Questions on CTI/UCCX integration with CRM (SFDC)

[Jason Amick]

Would like some input on what other UC members are using to integrate SalesForce (Cloud) with UCCX/Finesse.  I will include all current software versions below.  Our company recently purchased Salesforce CRM and are working on the build with a 3rd party vendor and were advised it would integrate seamlessly with UCCX.

We’ve looked at a few third party products like b+s, Tenfold, etc...; Cisco Call connector was EOL in 2008 and EOS in 2015. 

Sales is looking for a simple click2call / click-to-dial from within SalesForce.  Customer Service is looking to use SalesForce to manage incoming callers providing screen pops to specific accounts.  This ‘passing of data’ is easy to pass from UCCX via an HTTP search call.  However it only renders the search page and some agent interaction is needed to pull up records. Our business units don’t have a clear direction at the moment but I believe the idea is that they would like to use the CRM/SFDC interface to do all or most of their navigating without leveraging Finesse, including agent control via softphone/gadget.

These 3rd party connectors have limited technical information I was hoping someone could provide some direction on previous integration experiences. If we were to go the 3rd party CTI route what pros/cons would we run into?  I have included some basic questions below. 

1. Is the 3rd party connectors a replacement for Finesse since all the agent status a phone control options done within the 3rd party widget inside Salesforce?

2. Some vendors provide a CTI connector to embed a gadget in either the CRM UI or within Finesse. What would be the most practical way to do this?

3. If we were to use a 3rd party connector and offload all CTI control in a gadget in the CRM product could some agents still use Finesse or would all agents have to use the 3rd party gadget.

4.  Do you lose any features using a 3rd party gadget that we currently might have?  For example would supervisors still be able to see agent information in Finesse supervisor desktop such as agent state if the agent is not technically using Finesse to control their state?

I realize some of these questions should be directed to the 3rd party connector in question but wanted to start here. Please let me know if you need some additional information, any direction would be great.  I have included the UC versions below.

CUCM: System version: 11.5.1.15900-18

UCCX: System version: 11.6.2.10000-38 (ES05-9)

CUC: System Version: 11.5.1.17900-52

[david.macias]

There are a good bit of vendors out there that do pretty much the same thing. Some of them have some nice bells and whistles though and obviously more $$$. Besides the ones you've mentioned, there's Cloverhound's CTI connector, ExpertFlow, etc.

1. Is the 3rd party connectors a replacement for Finesse since all the agent status a phone control options done within the 3rd party widget inside Salesforce?

Yes.

2. Some vendors provide a CTI connector to embed a gadget in either the CRM UI or within Finesse. What would be the most practical way to do this?

The best customer experience is to have a single UI. Embedding Finesse in the CRM will accomplish that. Embedding the CRM inside Finesse has proven, to me, to be awkward and not a great experience.

3. If we were to use a 3rd party connector and offload all CTI control in a gadget in the CRM product could some agents still use Finesse or would all agents have to use the 3rd party gadget.

Yes, Finesse is always there for you no matter what. You can move only some agents to the connector and some stay on Finesse. You will want to do this because all the vendors charge per agent per month.

4. Do you lose any features using a 3rd party gadget that we currently might have? For example would supervisors still be able to see agent information in Finesse supervisor desktop such as agent state if the agent is not technically using Finesse to control their state?

So you don't lose any Finesse functionality, but if your supervisor is also on the connector then yeah they will not see as much as they do inside Finesse. The B+S solution probably has the most data available inside the connector, but even then I do believe some use cases will force the supervisor to go to Finesse. What I've seen is some customer have their supervisors on both Finesse and CTI connector at the same time and they toggle back and forth depending on what they need to do.

I have a fair bit of experience in this realm if you want to have a chat about it send me a PM and we can get on a call. I'm not associated with any CTI connector vendor if that helps.

david

[Ritesh Desai]

Hi @Jason Amick 

There are ways you want to integrate. You can embed Finesse functionality into SFDC so that Agents will interact on SFDC but telephony functions will call in backend.

regards,
Ritesh Desai

[Jason Amick]

David:

Thanks for the information it was very helpful.  The reason we were asking about the integration and if all agents had to use one or the other Finesse/CTI gadget was because Cisco TAC asked the below question and notified us that they recently noticed an issue with this.  See TACs response below.

From Cisco TAC:

Also, wanted to know what the end goal is in this case? Will all agents be using this CTI-client integrated with CCX or will this CTI-client be used alongside Finesse? We have recently noticed an issues with both are used (CTI-client integrated with CCX used by a few agents, while the other agents use Finesse)

We asked for some clarity on the issue and below was their response to this...

Hi Jason,

This was the scenario that was noticed:

## TP-CTI-client integrated with CCX that is used by a few agents, while the other agents use Finesse.

- When a particular CCX agent uses a 3rd party CTI Client, the initial logins and call function work fine.

- However, if any event for this user is received from the Finesse server [for eg: Supervisor initiated change], its breaks the connection between the CTI Server and the TP CTI Client.

There is a defect filed and it is in the development stage. It is set to be integrated on UCCX 12.5 release once fixed.

I thought I will let you know of this issue if in-case you are planning to use both.

So the defect looks to be in any UCCX version below 12.5.  Can anyone confirm this is the case?

[Jason Amick]

Also here is the bugID to reference, Thanks.

https://bst.cloudapps.cisco.com/bugsearch/bug/CSCvs94144/?rfs=iqvred

[david.macias]

Oh boy that's a terrible bug. :(

If I'm reading it correctly it sounds like the trigger is IF a supervisor performs an action on a connector agent then the connector agent will stop working. Sounds like training supervisors to not perform any supervisory action on the agents will mitigate this. This is really unfortunate as it forces businesses to go all in on CTI connectors which don't generally have all the features that Finesse has. Am I understanding the bug and it's impact correctly?

Thank you for sharing this.

david

[david.macias]

Can you ask Cisco if this is 100% only for adapters using CTI Protocol? Most modern day adapters use the Finesse API and not the CTI Protocol.

david

[Jason Amick]

I opened a new case since the original one was closed out.  I will see let you know what Ciscos response is on if this bug impacts both CTI adapters as well as the once that integrate via the FInesse API. 

[Jason Amick]

Below is TACs response, looks to only impact CTI adapters. Responded to get additional clarification on adapters integrated via the Finesse API.

*****This is Bhushan from Cisco TAC and I have taken ownership of this SR since I had some familiarity with your requirement,

To answer your question, yes its only applicable when CTI protocol is used. If the intention is to use both Finesse and the CTI Client, then that may cause an issue.

Please let me know if you any further questions on that.*****

[david.macias]

Perfect, then this really doesn't apply to most connectors vendors. Than you for providing an update.

david

[PTS]

You can checkout below 3rd party SFDC Connector

https://developer.cisco.com/ecosystem/spp/solutions/155214/

SFDC Connector video : https://youtu.be/vxr4QXl9Ze0