An enterprise VoIP solution is an alternative to a traditional switched voice service. Instead of using dedicated trunks between PBXs, you can share bandwidth with your data services, making better use of available capacity. Also, in today’s business world, the availability of a plethora of Unified Communications features within the VoIP ecosystem is a boon to business communications at all levels.
No matter which direction your business is headed with an enterprise VoIP solution… the key is to understand how you communicate and what you want to achieve.
The search for a business VoIP solution, or more appropriately Voice over Internet Protocol, can be confusing for any business. There are many flavors of VoIP…and many pros and cons…that you should consider when considering which service to choose. The goal of this article is to help you navigate through the tech jargon so you can make an informed decision that will save you time and money.
BUSINESS VOIP
The first thing to know about business VoIP service is that it can replace your local phone company. Whether you only have a POTS (traditional telephone service) line… or a voice T1 (24 dedicated lines bundled together)… a business VoIP solution is designed to replace your telephone company. Instead of using your local phone company’s voice connection, VoIP will digitize your voice signal and send it over an Internet connection.
In order for your voice to be transmitted digitally over the Internet, you must ensure that you have enough bandwidth to facilitate the communication link. To optimize the quality of your business connection, we recommend a minimum of one T1 line (preferably Ethernet fiber depending on the size of your business), a dedicated link directly to the Internet that is guaranteed to be up more than 99.999% of the time. Since you will be entrusting all of your company’s voice communications to this technology, your Internet connection becomes the critical link. You don’t want to risk a company-wide phone outage to save a few hundred dollars on your bandwidth connection. So always opt for at least one T1 line (preferably fiber ethernet) over DSL. It just makes business sense.
If you need help finding and provisioning bandwidth… we’ve developed software that will allow you to generate a circuit price in just seconds. You can request a bandwidth quote (as well as quotes for Business VoIP solutions) by simply asking Business-VoIP-Solution.Com. Of course the budgets are free and without commitment. NOTE:…all circuits purchased through this resource also include FREE independent circuit monitoring.
Once you’ve taken care of your high-speed Internet connection, it’s time to select a business VoIP service provider, the company that will actually route your digitized voice signal to a real phone on the other end. In essence, your VoIP carrier will become your long distance carrier. The service providers we work with offer unlimited phone calls to the United States and Canada, all for one fixed price. For businesses that average more than $40 in local and long distance usage per employee, VoIP is well worth the initial investment. In some cases, there are also very cost-effective options for international calls {just ask if you’re interested}.
There are also other hidden benefits of Business VoIP service, the main benefit being the reduced bandwidth required to conduct a regular telephone conversation. Since a VoIP transmission only requires 32KB of bandwidth, you can service up to 24 ‘VoIP lines’ in a T1 of data, and still have 768KB left for dedicated high-speed Internet access! This means you can migrate your entire phone system to your existing T1 and still have half the bandwidth allocated for data.
Another benefit of VoIP lies in the prioritization of the digitized voice signals that are generated when you speak. In case no one speaks, the VoIP line does not transmit any data. This allows your T1 line to dynamically allocate bandwidth as needed, rather than permanently blocking an entire channel of data.
Business VOIP stands for intelligent communications. Whether it’s pay-refer call routing, unified communications (integrated phone, email, instant messaging, etc.), or a dedicated app on the phone itself, the power of IPT is in the apps. In fact, the robust capabilities and functionality of available unified communications applications are a real selling point for adopting Business VoIP.
In a highly mobile sales organization, the “Find Me, Follow Me” feature can be priceless. In an organization where deadlines must be met, configuring point-and-click call control can be crucial. Other organizations can benefit from high-level call log metrics to track billable time. Enabling true mobility in your workforce, enhanced video conferencing activity, and ease of use when traveling around the world are also very attractive attributes for businesses.
With so many features available on most platforms… you rarely see all users applying the same controls and features. It is the freedom to control communication at a single user level that makes VoIP a great business solution. In addition, the marriage of Business VoIP technology and Unified Communications capabilities opens up a world of limitless possibilities and applications for today’s business communications.
