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Saving money has been at the top of the list for many businesses deploying VoIP, but there are many other advantages to upgrading your technology.

Lower Costs of Service – Since it is at the top of most lists, let’s start with saving money!  The charge structures for VoIP providers come in many shapes and sizes, however it is not uncommon for a VoIP phone service to save a business 20 to 40 percent on their monthly phone bill.  Many offer all distance calling programs, so if you have a high amount of long distance calls, your savings will be higher.  Also gone are the concurrent call restrictions of analog lines and PRIs, as you will not be forced to oversize your need based upon fears that all your lines will be in use.

Using Technology to Improve Communications – Many VoIP providers can customize their solutions to enhance your communication practices, making your business more efficient and improving your communications with your customers:

• Businesses use VoIP to improve customer service by providing for effective call routing and increasing access to front-line personnel.  An automated attendant, either as a primary or secondary option, provides customers with the ability to get to the right person or department quickly.  Call queues, ring groups, call forwarding options, and soft phone apps on cell phones are examples of how a customized VoIP solution can increase customer contact with front line service or sales personnel.
• Branch locations can be tied together under the same phone platform, whether they are in the same town or not.  Centralized reception or an auto attendant can be deployed to route calls to the appropriate branch office, driving efficiency to your business.  Employees can extension dial between locations without spending thousands of dollars to enable such features.
• You don’t have to be a large company with an expensive phone system to enjoy the benefits of direct inward dial (DID) lines for each employee, as hosted VoIP providers can deliver such a service at a fraction of the price.  These employees will enjoy unified communications, where they can receive their voicemails and faxes into their email so they are alerted to the message via a smart cell phone even when they are out of the office.

Empowering a Virtual Workforce – Businesses have been able to use hosted VoIP platforms to expand their workforce without investing in larger offices or multiple locations.  Employees can work from home, whether it is locally or out of state, and still be under the same phone system as the corporate office.   Such a deployment is seamless to customer service, as these employees can be a part of ring groups, receive quick call transfers, or utilize their DID to perform their jobs as if they were within the four walls of the office.

There are many other advantages, and, yes, you can save money!  Call a VoIP provider today to learn more! 

About the author:  Mark Greim is the Vice President of Sales and Marketing at sipVine, a provider of a variety of VoIP phone solutions and services. Mark has extensive experience working for start-up or entrepreneurial organizations and a passion for affordable, reliable, and purposeful technology solutions in those environments. 

There are countless benefits available for businesses when they switch to a hosted VoIP phone service.  Price is a big driver that has certainly been delivered by national VoIP providers as well as smaller, regional or local carriers.  However, when choosing a provider, don’t just settle for the price benefit received from providers who merely drop ship the phones with basic configurations for your business.

The beauty behind hosted VoIP phone service is that there can be many programmatic features and custom configuration options for your business, assuming the provider has a robust and flexible platform.  Every business has a flow of how they would like their calls routed and handled, and there are many ways to customize this delivery.  Your first test of a provider’s willingness to customize a call flow is whether they conduct a configuration meeting with you in advance of the delivery of the phones.  If it is merely setting up direct dial numbers for every phone and driving calls to your main number to one individual or to an auto attendant, there is a chance that you’re missing out on options to make the phone service work exactly how you would like it to.

In addition, one very important decision point is who is taking the responsibility for your voice quality.  You should be alerted to potential issues if a selling point from a drop shipper is “just plug the phones into your office LAN and they work.”  Hosted VoIP phones do in fact “work” when you do this, but call quality has not been addressed.  If this is addressed merely by internet bandwidth sizing and capacity, you still may face call quality issues.  Make sure your provider is delivering a new router or edge device for your LAN that has Quality of Service software built in.  This will ensure that your voice packets over the internet are prioritized and are not interrupted by data traffic. 

With careful selection of your VoIP provider based upon their desire and ability to configure your phones and call flow to how you do business and how they address call quality, you will enjoy BOTH economic benefits and the many benefits of the advanced calling features of a VoIP phone system!

About the author:  Mark Greim is the Vice President of Sales and Marketing at sipVine, a provider of a variety of digital phone solutions and services. Mark has extensive experience working for start-up or entrepreneurial organizations and a passion for affordable, reliable, and purposeful technology solutions in those environments. 

Many small to medium businesses have found that a Hosted VoIP Phone Service has improved their customer service.  Due to the fact that the entry cost of a hosted phone service platform is very low, these businesses have been able to take advantage of programmatic features that simply were not available through their previous analog phones or PBX.  A few of the specific features that have improved their customer service are as follows:

• Advanced Call Routing – Many businesses want their incoming phone calls answered by a person, and not via an auto attendant or receive a recording.  Digital VoIP platforms can create ring patterns where the phone can ring a primary, secondary, and additional groups of people to ensure that the call will be answered.  If there is a receptionist, the individual can also transfer a call into a ring group for a common function, giving multiple people the chance address a customer need.  Your hosted VoIP service provider should be able to consult with you on a variety of different ways your call flow can be programmed to best meet the needs of your customers and your business.

• Auto Attendant – Even if your company prefers a “live” answer, it is helpful to have an auto attendant serving as a back-up.  If your receptionist is juggling too many calls or secondary ring groups are unavailable or busy, and auto attendant can kick in and serve as a traffic cop.  Thus, the auto attendant can be deployed with an hours of operation message, with instructions to have the customer select certain departments (which would route to a ring group), corporate directories, and other customizable options.  Of course, this model, if well designed, can also sit on the front end for effective call routing and by-pass a reception function all together.

