Take a second and look around your house. I am sure you see appliances abound, but do you see a phone? Not a cellphone or a tablet, but an actual hardwired landline. Chances are probably not. Now, think about your office. There it is there’s phones everywhere! In fact, businesses are perhaps the last place where we use classic landline phones. Stores, office spaces, garages, warehouses, all full of phones. You already knew that. What you may not have known is this, you do not need a traditional copper wire PSTN or Public Switched
Telephone Network phone line to run your phone system. In fact, you can use your high-speed internet connection and save yourself some money in the process. It is called VOIP or Voice Over Internet Protocol, and it can be a great tool for your business.
First hitting the market in 1995, VOIP was created to cut down on long distance bills for enterprises doing international business. Originally brought on the market by VocalTech, the first internet phone used existing internet connections to convert voice packets from analog to digital. Originally these systems were only able to execute phone calls, and at the time, high speed internet was only available to major institutions such as government agencies and universities, and to big business. Though voicemail capabilities and computer to phone and phone to phone calling was available, it was only adopted by about 1% of businesses since you had to listen to commercials to make and end a phone call. In the early 2000’s however, the true shift began. Broadband internet became more available to small and medium sized businesses and became commonplace in households around the country. In fact, by 2003, almost 25% of all business phone calls occurred using VOIP. When Skype first launched in 2004, companies began to realize the true benefits of VOIP, and the growth boomed.
WHAT BENEFITS DOES VOIP HAVE
VOIP is a more cost effective, feature rich version of traditional phone systems. Using SIP (Session Initiated Protocol) trunking systems, VOIP allows for multiple lines to be set up on the same connection, for oftentimes $30 less per line. The number of extensions far exceeds that of a traditional phone system. SIP trunking also allows for feature rich apps to be created and integrated into a calling platform. What is more, it allows for you to keep your existing phone hardware intact, as the sip trunk handles the digital to analog routing of the calls.
You may have called a local office and heard an auto attendant. This attendant directs you to any number of extensions in the directory and can even answer questions for you and give you information on the business. Other features that are usually additional costs, such as call waiting, conference calling and direct video calling, are available far cheaper
if not free with your voip service. This is all done through what is known as a PBX. PBX technology has been a commonplace in business for decades now, however, in its traditional form, it is costly. VOIP has done away with much of the costs, hundreds or thousands per assigned user, as all of the call routing is done through broadband, eliminating the need for costly PBX hardware.
Many companies have switched over to a remote work force over the past year. Keeping a uniform system, where customers and clients can’t tell if you are working remotely or from an office can be hard in these cases. However, with VOIP technology, you can integrate remote workers and their devices of choice into your telephone network. Due to the PBX technology and the broadband capabilities, VOIP can offer a seamless transition for companies wherever their employees may be. Many times, business are concerned with porting over their phone numbers if they have to change locations, service providers, or add and subtract phone lines. However, VOIP offers complete portability, allowing businesses to keep and transfer their phone numbers to any device via login, regardless of the device type or network. This helps cut down on confusion in case of internal changes.
VOIP and auto attendant technology can save your company time and manpower. Think of your secretary. They do so much for your business, data inputting, schedule maintenance, file and record keeping. By making sure they don’t need to answer a phone every five seconds, you are enabling them to focus on the important tasks at hand for your business, allowing automation to do the tedious work of routing and rerouting calls to your office.
When it comes to running your business in our modern times, both accessibility and scalability have become more than buzzwords, but part of the process we all need to follow. VOIP allows for your team to be reachable as long as they have a data connection, even in places that they are lacking in traditional phone connections. In previous eras if you were trying to grow your business, you had to get someone in to physically add a phone line and purchase new hardware for each additional line you were adding. With VOIP, these upgrades can be made with the click of a button, without having to acquire new hardware.
VOIP allows for integration not seen in traditional phone technology. You can send files to be looked over, documents to be signed, and even collaborate on projects, right through your phone. You can make calls on any device that has a microphone and a speaker as long as it is connected to a broadband connection. This is done utilizing softphone technology. Softphones are basically apps that use a devices internet connection to make calls, bypassing the traditional phone system attached to the device, or allowing calls if there is no traditional system at all. All you need is your network working on the same app, and your business is off to the races.
VOIP even helps with security measures. Have you ever received a phone call and seen a spam warning? This is because softphone technology allows for similar security protocols to your computer network, such as IP traces and encryption. This allows your end user to spot malicious calls and social engineering attacks before they hit your network.
If you want a safer, clearer, more flexible way to reach the people you need to daily, then VOIP may be for you. Talk to your local internet service provider, or your MSP partner, like the good folks at Delval Technology Solutions, and see if a VOIP system is right for your business.