Gartner defines communications platform as a service (CPaaS) as a cloud-based platform that enables businesses to embed a range of communications capabilities into applications over channels such as voice, SMS, email, messaging apps, and video. They also provide conversational capabilities, security, authentication, and automation. CPaaS delivers omnichannel, programmable experiences to enhance digital customer engagement. In 2026 and beyond, CPaaS aims to offer deeper capabilities, such as customer journey analytics, automation, personalization, and omnichannel engagement driven by AI and 5G. The purpose of CPaaS is to enable enterprises to enhance their communication workflows by providing simplified access to multiple communication capabilities without requiring the complex architectures typically needed to leverage these channels. CPaaS enables enterprises to shorten the time to market for new products and services, personalize communications, and orchestrate customer journeys across multiple channels. It delivers digital engagement and operationalizes customer experience, while also driving business efficiencies at scale with digital service delivery. It is modular/composable in design and can expand from initial single use cases to many others as additional business units learn of its value.
Gartner defines the Contact Center Infrastructure market as equipment, software and services that enable organizations to manage multichannel self-service and assisted service customer interactions holistically from a customer experience and an employee engagement perspective. CCI solutions are dedicated to supporting a single customer enterprise or tenant on each instance of the system, even if that customer or tenant supports multiple contact center operations on that dedicated instance. CCI solutions can be deployed on the customer’s premises or can be hosted and managed in a third-party data center or private cloud.
Gartner defines contact center as a service (CCaaS) as solutions offering SaaS-based applications that enable customer service departments to manage multichannel customer interactions holistically from both a customer-experience and employee-experience perspective. CCaaS is a key technology platform used to support the customer service experience, whether it be self-service or assisted by customer service representatives. All organizations need to offer customer assistance. The preference is for remote support via voice and digital channels over physical presence in offices and stores, though it is common for organizations to offer multiple options. The ambition is for customers to self-serve assistance, through web portals or chatbots. But it is also recognized that complex issues still need the support of employees. CCaaS technology is instrumental in orchestrating both self- and assisted-service engagement with customers. The technology can also manage the quality of engagement between the customer and the customer service representative, recognizing that premium customer experiences are achieved through premium employee experiences.
Gartner defines conversational AI platforms (CAIPs) as platforms primarily used for developing applications simulating human conversation across multiple channels and on a mix of modalities such as text, voice and visual content. CAIPs leverage a composition of AI techniques, including classic natural language processing (NLP), and generative AI (GenAI) and agentic AI architectures. To support the building of conversational applications, CAIPs principally provide low-code and no-code coding options. Application areas include AI assistants and conversational AI agents. Conversational AI platforms are designed to address the increasing demand for organizations to efficiently build, deploy and manage AI-driven conversational systems at scale, addressing the requirements of both employee experience and customer experience use cases. While they may offer some predefined AI assistants or AI agents that can be modified, the primary focus of a CAIP is to equip organizations with tools for building customized conversational AI applications. CAIPs typically embed specialized, dedicated and feature-rich tooling for language-specific NLP and multimodal interactions, as well as conversational flow building and analytics. By offering a unified environment that supports low-code and no-code development — and, in some cases, extends to pro-code and GenAI-assisted options — CAIPs empower technically savvy business users, including citizen developers, to create and orchestrate both customer-facing and internal AI assistants and conversational agents. Unlike AI engineering environments, which primarily serve AI engineers, software developers and data scientists, CAIPs are purpose-built for broad enterprise adoption, enabling strategic, scalable and organizationwide conversational AI initiatives.
Gartner defines email marketing as the use of the email channel to deliver and optimize marketing messages — such as brand newsletters or contextually relevant, real-time and personalized communications — in support of engagement across the customer journey. Email service providers often bolster their technology platforms with supplementary managed services to improve the value and scalability of the email channel. Email marketing helps marketers deliver information to their audiences after obtaining an email address. This can take the form of product or service updates, new promotions, transaction updates and more. As a relatively inexpensive method for communicating at scale with contacts, email provides value for different use cases across the full customer-engagement life span. Email is the most effective channel for several marketing objectives, including demand generation, conversion to sales, and customer loyalty and advocacy.