It is always recommended to have an auto attendant for after-hours routing.  You may have an emergency service line to have customers select.  Sometimes there are simply after-hours calls that can be routed via an extension dial or directory listing to an employee’s extension or voicemail. 

• Improved Access to Mobile Employees – Many businesses have sales associates, service personnel or other functions that are mobile and out of the office frequently.  Hosted VoIP service provides a number of options to meet the demands of your callers to these types of associates.  You could choose to have the employee’s office phone and cell phone ring simultaneously for calls made to the employee’s extension.  Of course, the office phone could be forwarded to the cell phone when the employee is out of the office.  Additionally, through unified communication features, remote employees can receive their voicemails to their email so they can be alerted to messages when received on their smart cell phone.  Faxes can be delivered to email as well, so the remote employee will know when that important fax came in.

Small and medium business can receive these advanced features and not have to invest in an expensive phone system.  Hosted providers basically provide the phone system via the internet and your digital office phones are literally connected to that phone system via the office LAN. 

Finally, with the entry costs being fairly low (price of phones and potentially some other minor connectivity equipment), users of a hosted VoIP phone service many times see lower monthly service fees when compared to their previous analog service.  So, these businesses experience low entry costs, monthly savings, AND an improvement in customer service.  Why not at least explore a hosted voip phone service for your business?

About the author:  Mark Greim is the Vice President of Sales and Marketing at sipVine, a provider of a variety of digital phone solutions and services. Mark has extensive experience working for start-up or entrepreneurial organizations and a passion for affordable, reliable, and purposeful technology solutions in those environments. 

Does your business have an equipment closet that has a complex collection of wiring that has accumulated over the years?  VoIP applications can help clean up the mess!  If your business has been around for a while, you may have had several iterations of phone systems and related wiring.  Because Voice over IP shares the same connection as your data requirements and rides your office Ethernet, you can eliminate most of the wiring in that dreaded closet!

Your voice network will essentially be your data network.  All that is required is the router that connects to the internet and directs traffic into your network switch.  Ethernet wiring from around the office connects to your switch.  This allows for traffic efficiency, as your single connection can handle varying levels of voice and data traffic.  It is important to check with your VoIP provider to make sure they provide traffic shaping software on the router that ensures your voice traffic takes priority over the data.  This will provide a quality of voice calls that you and your clients expect.

Many VoIP phones have dual ports that allow for a computer and the phone to share the same Ethernet connection to the office.  This will eliminate the need to add wiring specifically for the phones.  Additionally, a power over Ethernet switch can be deployed in your network closet which will allow the phones to draw power and eliminate the need for a power cord for the phones.  If you have a back-up power supply for your network, your phones will continue to work in the event of a power outage.

If your business is moving, it would be a great time to evaluate a VoIP phone system.  You will benefit by only needing to build out wiring for your Ethernet and avoid the cost of wiring for traditional analog phones.  You can start out with a clean, spaghetti-free, equipment closet!  Plus, you will avoid the expense of moving and rewiring your existing phone system for your new office.

Efficient use of a single connection and a simple office wiring configuration are just a couple of the many advantages you business will benefit from by switching to a business digital phone service.

About the author:  Mark Greim is the Vice President of Sales and Marketing at sipVine, a provider of a variety of digital phone solutions and services. Mark has extensive experience working for start-up or entrepreneurial organizations and a passion for affordable, reliable, and purposeful technology solutions in those environments. 

Many businesses today are making the switch to a VoIP phone service from their traditional analog phone service.  There are many compelling reasons behind this shift, and the benefits are felt by businesses of all sizes.

Convergence of Technology – With voice and data riding over the same internet connection to the business, the opportunity to digitally link communication applications are great. The concept of unified communications includes advanced features such as voicemails to email and faxes to email. Capturing call detail records and call history is no longer just a feature on your wireless phone, as individual users can benefit from this data and companies can easily capture call history for audit and billing purposes.  Finally, the integration of voice and data over the same connection allows for the flexible use of bandwidth which can drive cost savings.

Advanced Communication Features – In addition to unified communications, VoIP phone service brings a host of features that drive efficient and effective production of your company associates.  Such features include hunt, ring, and call center groups and queues, automated attendant options, time of day routing, corporate directories, a host of call forwarding options, and much more.

Flexible Deployment – With most VoIP platforms, especially with a hosted voip service, being bound to a PBX platform unique to your office is a thing of the past. Businesses can operate outside the walls of their office with mobile or work at home employees and branch locations all on the same phone service platform.  To internal staff and external customers, the location of the phones is not prohibitory to effective communications.  With most VoIP providers, the phones can ride any internet connection and still have the appearance that they are on the same phone system housed at the central office.

Disaster Recovery Options – Through the utilization of a hosted VoIP provider, businesses have several alternatives for localized disaster recovery.  Phones can be physically moved to a location where internet is active or invoke remote forwarding to alternative numbers or locations. This provides peace of mind when concerns arise over internet stability or other location related disasters.

Lower Costs – With the economy continuing to provide daily lessons of the need for cost containment and control, the shift to VoIP has accelerated due to the potential for lower costs and stable monthly expenses.  New entrants in the marketplace have delivered direct blows to the traditional, high-margin analog voice providers.  Unlimited local and long-distance calling is just one example of a way these providers have approached delivering a lower cost to their customers.

The time has never been better to evaluate VoIP phone service.  Join the VoIP revolution and call a VoIP provider today!

About the author:  Mark Greim is the Vice President of Sales and Marketing at  sipVine , a provider of a variety of  digital phone solutions  and services. Mark has extensive experience working for start-up or entrepreneurial organizations and a passion for affordable, reliable, and purposeful technology solutions in those environments.