Cytracom has introduced a major series of additions to its VoIP solution for MSPs that significantly expand the platform’s capabilities.
The new offerings include the company’s first custom-made mobile app, first browser-based desktop interface, first business SMS messaging tool, and first custom-manufactured desk phone, as well as an all-new integration that embeds unified communications functionality directly within the Outlook Online component of Microsoft Office 365. Those enhancements are accompanied by new pricing plans designed to provide more flexible purchasing options and deeper volume ordering discounts.
The new mobile app, which is available now, replaces the third-party system Cytracom offered its customers previously. Unlike that earlier product, the new one provides access to presence information, visual voicemail, call history logs, and more in addition to the ability to make and receive calls.
The new app requires no technician configuration either after a user downloads it, according to Cytracom CEO Zane Conkle. “As long as you know your login ID and your password, you’re on the system,” he says. “We’re saving the partners just tons and tons of time.”
The new browser-based desktop system, which replaces a native Windows application introduced four years ago and ships this summer, also requires no administrator setup. “There’s nothing to install,” Conkle says. “You don’t have to worry about any security software getting in the way and security policies. You don’t have to worry about updating software.”
The desktop tool features the same appearance as the mobile app and provides the same functionality. The two systems are integrated with one another and the rest of the Cytracom platform as well. “If you make a call on mobile, it shows up on desktop. If you make a call on desktop, it shows up on mobile,” Conkle says. “They’re very tightly linked.”
The new Office 365 functionality, which mirrors capabilities available in the mobile and desktop apps and is similarly integrated with the Cytracom platform’s other components, is designed to provide an additional option for utilizing VoIP features. “Outlook and Office 365 is an interface that our users have up all day, 24/7, on their computer screen,” Conkle notes. Building VoIP functionality directly into that interface allows end users to place calls, message co-workers, and more without switching to another application.
Office 365 integration becomes available on May 15th. Cytracom plans to add more integrations with software-as-a-service products in the future, according to Conkle, who says that Salesforce and HubSpot are both early candidates.
The SMS messaging introduced today, which will reach users this summer, allows MSPs to communicate with customers who prefer texting to email or phone calls without handing out a personal cell phone number. “It’s going to allow our clients to engage with their customers in a totally new way that they really haven’t been able to do before,” Conkle says.
Cytracom’s first custom-built desk phone, called the D2 and available now, succeeds the Grandstream GXP2130 units the company utilized before. Like the previous device, the new one is included free with most subscription plans. The device includes 24 programmable keys, versus the GXP2130’s eight, optional Wi-Fi connectivity, and a digital user directory with real-time presence information.
Technicians can update that directory on all of a client’s phones at once, or make other changes, using the Cytracom platform’s centralized management feature. “I can make one change and it’s pushed out to all the devices,” Conkle notes. “I don’t have to roll a vehicle. I don’t have to VPN in or remote in to a computer.” D2 phones arrive pre-provisioned as well, he adds, so there’s no setup required after unboxing.
Cytracom’s new pricing scheme adds two alternatives to the single subscription the company offered in the past. That legacy package, which is now called the C1 plan, includes unlimited calling and the new mobile and desktop apps. Users can then pick and choose additional features like SMS messaging and visual voicemail from a menu of add-ons provided for extra fees. The new C2 plan includes the base functionality plus all of those add-ons for one flat monthly fee. A third “Mobile & Web” plan targeted at highly mobile users rarely at an office comes with the same features as the C2 plan but doesn’t include free desk phones.
Pricing starts at $29.95 a month per user for the C1 plan, $32.95 for the C2 plan, and $24.95 for the mobile/web plan. Existing Cytracom customers who stick with the C1 plan will pay the same monthly rate as they did before. “Everybody that’s priced where they’re at will continue to stay where they’re at,” Conkle says. “They’re basically grandfathered in.”
Volume discounts introduced today will enable users to make more margin on larger deals. In the past, only deals involving 40 or more seats were eligible for price cuts. Cytracom has now lowered that figure to 20, and added deeper price breaks for 50-seat and 100-seat sales. “At the top tier, the users see about a 40 percent discount off the list price,” Conkle states.
Partners can use Cytracom’s overhauled proposal generator, which is available immediately, to get pricing for any of the vendor’s plans. The new tool features an automated, wizard-based UI designed to make preparing bids simpler for MSPs and their salespeople.
Simplicity, Conkle emphasizes, is the unifying theme behind all of the tools and updates Cytracom unveiled today. “We truly want to be the easiest solution for an MSP to not only sell, but to install and support on an ongoing basis,” he says, noting that less manual intervention means more profit for channel pros who make their money in flat recurring installments.
Only a vendor that sells to and through MSPs exclusively, he argues, would make such a consideration the foundation for its entire platform and go-to-market strategy. “Everything that our product and our engineering team is pushing out is all geared towards this community,” Conkle says.
