Unified Communications and Social Media.

You may think that the world of Unified Communications and its brisk business persona of flagging up meetings etc., has nothing to do with social media, which is after all, the place we tell each other what we’ve been up to on our vacation. In fact, these two areas are increasingly melding and they complement each other well.

UC is the means to bring together VoIP, IM, video conferencing, email and so on, helping the end user to organize their time and communicate with colleagues. Companies have long seen the advantage of using UC. Plantronics conducted a study and the results show 98% of the Fortune 1000 list are either using UC or considering its use over the following two years. Microsoft is confident that there will be 1 billion users over the following three years of its Office Communicator Service, whereby you can make phone calls on the computer. Bringing together voice, IM, video and email under one umbrella is clearly the way to go. Different types of situation demand different types of communication from real time to email to the good old-fashioned phone call.

Companies are also using social media for recruitment drives and marketing aimed at the big outside world. The other aim is to connect with employees and keep them motivated. Linking social media to UC covers all the bases and businesses keep in control.

Facebook and Twitter are still the first port of call for companies. Employees know their way around the voice call facility, mobile options and so on. Google Buzz is predicted to do great things also.

Other enterprise grade alternatives are coming through however. Cisco has a platform they call MyCisco, which consolidates messages, news feeds and tasks and employees can chat on forums. Quickr from IBM is easy to share information and source expertise from participants.

The future is bright for UC and social media integration, as more and more people see the potential. Employees are scattered in today’s modern workplace and we need the means to bring them together in a way that business is comfortable with. Communication and sharing knowledge is key.