Last year, Cisco introduced Partnering for Purpose, where innovation and business goals with environmental, social, and governance (ESG) initiatives were highlighted to benefit partners and their… Read more on Cisco Blogs

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Last year, Cisco introduced Partnering for Purpose, where innovation and business goals with environmental, social, and governance (ESG) initiatives were highlighted to benefit partners and their customers. Cisco added a Partnering for Purpose Category in the sixth Annual Partner Innovation Challenge, and 88% of all partner entries for the Innovation Challenge were submitted in this Partnering for Purpose Category. It is inspiring to see this response from our global partner community.

Cisco’s 2023 Purpose Report

Annually, Cisco produces the Purpose Report showing our contributions toward environmental, social, governance (ESG), and corporate social responsibility efforts. Chuck Robbins, our CEO, sets the vision and business strategy goals to achieve amazing things for Cisco, our customers, and partners globally. You can read more about Chuck Robbins’ perspective and all the details from the 2023 Purpose Report and ESG Reporting Hub.

The 2023 Purpose Report can be an excellent resource for inspiring your practices to create positive ESG outcomes. But first, it takes a vision to see how to use ESG to expand your go-to-market strategy. As this year’s Innovation Challenge indicated, you are well on your way to engaging your customers.

Social Responsibility Actions

In the theme of an Inclusive Future for all, Cisco invested in 12 specific five-year actions to use the unique strengths of our people, technology, innovation, and partner ecosystem. One of these actions is diversifying our partner ecosystem by increasing the number of African American/Black (AA/B)-owned technology companies and growing opportunities to accelerate the financial growth of AA/B-owned partners. We are well on our way to this goal and have engaged with hundreds of partners in building strong technology practices to achieve sustained growth.

A Better Future with Sustainability

There has been huge momentum with sustainability. Cisco is fully engaged by offering partners the Environmental Sustainability Specialization, one of our fastest-growing specializations. Additionally, there is a Sustainability Partner Journey outlining how to operate a successful sustainability practice. Maybe the most important news is the recent announcement of the Sustainability Estimator, which provides partners insight into the estimated energy savings, emissions reduction, cost reduction, and environmental impact your customers can realize when modernizing their IT infrastructure.

The Talent Bridge

We know there is an ever-present need to locate people and grow their careers. To this end, Cisco created The Talent Bridge to connect Cisco, partners, and customers with qualified talent. We automate the connection between employers and job seekers at no cost through our Talent Bridge Matching Engine platform. We also have a tight alignment with the offerings and alums of Cisco’s Network Academy. Cisco Networking Academy helps teachers prepare students for in-demand tech careers like cybersecurity, networking, and programming. Free curriculum and learning tools are delivered through an online platform where learning and digital content are available for distance or hybrid learning.

I encourage everyone to access these resources to create an impact for our customers. As you can see, doing good is good for business.

Check out the Cisco 2023 Purpose Report

Learn more about Partnering for Purpose

We’d love to hear what you think. Ask a Question, Comment Below, and Stay Connected with #CiscoPartners on social!

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  Last year, Cisco introduced Partnering for Purpose, where innovation and business goals with environmental, social, and governance (ESG) initiatives were highlighted to benefit partners and their customers. Cisco added a Partnering for Purpose Category in the sixth Annual Partner Innovation Challenge, and 88% of all partner entries for the Innovation Challenge were submitted in this Partnering for Purpose Category. It is inspiring to see this response from our global partner community.  Read More Cisco Blogs 

Cisco Black Belt Academy offers the latest in technology enablement to our partners, distributors, and Cisco employees. With ever-changing industry trends and market dynamics, an in-depth… Read more on Cisco Blogs

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Cisco Black Belt Academy offers the latest in technology enablement to our partners, distributors, and Cisco employees. With ever-changing industry trends and market dynamics, an in-depth understanding of end-users’ requirements is of supreme importance, and we strive to offer the best in Partner Experience.

Learning from our learners

Listen-Learn-Act-Repeat is a never ending cycle at Black Belt Academy. We endeavor to engage our partners in a variety of ways to offer Black Belt Academy courses that help them succeed. With an exhaustive enablement catalogue, we ensure that we are in sync with the wants of our learners. Our Partner Experience team works tirelessly behind the scenes to support learners when they need help.

In principle, we believe in having a symbiotic approach in the way we go about doing business: we are as good as our learners on any given day.

Constantly refining based on learners’ input

We have identified specific touch points to include our partners’ input in refining our Learning Plans:

Voice of the Partner: The initiative is a part of Global Partner Routes and Sales. It is designed to understand the perspective of our consumers across all Cisco verticals. Such inputs help us in innovating and upgrading our offerings.

Partner Listening: Taking cue of the Voice of the Partner initiative, we have set forth a Partner Listening activity that caters to Black Belt-specific partners and distributors. We take pride in the fact that the initiative has increased our engagement levels with our consumers. Our platform refinement and the revamped framework of our learning courses exemplifies our commitment towards developing user-oriented products.

Review and Feedback: At the end we have the Review/Feedback option attached to our courses. This might be a contemporary tool, but it is nevertheless very important at sorting escalations at the earliest.

Your voice, our actions

The feedback received is diligently addressed by our entire Black Belt Team. We make deliberate efforts to accommodate the requested changes from our partners, especially those that affect our overall engagement and user experience. Our Annual Refresh is dedicated to integrating these changes into both the Platform Experience and the curated content. The Black Belt Content BDMs collaborate to enhance the quality of assets and the context of trainings each year, ensuring we provide what you need in the manner you need it.

An experience based on learners’ needs

We take pride in being among a handful of organizations whose product orientation is based on customers’ wants. Through the implementation of both proactive and reactive measures, we ensure our learners have the best experience. As you learn from us rest assured, we are continuously learning from you.

Happy Learning!!

Check Out Cisco Black Belt Academy

We’d love to hear what you think. Ask a Question, Comment Below, and Stay Connected with #CiscoPartners on social!

