The Total Economic Impact™ Of Microsoft Dynamics 365 Contact Center

Contact Center Representative Productivity From Increased Efficiencies

Evidence and data. Interviewees and survey respondents found that deploying Dynamics 365 Contact Center and integrating Microsoft Teams Phone provided representatives with more opportunities for efficiencies, which generated value in contact centers through metrics such as increased containment rates, improved first-call resolution rates, and better average handling times.

• The project manager at a manufacturing company noted that with Dynamics 365 Contact Center and Teams Phone working together, they saw improvements to their voice channels that decreased wait times by 27% and abandonment rates by 14%.

• The head of center of excellence for sales at a technology organization expected to see wait time improvements in the contact center after deploying Dynamics 365 Contact Center. The organizational goal is that 80% of calls or chats should be answered within 2 seconds. Although they have not yet achieved this KPI, they are well-positioned to do so with Dynamics 365 Contact Center in place.

• The director of digital transformation at an education organization saw handle times improve by seconds from functionality included in Dynamics 365 Contact Center that enables representatives to know who a caller is and facilitates transfers.

• The senior IT director at a technology company also experienced improvements to AHT in contact centers, stating: “When the queue in the contact center is free, the reps still have a lot of work to do. Improving AHT means our reps have more time to work on existing cases, follow up with customers, or maybe follow up with internal teams such as engineering or others. Overall, AI summaries and suggested knowledge from AI agents deployed with Dynamics 365 Contact Center contributed to much better average handle time that enabled reps more time to work on value-add activities for the organization.”

• A survey of 156 IT, contact center, and customer experience decision-makers at large global enterprises using Microsoft Dynamics 365 Contact Center solutions found that their organizations achieved, on average:

  • A 50% reduction in call resolution times.
  • A 10% reduction in handle times.
  • A 60% reduction in time to first response or wait times.
  • A 50% reduction in escalations.
  • Increased containment rates from 60% to 80% with Dynamics 365 Contact Center.

• The head of center of excellence for sales at a technology organization reduced representatives’ time by 50% and reallocated the remaining contact center representatives to lower cost center regions, saving additional costs in the contact centers while still providing flexible and complete coverage for customers.

• The director of digital transformation at an education organization said they have 165 representatives who previously spent 30% to 40% of their time on contact center interactions, which averaged about 15 hours per week. With Microsoft Dynamics 365 Contact Center, they reduced time spent by 25% due to faster handle times and higher containment rates where self-service options resolved student questions and problems before they reached a representative.

Modeling and assumptions. Based on the interviews, Forrester assumes the following about the composite organization:

• Average support interactions include time spent on customer call interactions and the average duration of interaction before the investment.

• Average volume of monthly inbound phone calls multiplies support interactions by the total volume of representatives, divided by 12 months in a year.

• Before the investment in Microsoft Dynamics 365 Contact Center, the containment rate for inbound call volumes was 60%, the AHT was 12 minutes, and the average duration per interaction was 21 minutes.

Risks. Contact center representative productivity from increased efficiencies may vary depending on the following:

• Contact center metrics including call volumes, AHT, interaction durations, and representative counts.

• The deployment schedule for the various components of Dynamics 365 Contact Center, including generative and agentic AI functionality.

Results. To account for these risks, Forrester adjusted this benefit downward by 20%, yielding a three-year, risk-adjusted total PV (discounted at 10%) of $16.4 million.

Contact Center Representative Productivity From Reduced Downtime

Evidence and data. Interviewees cited telephony quality issues in the prior environment that sometimes impacted representatives’ ability to do their work and resulted in downtime. But after the investment in Dynamics 365 Contact Center and Teams Phone, their companies improved contact center telephony performance, which reduced representative downtime.

The head of center of excellence for sales at a technology organization corroborated the time savings for contact center representatives from improved system performance, as proved through the reduction in helpdesk tickets, “We do not have the amount of tickets like we had in the past because we do not have the same volume of incidents like we had in the past, so from a telephone project perspective, we improved performance.”

Modeling and assumptions. Based on the interviews, Forrester assumes the following about the composite organization:

• The composite organization spent 20 minutes per incident in the prior environment logging tickets across multiple vendors in the contact center and customer service ecosystems.

• Twenty percent of those incidents caused downtime for representatives in the prior environment, and the average downtime duration was 10 minutes.

