuring the system remains operational during critical business hours. However, like any cloud-based platform, there have been occasional disruptions, though these were infrequent and quickly addressed. Overall, its availability has been excellent, supporting smooth daily operations.

Typically if Sametime is not available, it's because Windows Updates were done on the servers and they were not rebooted. However, that's not a problem with Sametime -- in fact, if you have Linux you could probably run Sametime for years without any hiccups whatsoever. We have no internal Linux expertise.

Incentivized

Overall, the platform performs well, with pages loading quickly and reports typically completing in a reasonable time, even with complex data. The interface is responsive, and most day-to-day tasks are executed efficiently. However, in some instances, especially during peak usage times or when running very detailed, large-scale reports, there can be slight delays. While these are rare, they occasionally affect workflow. Additionally, the platform generally integrates smoothly with other systems, though some integrations can slow down slightly, particularly when pulling large datasets or interacting with older, legacy systems. Nonetheless, the performance is strong and reliable for most use cases.

Generally very good. Occasionally AV or screen-sharing will stutter and every now and then I hear of it dropping out altogether, but in all cases it was easy to re-establish

Incentivized

There seem to be so many pages and options for support - but none of them are very seamless and some are very hard to maneuver or manage. I would like to learn more about the product features and tutorials etc. - but have had a hard time finding appropriate content.

Incentivized

I have to use support for many customers. However, support is generally quite responsive and continues to see an issue through to resolution and I would recommend using their knowledgeable and well-trained staff.

Incentivized

Genesys team that provide trainings are friendly and professional. They helped us to understand well the product and the functionalities. The training was detailed with use cases. At the end, we got a task to develop that ended with success and we got some Genesys rewards. It was amazing experience

Incentivized

In general, it gives a description and can help to understand what to do and how. but: Sometimes, it does not keep up with changes in the system (for example, in the GUI changes, additional features and so on). Sometimes, much easier and helpful to read the documentation (https://help.mypurecloud.com/) that gives the "better" explanations and takes less time.

Incentivized

My Team was involved in the discussion before implementing the application. We had a whole walkthrough of this product and during the demo itself we were very impressed with type of service we were getting. The integration of the product into our system was very quick and seamless.

Incentivized

Significantly improved over PureConnect. Much more reliable and much more flexible and feature-rich. There are some features I strongly miss, like on-device logging for errors - in PureConnect, there were rolling logs for all components like the phone, recording, desktop app etc. In GC these logs appear in the browser console (even in Desktop app) and have to be pre-configured, meaning often we don't capture a log for an error the agents have. Overall, a huge improvement - the IVR is much more flexible, admin is much more manageable, everything is a step up.

Incentivized

Text chat is text chat. It's not a technically hard problem to solve. It's when you try and move out of text chat into more fully featured applications that allow for audio or video calling, transcripts, etc, it becomes apparent that the developers on Sametime gave up a long time ago. In my organization, Slack has nearly completely replaced Sametime for any and all purposes that Sametime used to fulfill.

Incentivized

I give Genesys a rating of 10 for scalability because of its ability to adapt seamlessly to growing business needs, whether expanding across multiple departments, locations, or regions. Its cloud-based infrastructure allows for easy scaling without the need for costly hardware upgrades or lengthy implementation times. As our organisation grew, we were able to add new agents, channels, and features without disrupting operations, which significantly enhanced our flexibility. The platform's design supports both small-scale and enterprise-level operations, making it ideal for evolving businesses. Additionally, its capacity to handle increased interaction volumes without compromising performance ensures that customer service quality remains high, even during peak times. This flexibility and ease of scaling, combined with real-time analytics and automation capabilities, make it highly effective for growing organisations.

Sametime is rock solid. It runs on WebSphere, DB2 and other related IBM technologies. This does mean the back-end is highly complex and very difficult to learn and get comfortable with, however.

Incentivized

• Strategic Agility- Genesys Cloud CX has delivered both immediate cost benefits and long-term value through improved customer relationships, operational resilience, and administrative satisfaction.
• Enhanced Customer Experience- With advanced analytics and personalized interactions, we’ve seen an improvement in routing to address customer needs.
• Cost Savings and Operational Efficiency- The platform’s cloud-based architecture can eliminate on-premise infrastructure and maintenance in some cases.

Incentivized

• HCL Sametime is affordable thus it is cost-efficient for instant messaging compared to costs of phone calls, especially overseas calls.
• As Sametime is integrated with Lotus Notes it is convenient to use both of these together without separately using them.
• Still need to pay for other apps for effective video conferencing and webinar.

Incentivized