Cisco Partners Facebook  |  @CiscoPartners X/Twitter  |  Cisco Partners LinkedIn

  Cisco Black Belt Academy offers the latest in technology enablement to our partners, distributors, and Cisco employees. With ever-changing industry trends and market dynamics, an in-depth understanding of end-users’ requirements is of supreme importance, and we strive to offer the best in Partner Experience.  Read More Cisco Blogs 

Consumers are relying on digital channels for their retail needs now more than ever. This shift requires online experiences to be increasingly enhanced, and a strong digital experience can make a… Read more on Cisco Blogs

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Consumers are relying on digital channels for their retail needs now more than ever. This shift requires online experiences to be increasingly enhanced, and a strong digital experience can make a significant difference in consumer attraction and retention. 

While creating such engaging experiences is necessary for businesses of all sizes, smaller teams in particular need to find a way to get their customers’ questions answered without relying on as much manpower. The Cisco Store is one such program, and Webex Connect provides an efficient, easy-to-use solution to this problem. 

Multi-Channel Communication 

Webex Connect is an enterprise-grade Communications Platform as a Service (CPaaS) that transforms how businesses engage with their customers. In simple terms, CPaaS is a cloud-based technology that lets companies easily add custom communication features—like messaging, video, and voice—into their apps or services by deploying application programming interfaces (APIs). Webex Connect enables enterprises to deliver secure, automated, and hyper-personalized interactions at scale. And with little to no coding required, it empowers technical and non-technical teams alike to create rich, seamless customer interactions. 

With a diverse API portfolio and multitude of integration options, businesses can connect their existing backend systems – such as their customer relationship management (CRM), order management, delivery management or even shift management – with the latest digital communication channels to create personalized, automated customer experiences. 

Webex Connect handles customer communications over multiple digital channels, including SMS, WhatsApp, Voice, Email and more. The platform allows for inbound messages and automated two-way interactions, allowing customers to feel just as attended to as they might in a physical location. Customers can manage their communication preferences and consent at all times in accordance with online regulations, giving them full control over their digital experience. On the business side, employees can easily debug any issues in real-time and view key statistics through the platform’s centralized dashboards, data visualization, and data analytics capabilities. 

Ease of Use 

The Cisco Store sets up multiple travel stores every year at events such as Cisco Live Amsterdam, Cisco Live Vegas, and Cisco IMPACT. These stores feature both our merchandise and our Tech Lab equipment, and our small team hosts numerous customer tours every day. To streamline efficiency with our limited staff, we can easily program Webex Connect to have prompts and answers ready regarding our events, such as the store’s hours and location in the building. Customers simply need to message the bot on their channel of choice to receive rapid assistance.  

Live Agent Handover 

The platform also allows for bot interactions to be seamlessly handed over to live agents while still retaining the conversation context. Escalation to an agent is routed to a Webex Space, where someone on the Cisco Store team can claim the task and interact directly with the customer. 

Webex Connect and a New Digital Experience

Webex Connect is currently being used both online and in-person at the Cisco Store, with 77% of the bot’s sessions occurring on the web, followed by 23% of the sessions occurring on Apple Messages for Business. Moreover, throughout the first quarter of FY24, Webex Connect averaged 30.4 messages per day, with 42% of the total sessions being handled by the bot.  

 Interactions with Webex Connect during Q1 FY24 have mostly occurred online compared to in-person at the store locations. The most common conversation topics with the bot, in order of frequency, were engagement with a live agent, order tracking, store timings, and store locations.   

Looking Ahead 

The Cisco Store plans to use Webex Connect in a multitude of additional ways moving forward to truly maximize customer engagement. Customers may be able to do self-checkout via the platform by simply scanning a QR code and paying from their mobile devices. To speed up their order process, customers could buy their products online and pick them up curbside with the assistance of the chatbot. Moreover, Webex Connect could eventually be integrated with order management systems: customers can receive updates on their order statuses and shipping notifications via their preferred mobile channel. 

The possibilities of Webex Connect reach far beyond a simple Q&A platform – teams will receive 24/7 support, developer resources, account management, and expert live chat whenever they need it. Webex Connect will prove to be an efficient solution for customer engagement, starting with the Cisco Store itself.  

Interesting in learning more about our enterprise-grade CPaaS solution, Webex Connect? Visit our retail solutions page or get in touch with one of our experts.  

  Webex Connect, Cisco’s enterprise-grade communications platform (CPaaS) solution, engages customers better than ever at the Cisco Store.  Read More Cisco Blogs 

‘Tis the season! As we look forward to numerous holidays, special traditions, and spending time with loved ones, I can’t help but think about the impact of my actions. Sometimes it feels like my act… Read more on Cisco Blogs

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‘Tis the season! As we look forward to numerous holidays, special traditions, and spending time with loved ones, I can’t help but think about the impact of my actions. Sometimes it feels like my actions alone can’t really change the amount of consumption, waste, and emissions the holiday season produces. And it’s true, alone I can’t. That’s where all of you come in! Based on research by The United Nations Environment Programme, household consumption accounts for around two-thirds of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.

As a member of the Cisco Chief Sustainability Office, I am deeply invested in our planet and hope to help educate others on various topics surrounding environmental sustainability. So I spoke with some of our Cisco Green Team members about ways to help reduce your holiday footprint, positively impact the planet, and help you feel good about the actions you take this season.

Decreasing Energy Usage

Switch to LED lights: Decorating with lights is popular this time of year. It’s dazzling and it’s festive so what’s the problem? It’s estimated that throughout the month of December, in the U.S. alone, households will use 3.5 billion kWh of electricity to power holiday lights, which is equivalent to the annual energy usage of 350,000 homes. However, if everyone were to switch to LED lights, the usage would decrease to one quarter of the amount, as LED use about 85% less energy than traditional lights. Plus, it would cut down on everyone’s electricity bill (around $850 million each year!)

Invest in a timer: Ever go to bed and forget to turn off your lights? An easy solution is to add a timer to your lights. This way you can set how long your lights will be using energy and when you would like them to turn on and off each day.