• Seventy-five percent of the contact center representatives live on the Dynamics 365 Contact Center are on shift in a given day.

Risks. Contact center representative productivity from reduced downtime may vary depending on the following:

• The volume of downtime experienced in the prior environment, including how many of those events impact contact center representatives and for how long.

• The implementation schedule of Dynamics 365 Contact Center in terms of representatives live on the platform.

• Contact center locations and the representative types in terms of full-time employees, part-time employees, and job levels.

Results. To account for these risks, Forrester adjusted this benefit downward by 20%, yielding a three-year, risk-adjusted total PV (discounted at 10%) of $1.5 million.

Customer Service Representative Productivity From Workflow Automations

Evidence and data. Microsoft Dynamics 365 Contact Center included multiple in-product agents that worked across the CCaaS and CRM capabilities to improve customer service workflows. Interviewees and survey respondents noted that these agents provided efficiencies in many areas of back-end administration for customer service representatives such as extracting information from and summarizing cases as well as closing cases in the system.

• A survey of 156 IT, contact center, and customer experience decision-makers at large global enterprises using Microsoft Dynamics 365 Contact Center found that their organizations:

  • Saved customer service representatives an average of 41 hours per month through workflow automation, representing a 12.6% productivity improvement.
  • Reduced the time representatives spent extracting information from conversations by an average of 11.3% using in-product agents, from a baseline of 32 hours per representative per month.
  • Reduced the time representatives spent on case information summaries by an average of 11.3% using in-product agents, from a baseline of 24 hours per representative per month.
  • Reduced the time representatives spent closing cases in the system by an average of 10.3% using in-product agents, from a baseline of 15 hours per representative per month.

• The head of center of excellence for sales at a technology organization has an organizational goal of achieving an 80% solution rate for customer service cases, which they feel well-positioned to reach with Dynamics 365 Contact Center and specifically the various in-product agents deployed to assist representatives.

• The senior IT director at a technology company indicated that their representatives saw a 30% improvement to after-call work timelines, including activities such as summarizing calls, listing action items, and drafting responses. The time savings were redistributed to frontline work as representatives could get back into the queue faster to handle more cases. In turn, the back-end workflow efficiencies will contribute to improvements such as lower AHT and better first-call resolution rates: “Our main objective was to improve, and I think we achieved at least 30% improvement for after-call work. And we were able to put representatives back in the queue, and that’s significant.” They specified that the Microsoft Dynamics 365 Contact Center in-product agents provide the biggest impact that “save significant time for the representatives in terms of summarizing calls, creating action items, or drafting responses. These time savings have also affected our average handle time as the Customer Assist Agent also suggests certain resolutions to guide conversation.”

Modeling and assumptions. Based on the interviews, Forrester assumes the following about the composite organization:

• The composite organization deploys Dynamics 365 Customer Service Premium to all 500 customer service representatives in Year 1.

• Over the three-year investment period, the organization rolls out all of the in-product AI agents, which assist with information extraction, case summarization, and autoclosing cases for the representatives.

Risks. Customer service representative productivity from workflow automations may vary depending on the following:

• The number of representatives with customer service responsibilities and the deployment or rollout schedule for Dynamics 365 Customer Service.

• The agent types deployed to customer service representatives.

Results. To account for these risks, Forrester adjusted this benefit downward by 20%, yielding a three-year, risk-adjusted total PV (discounted at 10%) of $1.6 million.

Technology Overhead Savings: Avoided Cost To Third-Party Providers

Evidence and data. Interviewees and survey respondents noted that before deploying Dynamics 365 Contact Center, their organizations employed multiple technologies, often from different vendors, to meet customer service, contact center, and telephony needs. As such, they experienced high technology costs for platform licenses or additional spend on redundant licenses within the same vendor. With Microsoft Dynamics 365 Contact Center and associated solutions, their organizations eliminated legacy solutions and consolidated onto Microsoft to optimize license spend across CCaaS, CRM, and telephony. Additionally, interviewees from organizations that utilized different vendors for CCaaS and telephony specifically said they eliminated previous monthly service fees for disparate solution integration after streamlining CCaaS and telephony to Microsoft solutions.

• The project manager from a manufacturing company noted that their organization reduced spending on integration service fees by consolidating to Microsoft Dynamics 365 Contact Center and Teams Phone. They previously paid service fees to a telecom provider for SP trunks that cost roughly $2,500 a month per contact center. With the rollout of Microsoft Dynamics 365 Contact Center and Teams Phone, Microsoft became the primary telecom provider and the organization continued to pay the platform and Teams Phone licensing fees, which they found less costly.

