BACKGROUND
Lyon & Associates Realtors® in Sacramento is the fifth largest residential real estate firm in California. As a growing company with more than 500 sales associates and 10 offices, Lyon & Associates was looking for a messaging system that would serve their present needs and grow with future needs in a cost effective manner.

THE CHALLENGE
All Lyon & Associates locations were using proprietary Octel® systems for their voice messaging, and the opening of the company's newest office sparked a search for a new messaging system. Lynn Ryan, manager of information systems at Lyon & Associates, was searching for a new system that would address three issues:

They wanted a PC-platform (open standards) rather than a proprietary product so it would be less expensive to maintain. According to Ryan, when one piece of proprietary hardware went down in their Octel system, it could easily cost $4,000 to $6,000 out of their maintenance budget.

They wanted to go beyond voicemail to gain unified messaging benefits.

And they wanted a system that was easy to administer and was easy to integrate with their Microsoft® Windows environment and Exchange network.

THE SOLUTION
As Lynn Ryan describes it, the agents at Lyon & Associates often work at the office but not necessarily at desk. And, they work "at home, in a car on a cell phone - they are everywhere."

"We're such a big sales force, voicemail is very much the primary medium here," said Ryan. "So it had been very hard for us to look at breaking away from the Octel system." Initially, the company looked at a unified messaging product other than CallXpress, but it could not integrate with the Octel systems at their other offices so that stopped them in their tracks.

Then Ryan and company owner Mike Lyon saw a presentation by Jim Gragg of ProLogic Communications, Inc. Gragg presented information on AVST CallXpress® unified messaging and also on OmniBridge, a independent networking gateway that bridges a CallXpress unified messaging system with a proprietary system.

Because CallXpress is based on open standards and runs on a Windows platform, it easily met Ryan's first requirement. The price tag for the new CallXpress system to meet the company's needs was only slightly higher than an upgrade proposed by the vendor for their old system. "For us, it was looking less at upfront costs than at the lower cost over time for an open-standards system," said Ryan.

With OmniBridge, the real estate firm could migrate to open standards unified messaging at their own pace. They installed it first in an existing sales office and then in a brand new location -- without having to replace all of the company's Octel systems at one time. "OmniBridge gave us the ability to create a seamless messaging system among our multiple offices, and it definitely seemed reasonable for that ability," said Ryan.

Ryan admits that, prior to installation, she had major concerns about the reliability of OmniBridge. "We worried if OmniBridge would really integrate, but we haven't had one minute of trouble," said Ryan. “It was as smooth as glass.”

As a full-featured unified messaging software, CallXpress would allow Lyon associates to go beyond simple voicemail to receive voicemail and fax messages along with email in their familiar Microsoft Outlook® Inbox.

Sales associates at Lyon & Associates are very mobile during an average workday, and they especially depend on telephone messages. CallXpress allows them to call in and listen to their email messages in addition to voice messages. They can set the priority for messages they will hear first and even skip through messages when they choose.

Ryan's ease-of-administration objective was also met with the new CallXpress system. CallXpress can be administered through Microsoft Exchange Directory. All adds, moves and changes for CallXpress and the RightFax fax server component of CallXpress can be administered in one place. Because Ryan was already familiar with Exchange administration, the new system "is very seamless."

THE RESULTS
"Our purchase of CallXpress and OmniBridge has been worthwhile right from the start, because it is easier to internally administer and has open standards," said Ryan. "Getting the benefits of unified messaging is icing on the cake." As a company, Lyon & Associates is focused on using the latest technology in all areas of the real estate business to increase sales and help their associates be more efficient and effective. "We were looking for increased productivity from unified messaging but having the system is also a selling point for recruitment and retention of sales associates," noted Ryan. "It differentiates us."

FOR MORE INFORMATION
Applied Voice & Speech Technologies, Inc. (“AVST”) is a leader in the unified communications (“UC”) marketplace uniquely combining the strengths of its world-class messaging platform, CallXpress®, with its speech-enabled call management module, Seneca™, to create a powerful, next-generation unified communications solution. The Company’s products are designed to scale and support organizations of all sizes. For more information please contact us at: www.avst.com or +1.949.699.2300.