Reducing Waste

Cut down on food waste: Hosting dinner parties, baking cookies, and sharing meals are all delicious ways to enjoy the gift of food, but they can also lead to unexpected waste. Did you know that  one-third of all food produced in the world – approximately 1.3 billion tonnes – is lost or wasted every year?

Grocery stores and households both play a part in managing the amount of surplus food, whether unsold or uneaten, that is discarded into landfills. According to ReFED, it makes up 24% of all landfill inputs, making food the number one material in landfills. The good news is we have a few ways to cut this number down.

Start with buying only what you need and plan ahead if you know you need to feed a certain number of people.  If you do have scraps or leftovers, sending them to a landfill won’t helpto reduce GHG emissions. The decomposition of food and other organic materials in an environment without oxygen (like a landfill), produces methane, a greenhouse gas. Wasted food is responsible for 58% of landfill methane emissions. Instead, take notes from Cisco’s Tram Quach in Raleigh, United States: “We compost our cooking scraps at home with a tumbler in our backyard and use glass containers to take or bring back food to avoid using disposables.” Composting is a great option to discard food waste and can reduce greenhouse gas emissions. However, one of the easiest ways to cut down on food waste is simply eating all your leftovers. Bonus points if they are in reusable containers like Tram’s.

Be conscious of packaging and decor: Opening a special gift from a loved one can create an unmatched feeling. Unfortunately, most conventional wrapping paper sold in stores has plastic lining, coating, or harmful chemicals, which means it cannot be recycled. Out of the 4.6 million pounds of wrapping paper produced each year, around half, or 2.3 million pounds ends up in landfills (that’s 277,000 miles worth!)

Don’t worry, you can be sustainable and still experience the surprise of unwrapping a gift. “I always find fun, silly, and odd things to wrap my gifts in from around my house. Whether it be newspaper, unused fabrics, or other creative materials, this has been a loved tradition in my family, and they always look forward to what I come up with,” says Cisco’s Angee Barnett from Topika, United States.

Similarly, Green Team co-lead Jordan Hart White based in Raleigh, United States likes to wrap presents in butcher paper and then draw on decorations and name tags. “This saves some of the plastic holiday waste from going into the trash and allows me time to get creative,” says Jordan, who knows her plastics!

Another part of holidays that bring both joy and waste are decorations. And I get it, who doesn’t love festive décor? But as always, there are ways to make this tradition a little lighter on the planet. One example comes from Toronto, Canada Green Team member Alyssa Copp: “Make your own decorations! I strung my first citrus garland this year which is both sustainable AND economical!” This might even check off two boxes: consciously made décor and cutting down on food waste, a win-win. Besides making your own decorations, another option is to thrift or buy secondhand.

Avoiding Over Consumption

Forgo buying new: In the sustainability world, we say “why buy new, when you can get it used or homemade?” or maybe that’s just me! People buy 60 percent more clothing today than 15 years ago, and each item is kept for only half as long. Getting used items or DIYing is a unique and circular way to change up your wardrobe. “Instead of buying new ethnic wear for Diwali, I often try and wear my mom’s age-old sarees (Indian ethnic wear),” says Cisco’s Neha Agarwal from Bangalore, India, “which have not been worn by her for one or two decades at least. They feel new because no one remembers seeing them. I am totally re-using them and make small fashion edits to make it match the current fashion trend.” We love mom’s hand-me-downs!

Like decorations, gifts are a perfect opportunity to get creative and make something homemade. If you aren’t the DIY type, secondhand stores have gift options for everyone. Cisco’s Erin Carter from Chapel Hill, United States likes to incorporate both by buying cute baskets at thrift shops, lining them with paper, and filling them with cookies as gifts. And Green Team member Elizaveta Vatlina from Oeiras, Portugal also opts for secondhand, saying “Last year I didn’t buy clothes at a new store, instead I used Vinted or vintage stores.”

There are several online secondhand stores that are wonderful options if you don’t have the means to get out to your local secondhand store. A few that I know of are Vinted, Mercari, Depop, Poshmark, and thredUp, but I am sure there are many more. San Jose, United States Green Team member Kayshav Dattatri recommended Thriftbooks.com as a great online source for used books at a bargain!

A final idea from Cisco’s Scott Weber based out of Ann Arbor, United States is a book exchange where each person brings a book that they enjoyed reading over the past year. Then everyone goes home with a new-to-them used book and a personal recommendation.

Buy local: If you are interested in buying something new, there are plenty of amazing options that you can find right down the road. Yes, I’m talking about shopping right in your local community! “I’m a big book-giver, so I head down to my local used bookshop and pick out gifts there,” says Cisco’s Ron Toland in Vancouver, Canada. It’s estimated that buying locally generates 3.5 times more wealth than shopping at national chains. Plus, it reduces your carbon footprint by cutting down on the amount of fossil fuels that are burned, since it changes how far goods must travel.

Give experiences: This idea stems from the absence of buying something material. “I love to gift experiences instead of things!” says Cisco’s Alex Wilkins, from San Jose, United States, “I’m planning a cooking class for my partner, a fancy dinner with my mother, and bowling with my brother!” Other ideas could include guitar lessons, yoga classes, or tickets to a concert, comedy show, sporting event, or museum exhibit.

Donate or volunteer: Donating to charity on behalf of another instead of giving physical gifts is an idea brought to us by Sydney, Australia Green Team member Vivien Chia. You can also get in touch with local charities to see if they have volunteering opportunities available, because giving your time is an incredible gift. And don’t forget, Cisco provides 10 days a year of Time2Give, donates $10 for every hour volunteered, and matches dollar for dollar on approved organization donations.

There are probably hundreds of other ways that we can practice sustainability during the holiday season. If you have a favorite practice, share it in the comments! Our decisions matter and we can create change with the choices we make. I hope everyone has a safe and happy holiday season!