• The head of center of excellence for sales at a technology organization refreshed their licensing agreement with Microsoft when they consolidated platforms to Dynamics 365 Contact Center and associated solutions, which resulted in the elimination of old phone numbers as well as a reduction in telephony consumption costs for the organization.

• The director of digital transformation at an education organization eliminated a prior CRM platform to consolidate to Microsoft Dynamics 365 Customer Service in conjunction with Microsoft Dynamics 365 Contact Center, thus eliminating competitive vendor licenses: “It’s a difference of $770 a month for the whole enterprise instance versus a quarter of a million dollars for 70 people on [the competitive CRM platform].”

• A survey of 156 IT, contact center, and customer experience decision-makers at large global enterprises using Microsoft Dynamics 365 Contact Center solutions found:

  • Thirty-seven percent of respondents saw technology cost savings from eliminating license costs in their prior CCaaS environment, with an average reduction in licensing costs of 10.6%.
  • Thirty percent of respondents saw cost savings from eliminating license costs in their prior CRM environment, with an average reduction in licensing costs of 9.4%.
  • Twenty-five percent of respondents saw cost savings from eliminating license costs in their prior CCaaS environment, with an average reduction in licensing costs of 9.8%.

Modeling and assumptions. Based on the interviews, Forrester assumes the following about the composite organization:

• The composite organization has three total contact centers and 1,100 contact center representatives, including 500 representatives who also have customer service responsibilities.

• The organization deploys Dynamics 365 Contact Center and Teams Phone one contact center at a time, starting with the most complex contact center in the initial period over a six-month implementation timeline. Within Year 1, the second contact center is up and running on Dynamics 365 Contact Center and Teams Phone. The final contact center deploys Dynamics 365 Contact Center and Teams Phone by Year 2 of the investment so that all 1,100 contact center representatives are live on the CCaaS platform by Year 2.

• The organization replaces its prior cloud-based CRM solution with Dynamics 365 Customer Service within Year 1 of the investment so that all 500 contact center representatives with customer service responsibilities are live on Dynamics 365 Customer Service within Year 1.

• The organization previously used a third-party vendor for telephony before the investment in Dynamics 365 Contact Center. In consolidating to Microsoft, the organization saves on third-party integration service fees related to integrating CCaaS and telephony systems.

Risks. Technology overhead savings for avoided costs to third-party providers may vary depending on the following:

• The size and scope of the contact center and customer service functions in terms of total contact centers and volume of representatives.

• The technology in place across those environments before the deployment of Microsoft Dynamics 365 Contact Center and the prior existing relationship with Microsoft.

Results. To account for these risks, Forrester adjusted this benefit downward by 15%, yielding a three-year, risk-adjusted total PV (discounted at 10%) of $4.3 million.

Technology Overhead Savings: IT Labor And Administration Time Savings

Evidence and data. In addition to vendor and service fee reductions, interviewees and survey respondents said their organizations’ infrastructure management teams realized resource time savings from streamlining the back-end infrastructure that powers their customer service functions. Interviewees said before deploying Dynamics 365 Contact Center solutions, administrators in their organizations’ contact centers spent additional time training representatives and managing system operations across the different tools and solutions in place. After the deployment, administrators saw efficiencies from streamlining solutions in the contact center because it eliminated the need for additional training sessions and provided better manager and supervisor views across operations. Interviewees from organizations that had existing Dynamics 365 licenses before deploying Customer Service and/or Teams Phone said that their companies saw additional administrator time savings from extending a familiar interface to end users, which reduced onboarding timelines and accelerated time to value. Additionally, interviewees found that in their organizations’ prior environments, high volumes of incidents related to connectivity issues negatively impacted telephony quality in the contact center. When an incident occurred that required problem solving or mitigative action, the time to resolve was prolonged due to the sheer number of vendors and solutions involved in the back-end system architecture. Interviewees explained that by streamlining customer service platforms and telephony solutions with Microsoft, their organizations improved telephony performance by shortening the chain of vendors involved, which allowed them to resolve incidents sooner.