  Cisco Green Team members share ways to help reduce your holiday footprint so you can feel good about the actions you take this season.  Read More Cisco Blogs 

Having just returned from AWS re:Invent 2023, I can tell you that the energy and excitement surrounding the Cisco and AWS partnership could not be higher. Not only am I hearing this from our… Read more on Cisco Blogs

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Having just returned from AWS re:Invent 2023, I can tell you that the energy and excitement surrounding the Cisco and AWS partnership could not be higher. Not only am I hearing this from our customers and partners, but the evidence is undeniable.

Cisco Wins 2023 AWS Global ISV Partner of the Year Award

For example, in a recent blog post, I shared that Cisco won the Global ISV Partner of the Year Award announced at AWS re:Invent 2023. This prestigious recognition is partially due to the fact that the entire range of Cisco software offerings—encompassing security, observability, networking, and collaboration—is available globally via the AWS Marketplace. Notably, these offerings include the availability of Cisco Enterprise Agreements (EAs), which enable consumption across our comprehensive portfolio of software. Strategically, this aligns with the Cisco strategic commitment to enable our customers to choose where they purchase Cisco software.

Exploring the New Frontier in Cloud Monitoring and Digital Experience Optimization

Also at AWS re:Invent 2023, Cisco and AWS unveiled a significant step forward in our strategic collaboration by announcing the integration of the Cisco ThousandEyes Network Assurance Platform with AWS CloudWatch Internet Monitor (CWIM). This marks a first-of-its-kind, bi-directional integration that offers our mutual customers an unparalleled level of visibility into their cloud deployments and sets a new standard for delivering optimized digital experiences.

This innovative integration enables joint customers to harness operational insights in a way that optimizes the placement of AWS instances and enhances monitoring coverage tailored to user traffic profiles. This development follows closely on the heels of  the Cisco ThousandEyes announcement of AWS Network Path Enrichment. This feature enhances the visibility into the AWS cloud network by integrating data from both public and proprietary AWS sources into ThousandEyes Path Visualization. The result? Customers can now work more collaboratively with service providers to address and resolve issues that affect application performance quickly and seamlessly.

This new integration builds upon the already robust partnership between Cisco and AWS. It is a testament to the Cisco commitment to its End-to-End Network Assurance vision. The Cisco mission–to securely and sustainably connect everyone to everything and ensure the digital experience of each connection—is further realized through the partnership with AWS. By providing visibility across every domain impacting digital experiences—user, enterprise, Internet, or cloud—Cisco is poised to offer AI-driven insights, recommendations, and solutions. This collaboration is a significant leap in the support of customers’ digital transformation journeys, regardless of whether they’ve just begun or are well on their way.

That said, the integration between Cisco ThousandEyes and AWS CWIM at AWS re: Invent 2023 is more than a technological advancement. It’s also a strategic leap forward. The integration reinforces the Cisco and AWS commitment to empowering our customers with the tools and insights needed for effective cloud environment management. As we continue to witness the evolution of cloud technology, partnerships like this pave the way to a future where digital experiences are not just managed but also optimized to their fullest potential.

Cisco ThousandEyes is now available on the AWS Marketplace. Purchases of ThousandEyes through this platform are applicable to the customer’s Enterprise Discount Program (EDP) commitments. This offers customers the dual advantage of unparalleled technology innovation and visibility, along with the procurement benefits afforded by the AWS Marketplace

Contagious Leadership

The energy and enthusiasm surrounding the Cisco and AWS partnership rose to unprecedented heights at AWS re:Invent 2023. Winning the 2023 AWS Global ISV Partner of the Year Award was a testament to the Cisco dedication to offering a comprehensive range of software solutions through the AWS Marketplace, emphasizing customer choice. The integration of Cisco ThousandEyes’ Network Assurance platform with AWS CWIM marked a significant milestone, providing unmatched visibility into cloud deployments and setting a new standard for optimizing digital experiences.

As our partnership continues to evolve, we not only advance technology innovation. We also strategically empower our customers with the tools and insights necessary to optimize outcomes, leveraging AWS and Cisco market leadership.

Learn how the Cisco and AWS partnership

can enhance your business outcomes.

We’d love to hear what you think. Ask a Question, Comment Below, and Stay Connected with #CiscoPartners on social!

Cisco Partners Facebook  |  @CiscoPartners X/Twitter  |  Cisco Partners LinkedIn

  Having just returned from AWS re:Invent 2023, I can tell you that the energy and excitement surrounding the Cisco and AWS partnership could not be higher. Not only am I hearing this from our customers and partners, but the evidence is undeniable.  Read More Cisco Blogs 

Cisco Full-Stack Observability solutions help optimize and secure the applications that underpin
online and in-store experiences from the customer to the warehouse to economies of scale. 

As retail … Read more on Cisco Blogs

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Cisco Full-Stack Observability solutions help optimize and secure the applications that underpin
online and in-store experiences from the customer to the warehouse to economies of scale. 

As retail disruptors continue to raise the bar for ever-greater convenience and immediacy, the competitive pressure has been on to accelerate digital transformation. The annual peak holiday shopping season is upon us and retailers are looking to reap the dividends of performant, always-on, secure digital experiences for customers.

This year, online purchases on Black Friday reached a record $70.9 billion globally — $9.8 billion in the U.S. alone. This crucial time of year exposes retailers that do not meet customer expectations because the cost of distribution system glitches or disruptions to ecommerce sites is significant on both revenues and brand.

Omnichannel retail experiences that make it easy for shoppers to find, buy, receive, and return products using physical and digital channels interchangeably — a clear preference according to IDC — are now commonplace. However, managing the multitude of interconnected services, supply chains, and fulfillment systems that ensure online and in-store transactions are processed smoothly requires economies of scale and flawless business and IT execution.

Cisco Full-Stack Observability solutions help retailers bolster customer-centricity with granular-level visibility into the online customer journey. They provide insights that help drive decisions like modifying an ecommerce user experience (UX) or streamlining the buying process on mobile devices to increase online sales conversions. For traditional bricks-and-mortar retailers, Cisco Full-Stack Observability solutions help teams monitor inventory systems and make sure that point-of-sale (POS) payment processing systems are running smoothly.

Facilitating reliable and secure retail experiences, whether that means streamlining online purchasing, helping retail representatives quickly locate products in-store, or monitoring inventory and dispatches, is only possible when IT, site reliability engineers (SREs), DevOps, and SecOps teams can observe the health and security of business processes and transactions in real time. This includes the interoperable platforms, microservices, application programming interfaces (APIs), cloud providers, and Paytech operators, along with security and fraud protection systems, that underpin applications.

A consistent, reliable, and secure digital experience is also critical for trust. However, as many as 88% of consumers report in the recent Cisco AppDynamics App Attention Index that they have experienced performance issues when using applications over the past 12 months.

There’s an astonishing trust gap between customers and organizational leaders in consumer markets. PwC reveals that fully 84% of executives believe their brand is highly trusted, while just 30% of consumers agree. With only 37% of consumers willing to forgive mistakes even if a company takes the steps to make it right, the stakes are high for retailers.

Cisco Full-Stack Observability solutions help retailers deliver flawless, personalized buying experiences that drive customer loyalty, and optimize systems and processes that increase revenue.

Flawless application performance, optimized for business outcomes 

It’s clear that reacting to unexpected product supply issues, degraded application performance or security concerns only after they have become apparent is not an effective business strategy — and certainly not one that shoppers will accept.

A core element of our portfolio is Cisco Observability Platform, which helps retailers simplify business by bringing together observable telemetry data across any system to create full visibility, real-time business context, and recommended actions for resolving issues over the digital estate. These solutions harness capabilities from across the Cisco portfolio for vital security intelligence, transaction and performance insights, an end-to-end view of application workloads, and cost optimization options.

Retailers can become more customer centric by taking action that directly supports business outcomes around the health, security, and performance of hybrid and cloud native applications and particularly the digital experience of users. One capability of our solution, Customer Digital Experience Monitoring (CDEM), helps retailers gain actionable, end-to-end insights into those application experiences and their underlying dependencies as well as downstream business impacts.

Teams can track all points of the customer journey from the user’s mobile device, desktop, browser, or game console, including a digital endpoint like an API, IoT device, SaaS service, or application agent. Granular metrics and visibility into business transactions across stores and online purchases makes it possible to, for instance, analyze and model user behavior to make improvements to the UX or purchase process.

Cisco Cloud Observability provides application monitoring

This application on Cisco Observability Platform allows visualization of the entire cloud native environment – from cloud infrastructure to Kubernetes layers. This enables teams to identify bottlenecks and accelerate application performance. The retail associate experience itself can be observed by monitoring fulfillment and assisted selling applications, for instance, keeping associates engaged and able to assist customers by ensuring relevant applications work as they should, and are available to facilitate in-store purchases.

These solutions, from a broader view, offer insights that tell retailers everything they need to know to identify root cause of problems — such as performance degradation when looking up inventory or unexpected responses from payment processors — and fix them before they result in outdated inventory levels or lost revenue due to failed API calls or missing database resources.

HKTVmall is Hong Kong’s largest 24-hour online shopping mall supporting tens of thousands of daily orders. When website traffic increased tenfold during the pandemic, their SAP Hybris ecommerce platform began to experience serious, undiagnosed performance problems. By deploying Cisco Full-Stack Observability solutions, they identified application memory as the root cause, which allowed them to resolve the problem and eliminate performance issues that had plagued peak activity.

Retailers are also looking for composable commerce with microservices-based, API-first, cloud native solutions that make it easier to deliver seamless, secure digital experiences to end users. This requires a robust cloud infrastructure and a clear sightline into the relationship between application performance and business KPIs such as customer conversion rates, and real-time impact on revenue.

Business metrics in Cisco Cloud Observability enhance this type of business context for modern applications running on Amazon Web Services (AWS), which powers a massive share of the retail market. Business metrics also support integration with AWS services and application performance monitoring (APM) correlation, providing end-to-end visibility into the performance of cloud native applications.

Hybrid and cloud application security, real-time business risk observability

The peak shopping season has become a prime attack window for exploiting the functionality and processes of applications. In particular, APIs now account for 45.8% of all online retail traffic with API attacks increasing as this year’s peak season progresses, going up by 6% in October and another 9% in November. Denial of service (DoS) attacks, as well, such as those that target 802.11b networks, are rising as a critical aspect of secure retail operations.

Surfacing vulnerability intelligence and alerting retailers to threats in real-time, Cisco application security solutions are a fast path for IT and SecOps teams to identify the source of security-impacting issues before they affect business outcomes including uptime obligations and compliance with data privacy mandates such as the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), and California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA).

They help retailers identify threats in real time, prioritize vulnerabilities by their likelihood of exploitation and potential business impact, and provide recommendations on how to resolve issues. Hybrid applications are of particular interest to retail and ecommerce businesses. Built with web technologies like HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, these applications run inside a cloud native layer to operate on mobile devices. More than 74% of the top 50 retail mobile applications are hybrid.

Cisco Secure Application provides business risk observability for hybrid applications. Business risk observability prioritizes security issues based on potential impact on business so retailers can quickly identify and map vulnerabilities and act on what matters most.

Teams can identify risks in hybrid applications and drill down on the business transactions – the end-to-end, cross-tier processing paths used to fulfill service requests by applications – that have high risk scores. Cisco uniquely provides this score which combines application observability and business impact data with security and threat intelligence feeds from Cisco security products. The real-time risk score shows likelihood of exploitation and indicates what needs to be fixed first.

Cisco Secure Application aggregates information by looking into internet access, data storage usage, third-party vulnerabilities, runtime behavior, and use of insecure external APIs. Context is provided around identified security issues including analyses of transactions that show upward risk trends. It then offers prioritized real-time remediation steps to accelerate response and address key risk factors.