• Since the components of Microsoft Dynamics 365 Contact Center, Customer Service, and Teams Phone all natively integrate, the interviewees found that their internal teams did less custom integration projects. The director of digital transformation at an education organization accelerated integration timelines by five months by moving to Microsoft Dynamics 365 Contact Center solutions: “When we were using [a competitive CRM solution], we tried to connect Outlook with that system because that’s where all the emails are going. The project took us five months of working with a consultant, and we didn’t manage to do it. And I can tell you that my staff were very frustrated spending all that time on a project that was unsuccessful.”

• The EVP of information systems at a technology company experienced less integration development work specifically to create and build necessary dashboards and analytics: “We had built dashboards internally, traditionally with in-house developers and programmers. When we moved to Microsoft Dynamics 365 Contact Center, we had to rebuild those dashboards, but it was so easy to do. Especially using Microsoft’s AI functionality, what was taking us months to develop now took hours or days because they also offer frameworks and consistent metrics.”

• The head of center of excellence for sales at a technology organization simplified integration projects for their critical CCaaS and CRM systems with Microsoft Dynamics 365 Contact Center solutions, “It was much easier to integrate the Digital Contact Center or our CRM system with a Microsoft-based solution like the Microsoft Teams Phone system than it was to integrate it with a couple of different external telephone systems we had in place before.”

• A survey of 156 IT, contact center, and customer experience decision-makers at large global enterprises using Microsoft Dynamics 365 Contact Center found that 44% saw time savings on integration projects. On average, respondents had internal teams spending 24 hours a month on custom integration work before Microsoft Dynamics 365 Contact Center. Those teams saved an average of 10.3% of their time postdeployment.

• Infrastructure management teams also saw large gains in internal resource time saved. The head of center of excellence for sales at a technology organization expounded on the benefits of having a lean infrastructure with Microsoft Dynamics 365 Contact Center: “We have a lean infrastructure now. I don’t have to send colleagues to trainings on three different systems. That makes things much easier with respect to operating those solutions. There is also cost savings on custom development work in the infrastructure, such as for language or translations support, that is now replaced with out-of-the box Microsoft functionality.”

• The director of digital transformation at an education organization saw time savings for their telephony team, stating that the five FTEs used to dedicate several hours per day to ongoing management and fixes related to the telephony infrastructure, which was eliminated since consolidating to Microsoft.

• The same interviewee expressed that the technology time savings was a compounding benefit as internal teams grew in their familiarity with the Microsoft system: “For my staff, the more they become aware of how to use the Microsoft ecosystem, there is momentum. The more they learn, the more it applies to everything new that we do, like when we roll out new functionality.”

• This interviewee also credited the relationship with Microsoft for contributing to internal resource time saved for technology teams, stating: “Managing the ecosystem, the various connections between systems with Microsoft, is simplified in part because they know how to work with us. They can look at our trajectory and know how to help us at different points along the way. It helps us avoid integration misalignment or a strategic misalignment, because the tool itself is growing in a specific way, and we can make our strategy match and complement where the Microsoft product trajectory is going. This is especially true with new AI functionality rollouts, such as for agents.”

• Fifty-eight percent of the survey respondents saw time savings on infrastructure management and maintenance efforts. On average, respondents had internal teams spending 46 hours a month on infrastructure management before Microsoft Dynamics 365 Contact Center. Those teams saved an average of 13% of their time postdeployment.

Modeling and assumptions. Based on the interviews, Forrester assumes the following about the composite organization:

• The organization previously had a team of three integration resources dedicating 15% of their time to integration development and maintenance tasks before the investment.

• A team of 10 infrastructure resources dedicated 20% of their time to infrastructure management before the investment.

• A team of four system administrators dedicated 24% of their time to system administration before the investment.

• IT support teams spent 1.5 hours per representative per year logging tickets before the investment.

Risks. Technology overhead savings from IT labor and administration time savings may vary depending on the following:

• The systems in place and level of complexity across contact center and customer service functions.

• The size of the teams and resources involved in managing the prior environment.

Results. To account for these risks, Forrester adjusted this benefit downward by 10%, yielding a three-year, risk-adjusted total PV (discounted at 10%) of $284,000.

Profit Increase From New Sales Pipeline Generation

Evidence and data. Overall, with the Dynamics 365 Contact Center solutions deployment, interviewees and survey respondents hoped to improve customer experiences across the various touchpoints within the customer service function. They also noted that improved customer experiences contributed to revenue opportunities for their organizations, which led to profit improvements.