Cisco Secure Application also provides application security with business risk observability for cloud native applications. This includes mobile applications that run on dedicated codebase for targeted platforms such as Swift for iPhone apps and Java for Android apps. For retailers looking to provide a secure digital experience to customers, Cisco Secure Application can track business risk across all business transactions. It provides context around issues, traces transaction performance, and reveals infrastructure risk as well as associated data risk.

Prioritized remediation steps help application teams focused on cloud applications speed up their response to address key risk factors for vulnerable transactions. This includes the ability to locate, highlight, and correlate security issues across application entities, such as Kubernetes pods, making it possible to look deeply into the security issues that elevate business risk scores.

Risks in the application stack, for instance, that could potentially expose personally identifiable information (PII) and therefore impact revenue and reputation, are given high priority and real-time guidance on prescriptive actions is provided.

The infrastructure behind the applications that support digital experiences include customer single-sign-on, purchase records, support history, billing information, and shipping details. Taking it a step further, Cisco Secure Application helps retailers detect and redact critical sensitive data from vulnerable transactions.

Automatic continuous application security with business risk observability provided by Cisco Secure Application helps retail organizations secure the buying experience of their customers as well as the security of their operations from payments processing and approvals to supply chains and fulfillment.

Mission-critical application visibility, presented with retail context

Our application modules — plugin-like extensions created by Cisco and by development partners — extend the capabilities of Cisco Observability Platform. A growing number of modules provide retail organizations with specialized insight and observability over the applications and dependencies that support merchant operations ranging from in-store barcode scanning and POS payment transactions to ecommerce websites, and delivery tracking.

As the ecommerce application environment becomes more complex due to fluctuating user demand, multiple online and remote databases, services running on different clouds, and layers of virtualization, tracking their performance has become enormously difficult.

Already a data-driven business, retail operations increasingly require that organizations identify, analyze, and gain insight from data to guide business and marketing strategies. Applications and modules built on Cisco Observability Platform ingest countless telemetry datapoints generated by applications and their components as a part of normal retail operations including from end-to-end transaction flows, the network, and underlying infrastructure to present meaningful, contextual insights and alerts.

This makes it possible to tie the “numbers game” together so teams can understand what is happening behind the scenes of the technology stack, and ultimately take action to avert deleterious effects on the buying experience of customers and overall revenue down the line.

For example, the eCommerce module from Evolutio enables retailers to monitor orders, shipping, inventory and payments, with correlation by product category or shopping region, to swiftly identify issues within applications and infrastructure. It is available in the platform exchange alongside other retail-enabling modules such as Fintech, also by Evolutio, which monitors KPIs relevant to credit card authorizations.

While cloud providers offer some baseline tools for monitoring resource usage and logging frameworks for collecting and storing data from applications and services, modern merchants need more visibility into the cloud environment as their razor-thin margins give them little ability to absorb unwarranted expenditure. However, IT teams tend to provision cloud-resources on the side of caution whenever they lack visibility because of the damaging impact of constrained resources on application performance.

Cisco Observability Platform helps retailers improve profit margins by right-sizing cloud resource to support optimal runtime without wastage. While cloud resources must be scalable to meet short-term, high-volume shopping events such as Cyber Monday, maintaining additional capacity when not required is unnecessary and expensive.

The visibility delivered by our Cost and Workload Profiler module allows teams to pinpoint cloud resources that are out of performance and cost baselines. Teams can scale back on inefficiencies and scale up where resources are insufficient to support workloads. Additionally, they can identify excessive costs in real-time, using the module’s dynamic baseline of average spend on Kubernetes workloads, which is powered by its AI and ML engine.

Our Cost Insights module opens a window into all the cloud resources the retailer has provisioned, with high-level views for the business and granularity for IT and FinOps teams, which allows them to see exact cost allocation. Spend and utilization are highlighted, taking the guesswork out of scaling up or down to support critical application performance.

Our Application Resource Optimizer allows teams to fine-tune configurations in real-time, using data-driven recommendations. Its machine learning (ML) capabilities continuously test settings and recommend tweaks to deliver optimal performance, and control costs in a fraction of the time required by a human-driven, trial-and-error approach.

Retail application ecosystems, tuned to business KPIs

Each of these optimization capabilities correlates data signals with business impact. Cross-functional teams no longer need to work out for themselves whether the actions they’re taking may have an unforeseen negative impact on user experience, which will cause a knock-on effect on revenue.

Instead, they can optimize based on business commitments to supporting the needs of end users, ensuring vital resources have sufficient capacity. At the same time, the ability to scale back over-provisioning allows them to finely balance resources to deliver a flawless shopping experience and minimize loss.

Furthermore, the profitability of marketing campaigns becomes easy to assess, as insights into the cost impact of traffic spikes on cloud resources are immediately available. This in turn allows teams across retail organizations to rapidly optimize campaigns for success, as well as identify and remediate points of friction around how goods and services are bought, fulfilled, and delivered.

In many cases, SAP and other cloud-based ERP processes are at the center of this vast web of interconnected systems that enable economies of scale and keep retail operations running smoothly. Interactions between systems must run smoothly for SAP applications to perform at every point in the order-to-cash (O2C) cycle from the front end to back-end logistics. When a customer places an order, for example, it automatically triggers a series of actions by different departments responsible for fulfillment such as inventory management, shipping, and reporting.

Carhartt, an apparel retailer known for heavy-duty working clothes, leverages Cisco Full-Stack Observability solutions to achieve visibility over every tier-1, mission-critical application such as its SAP HANA ERP, ecommerce and main customer sites, and the middleware layers that connect warehouse, inventory, and distribution systems. The company has virtually eliminated costly service or application downtime, avoiding millions of dollars in lost revenue and increasing customer trust in the purchasing process.

The CloudFabrix SAP Observability module can ingest data from Cisco AppDynamics SAP Monitoring, correlating it to asset types to isolate root cause and determine the effect of impacted services on the business.

Moreover, innovative retailers are making sustainability an integral part of their business model – which is rewarded by consumers with loyalty. The buying experience of customers is an extension of that strategy where the poor performance of retail applications and infrastructure amplifies inefficiencies. Our Sustainability Insights module provides real-time interactive visualizations, measurement, estimation, and reporting of key infrastructure sustainability indicators, trended over time.

Applications are behind the sale and delivery of nearly every product and service. Applications power supply chains, procurement processes, inventory and pricing, POS systems, and both online and in-store transaction processing. When the application suffers, so does the business.

Now, assisted by Cisco Full-Stack Observability solutions, retailers can stay one step ahead of rapidly evolving consumer behavior, maximize revenues from peak shopping periods, and ensure any mix of hybrid- and cloud-based applications, ERP and operational systems, and business infrastructure perform at scale.

Cisco makes it easier for retailers to turn their massive streams of observable data into competitive advantage. Leveraging data-derived insights, they can improve business outcomes and make the exceptional, personalized buying experiences that drive customer loyalty and revenue a reality.

Developers — visit the  Cisco Full-Stack Observability topic hub.

Learn more about Cisco Full-Stack Observability solutions, visit us at

NRF 2024

January 14—16 in New York City

  See how Cisco Full-Stack Observability solutions help optimize and secure the applications that underpin online and in-store experiences - from the customer, to the warehouse, to economies of scale.  Read More Cisco Blogs 

Cisco Training Bootcamps have been on the scene for a couple years now. One of the things that makes them so popular is their intensity and real-world application. We sat down with Subject Matter… Read more on Cisco Blogs

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Cisco Training Bootcamps have been on the scene for a couple years now. One of the things that makes them so popular is their intensity and real-world application. We sat down with Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) John Capobianco, Bootcamp Developer Advocate, Joe Rinehart, Engineering Leader, and Palmer Sample, Software Engineering Technical Leader, to find out what makes Cisco Training Bootcamps so special. 

Plus, we got a sneak peek at what they’ll cover in the upcoming Cisco Training Bootcamp webinar on December 13, 2023, at 10 a.m. Pacific Time. 

Why are Cisco Training Bootcamps so popular? 

John: I think it’s the way they align with market trends. Enterprises around the world are looking for ways to adopt network automation and get the maximum value out of their Cisco investments. A Cisco Training Bootcamp provides a direct path toward cultural changes, helping organizations adopt automation and programmability. 

Joe: They also address significant business and technical needs like automation and complex product competence. The teaching methodology is well-suited to rapid learning and developing skills that engineers can apply now, not only in the future. Having two learning events close together (the Instructor-led Training [ILT] classes and the deep dive labs) amplifies the learning at every level. It’s like the expression, ‘one-two punch.’

Palmer: I think people like our bootcamps because they answer the question, “Now what?” Today’s competitive business environment requires agile networks that can adapt to mission objectives without impacting stakeholders. As our customers deploy modern infrastructure, they find that the problem is not that the technology is too complex but that it’s different from what we’ve all worked with for so many decades.  

We’ve heard:  

“We have deployed Software-Defined Access…” 
“We are running ACI but have not moved to an application-centric model…” 
“Our team needs to embrace NetDevOps principles and learn automation…” 

Now what? 

Cisco Training Bootcamps remove complexity and focus on what is important. Whether it’s an Operations and Troubleshooting Bootcamp for Software-Defined Campus and Data Center Solutions, or an Automation Bootcamp, our customers leave with the confidence they need to transform network operations and contribute to their team’s success. 

You guys are in the perfect position to know what customers need. What are you hearing from the front lines? What automation needs do customers believe these Training Bootcamps might solve? 

Joe: Customers need to solve problems now, which is why the hands-on component of the experience is so vital. The Bootcamps not only encourage students to learn concepts and configuration, but they also provide the imperative for students to apply them immediately in their environments. 

Palmer: While customers are eager to automate, they face common challenges, such as ensuring their teams can speak a common language, which automation technology they should choose, and perhaps most importantly, what they can actually do with automation. A Cisco Training Bootcamp addresses these challenges with a unique teaching format. The 5-day training covers a broad range of prerequisite knowledge to ensure students gain a common skillset. The real-world use cases and deep-dive labs show what customers can do with network automation. These labs are designed to progress from the basics, such as learning Git, to popular tools, including REST API Clients and Python. Finally, most learning tracks culminate with a CI/CD pipeline. After the Bootcamp, customers maintain access to code they can immediately use when they return to the office. The overall experience requires focus and teamwork, but the customer response has been overwhelmingly positive. 

John: Some of our former students stay in touch with us for over a year after their Automation Training Bootcamp! The scale and complexity of the modern network can no longer be operated manually. Automation is not just about speed and moving fast; it’s about security, repeatability, testing and validation, and developing CI/CD pipelines as complete solutions. Ultimately, most customers are looking for a place to start with confidence. Cisco Training Bootcamps provide them those initial stepping stones toward success. 

What are the elements of a Bootcamp that make it so intense? 

John: The labs! In the 4-day, deep-dive lab portion, 80 percent of the class is lab work based on real situations and scenarios. Students actually practice what they’ve learned during the 5-day ILT with actual equipment and real problems to solve. There are a variety of ‘spice levels’ (difficulty levels) to challenge even the most advanced student. For instance, they learn things like version and source control with Git and Ansible playbooks and how to automate solutions with Ansible, Python and Cisco pyATS, and CI/CD pipelines. 

Joe: The Deep Dive Labs (DDLs) are all about using the tools, writing code, and making things happen. The labs are action-oriented, and the ratio of lecture versus lab in the DDL is about 20 percent lecture, leaving 80 percent for labs. 

Palmer: I think the intensity lies in the amount of content we cover in such a short period of time. Coupled with the labs, which get progressively more challenging, it’s a lot to learn—especially for students who are relatively new to the technology track they’ve selected. The good news is they have a dedicated team of instructors to support their learning experience. In turn, we’ve noticed our classes often embrace a team mindset, helping each other succeed. Yes, the experience is intense, but it’s not impossible! At the end of the deep-dive lab week, students are exhausted but inspired to continue their journey. 