• The head of center of excellence for sales said their technology organization accelerated revenue by reducing the number of touchpoints required with a customer before a sale was made. The goal was to be below four touchpoints, and some of their countries have beat that goal. For example, Germany — the most mature country in the Dynamics 365 Contact Center deployment — is at two touchpoints.

• The director of digital transformation at an education organization had a slightly nuanced perspective on revenue outcomes given their industry. However, they noted that if the customer service function could better answer student questions and concerns, there would be an improvement to student retention and graduation rates, which, in turn, assist the organization in attracting new students: “We always talk about administrative barriers and how they stop students from progressing in their degree and graduating. For example, sometimes students need to figure out why they haven’t received their financial aid or why they owe money. They must interact with our call center to resolve a concern like that. All of the things that I talked about, including not having to call five times and talk to five different people and talk about exactly the same five same things every time, helps to remove the administrative barrier when it comes to student recruitment, retention, and graduation rates.”

• This interviewee also noted that improving student experiences enhances the organization’s ability to attract and retain admissions fees: “Every engagement the student has with the school is a recruitment opportunity. A bad experience for the student in trying to reach out and ask about our deadlines will make them look at another university. There are so many other opportunities for them, and many of them are not even sure they want to come to college. We are competing with very, very savvy technology, including social media, so we cannot be lagging in quality.”

• A survey of 156 IT, contact center, and customer experience decision-makers at large global enterprises using Microsoft Dynamics 365 Contact Center found that respondents expected 44.48% of total annual revenue to be impacted by or improved by Dynamics 365 Contact Center, with a 9.49% uplift expected on average.

Modeling and assumptions. Based on the interviews, Forrester assumes the following about the composite organization:

• The composite has $1B in annual revenue and a gross margin of 10%.

• The opportunity conversion rate is 5%.

Risks. Profit increase from new sales pipeline generation may vary depending on the following:

• The size of an organization and the industry characteristics that determine gross margin.

• The sales organization and revenue streams impacted by the Dynamics 365 Contact Center and Customer Service platforms.

Results. To account for these risks, Forrester adjusted this benefit downward by 15%, yielding a three-year, risk-adjusted total PV (discounted at 10%) of $205,000.

Unquantified Benefits

Interviewees mentioned the following additional benefits that their organizations experienced but were not able to quantify:

• Potential technology cost savings. The composite organization previously used cloud-based solutions for CRM and telephony, but if a company transitions from using an on-prem solution, there may be additional hardware, data center, and consumption cost savings. Additionally, the composite organization previously did not have a CCaaS platform in place, however there may be additional licensing cost savings if an organization transitions from a comparative solution to Dynamics 365 Contact Center.

• Better reporting and insights. Interviewees said using a unified solution from a single vendor enables easier monitoring and reporting on contact center operations, customer service workflows, and technology performance. The composite organization uses these insights to further improve how technology supports the contact center and business processes, which helps increase customer satisfaction.

• Faster onboarding of new contact center representatives. The composite organization onboards new hires more quickly because there is less training required for the unified Microsoft stack and because workers become comfortable using the tools faster. Additionally, interviewees anticipated that agentic AI would further contribute to representative onboarding. Specifically, the Knowledge Management Agent could help organizations better manage their knowledge-based content to fill gaps that not only better serve customers but also assist representatives in overcoming the learning curve on service faster.

• Increased customer satisfaction. By consolidating CCaaS, CRM, and telephony providers to a single vendor, the composite organization realizes faster response times during incidents or downtime events. This results in better performance and availability of voice channels in the contact center, and interviewees said better contact center performance in terms of availability and voice quality can increase customer satisfaction. This can result in better customer retention and lifetime value.

• Ability to meet security and compliance standards. Dynamics 365 Contact Center, Customer Service, and telephony solutions incorporate Microsoft’s security and compliance solutions, and interviewees said this makes it easier to implement and manage than other solutions. It can also help demonstrate compliance to internal auditors and regulators.

Flexibility

The value of flexibility is unique to each customer. There are multiple scenarios in which a customer might implement Dynamics 365 Contact Center and later realize additional uses and business opportunities, such as scaling AI use, including in-product agents across contact center and customer service operations. These opportunities are described in the earlier Spotlight section.

Flexibility would also be quantified when evaluated as part of a specific project (described in more detail in Total Economic Impact Approach).