Between the two types of Cisco Training Bootcamps, automation and product (operations and troubleshooting), what are you finding most popular and useful?  

John: Both tracks are very popular and address different needs. Some customers find the Ops and Troubleshooting Bootcamps more practical for their current day-to-day needs, while others are forward-looking, trying to transform those operations into fully automated solutions.  

Joe: Each has their niche, with automation and product Bootcamps often running around the same number of times. While we introduced the DevNet Automation Bootcamps first, the Operations & Troubleshooting tracks came along later and remain wildly popular. 

Palmer: It depends. Some customers have a dedicated team managing infrastructure, while another focuses on automation. Some customers are just deploying a technology such as Software-Defined Access. Meanwhile, others have realized that automation is here to stay, so they need to upskill. 

The Bootcamps also complement each other and provide a path for our customers to evolve as their requirements change. For example, a customer new to ACI would benefit from the Operations and Troubleshooting Bootcamp. Then, they can expand their knowledge by taking the Cisco DevNet Automation for ACI when they move to a NetDevOps model. 

Could you tell us more about the new Cisco Training Bootcamp for Enterprise Networking (EN)?  

John: I am really excited about this bootcamp! While we do have an SDA Bootcamp for those with Catalyst Center and a controller-based approach, the EN Bootcamp will enable those customers without SDN to fully embrace automation and programmability. We explore technologies like Ansible and Cisco pyATS, and build toward a full CI/CD pipeline solution that students build over the course of the DDL. And did I mention the lab is IPv6-based around OSPFv3?!  

Palmer: The Cisco DevNet Automation Bootcamp for Enterprise Networking, or as we call it, ‘EN-A,’ is in the final stages of testing. It’s based on Cisco IOS XE software, which is present in switches, routers, and wireless devices and is the backbone of our customers’ enterprise networks. 

After the 5-day instructor-led training, students begin the Deep-Dive Lab (DDL) with a topology consisting of Cisco Catalyst 8000V Edge devices, which are only configured with management interface connectivity. After being introduced to NetDevOps and Git, students will use a variety of modern methods to incrementally configure the simulated branch topology. They gain hands-on experience with test-driven automation, Ansible, Python, Cisco’s pyATS automation framework, REST API clients, YANG models, model-driven programmability, streaming telemetry, and CI/CD pipelines. At the end of the Bootcamp, the simulated branch will be fully configured and IPv6-enabled, with OSPFv3 and BGP in the mix for added excitement. We can’t wait to share the experience! 

What’s the most popular Training Bootcamp so far? Why? 

Joe: Cisco ACI has emerged as one of the most popular topic areas. First, the automation bootcamp, followed by the operations and troubleshooting bootcamp. Naturally, there are fluctuations about which track is the most popular, but these two are nearly always at the top. 

John: People are drawn to ACI and software-defined networking in general, mainly for simplicity, scale, and automation capabilities. ACI was built from the ground up with APIs and programmability in mind, but it is also a departure from classic enterprise networking. There is a bit of a learning curve as things are done differently. 

What’s the advantage of Training Bootcamps for individuals? 

John: I think it’s the skills they will acquire with real-world examples and the new appreciation for how accessible and easy it is to get started with network automation. It’s also the Cisco Continuing Education (CE) credits they will receive upon successful completion. 

Joe: Many customers do not have 12 engineers dedicated to the technologies covered in Cisco bootcamps. The Training Bootcamps for individuals offers the flexibility of accommodating smaller numbers of students. In addition, we often hear that having the entire team out for training can impact business productivity, so sending the team in waves can mitigate that issue. 

And how is an individual Bootcamp different from the Cisco Training Bootcamps for teams? 

John: The team Bootcamps (aka closed enrollments) offer a private setting for team members from organizations to take the Bootcamp together. One of the natural side benefits of these enrollments is the team building that goes on over the course of the week. Teammates from organizations become closer as they learn these new skills and technologies. They learn, struggle, fail, and succeed together.

Individual Cisco Training Bootcamps have their own charm, as a wide range of individuals come together to achieve the same goals. People from around the world learn together and make friends. It’s quite remarkable. 

Joe: Bootcamps for Teams are structured on a per-class basis, from pricing to project management and tailoring. These Bootcamps can have the content and labs tailored specifically to a single customer, which we do not provide for the Bootcamps for Individuals, a.k.a. open enrollment. 

Where do you see Cisco Training Bootcamps going in the next year? 

John: I am very excited about the EN offering as well as the continued interest in ACI, NSO, SDA, and Meraki. I hope demand goes up. I hope our team grows. We are having a tangible impact on the industry, and I think our days as Cisco’s best-kept secret are numbered. 

Joe: We are releasing a new track called Cisco DevNet Automation for Enterprise Networks, which may be a mouthful, but it addresses the largest installed base of installed devices—namely, those that run the IOS-XE operating system. This has been quite the undertaking, but it hits a relevant area of focus that almost every customer needs. Beyond that, we are always looking at updates and improvements to existing content and labs and expanding into new content areas. 

Palmer: It’s going to be a busy year, for sure. I anticipate that the Enterprise Networking Automation Bootcamps will be very popular, and we have a number of returning customers looking to expand their skills and train new teams. We’ll also be reviewing our current Bootcamps to identify opportunities to add new content and showcase new technologies and capabilities. Nothing in this industry ever stands still, and we look for “force multipliers” to incorporate into the content so our customers stay competitive. Also, our team is frequently accepted to present at events such as Cisco Live! That’s a wonderful opportunity to meet former and future students in person. 

Tell us more about this upcoming webinar: What can customers expect during the event? 

John: We’ll cover all six Bootcamps. Customers will get to know us as instructors if they haven’t met us yet. They’ll get to know our distinct ‘Edutainer’ styles. We will be covering each Bootcamp for about five minutes each to give you a sense of the material covered. You’ll have a chance to ask us any questions along the way. 

Palmer: We’ll also cover the Enterprise Networking Automation Bootcamp, which is in the final stages of testing. We look forward to answering questions that come up. 

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