VoIP office telephone solutions are becoming very popular for a reason. The solution offers savings, features, flexibility and convenience that no other business communication solution has offered before thus, the widespread use of VoIP is no surprise. Global statistics showed that VoIP will reach an outstanding $35 billion over the next few years especially with the roll out of wireless internet connectivity that will fuel the technology even further.

One aspect that made that made VoIP office telephone very popular is the various types of solutions to choose from making it very flexible, affordable and available to almost all businesses big or small. Below is a quick rundown office telephone configuration you can choose from depending on your needs and budget.

Cloud PBX

A Cloud PBX is a virtual business phone system that utilizes servers and trunks instead of the traditional hardware and copper wires to connect calls. You can think of if as if your PBX hardware is located in your service provider and you gain access to it using your internet connection. This means that you can locate handsets or extensions anywhere in the world as long as there is an internet connection. Also, a cloud PBX uses a programming algorithm similar to website, this means that the solution is very flexible and can be customized to suit your every requirement.

A cloud PBX is VoIP’s answer to the ever growing problem of expensive telephone systems, on average businesses can cut down phone bills by more than half just by deploying it.

SIP Trunking

For businesses with existing PBX, a SIP trunk can be connected to it to enjoy the affordable call rates. SIP trunking or simply SIP trunk is a communication protocol that is less expensive than the protocol that traditional telephone system uses. Most new PBX supports the protocol but older ones may require a SIP card installed first. This will effectively reduce your set up cost as you will still be using exactly the same handsets and you are just connecting a new line to it. On average call rates are 50% cheaper and line rentals are also relatively cheaper.

Computer based

One of the earliest VoIP solutions is a computer based phone. This popularized the technology and paved way for its continuous development. This type is often indicated for small businesses who solely run via computer because it requires your computer to be turned on before you can make and receive phone calls. These days, contact centers are the primary users of this type because of their dependence on computers.

For some businesses a CRM or Client Relationship Management system is a must have and an office telephone solution should work hand in hand with system. Not only that it will facilitate convenience and efficiency in carrying out your business processes through phone it will also help improve productivity and the overall all performance of your staffs and your business.

Why Integrate a CRM

There are many benefits of integrating a CRM to your office telephone system. The obvious benefit is the convenience. A CRM will serve as a central place of recording our customer’s details such as contact information, requirements, orders, quotes, important notes and previous invoices. Your staff can then utilize this information to follow up on a client and directly dial from the CRM. If you business process involves tele-prospecting your sales representative or appointment setter can have an improvement of about 20 to 30% just by directly dialing from the CRM and having all information in one place.

Additionally a CRM that is integrated with your office telephone system can also work like an automated dialer. This will reduce time wastage from dialing a number and avoid mistyped numbers, therefore reducing wrong number calls. Some advance CRMs even have the ability to automatically dial in a number on a specified date and time to ensure continuous customer follow up.

Things to Consider

The most important factor to consider is if the CRM you are looking to acquire is compatible with a TAPI or Telephony Application Programming Interface which is an application or software that allows computers to utilize telephony services. Bear in mind that there are different versions of TAPI indicated for different computer operating systems. Make sure that you have a compatible version of your CRM, operating system and TAPI for a successful deployment.

A TAPI is originally used to control computer hardware such as modems and printers, but its revolutionizing diversity has paved way to control even business telephony equipments or PBXs. Additional cost may range from $8 to $12 per handset depending on the version and or software developer.  Be sure to purchase a license for such application to allow legal access and full control of the software.

Lastly be sure to download or request for a driver from your PBX manufacturer as you may need it to support such integration. It is also advisable to discuss it with your office telephone provider and ask for the things you need to consider and requirements that you might need beforehand.

Industry professionals and entrepreneurs today are looking for a flexible working environment. In fact recent surveys revealed that more and more staff prefer to work on a flexible shift and if possible to work from home. All these may seem to be too much for a business to handle but in reality businesses and staffs will gain equal benefits from such set up.

A flexible working environment such as work at home will promote better efficiency and dedication to work which will lead to higher productivity rate. Cost wise, having your staff work from home can also save you money. How? Obviously the more people in the office the higher your bills will be and since you will have less people on site you can even downsize your office to a smaller space further reducing your overhead costs. But bear in mind though that there are also quite a few considerations that you need to bear in mind before deploying such set up. Below is a list of considerations you need to take into account.

Communication – One of the biggest challenges in a work from home set up is communication. This is where a reliable and effective office telephone system comes to play. You should be able to contact your staff; the same way contact you anytime without the distance boundaries. The main idea to perform duties and tasks as if they are in the office, luckily technology today has paved way for a newer and innovative office telephone system that allows just about that.

A cloud PBX is a solution from VoIP that removes the distance boundaries because it uses the internet and trunks instead a set of hardware. This means phones can be located anywhere in world as long as there is an internet connection and work as if it located under one roof.

Data storage – Since you will be working distant from each other, local file storage will not work anymore. A cloud based storage where you and your staff can view, download, upload and share files is a must have. There is several free cloud storage software in the market today and some CRM also has the capabilities to accommodate such feature.

Time tracker – A method to track your staffs time and progress is also a must have. Not only that it will tell you how much work they’ve put up to pay accordingly but also let you know the challenges they are facing with their work. Additionally, there are some time trackers that will even take screen shots or allow you to view your staff’s screen in real time to remove any doubts in a home based set up.

In general a cloud PBX office telephone system is a great business communication solution. It is able to deliver unimaginable levels of flexibility, tons of amazing features and above reduce overhead cost by as much as 50%. However businesses need to be aware that since it is a VoIP solution the main requirement is the internet, which today is a no brainer because almost everyone can secure a reliable connection. But still it pays if you are able to understand the exact requirements of VoIP solutions to maximize the technology.

Most articles on the web will say that a good internet connection is a must have for a cloud PBX office telephone system to work properly. Well, that is true. However, it raises a question. What is considered good and what’s not? Below are some points to watch out for before deploying a cloud PBX office telephone system or any other VoIP solutions.

Speed – Obviously a sufficient bandwidth is needed to run VoIP solutions, both download and upload speeds are equally important as phones work both ways. Depending on the audio codec built onto it, an IP phone may require 7kbps to 50 kbps. Not much, but remember it is a continuous stream, whilst on a call, so the internet speed you have should be able to accommodate all the requirements of your phone and your computer, if you will be sharing a network. Also some ISPs have bandwidth thresholds, which mean that you can only use a certain amount of data in a month. Be sure to also take this into account.

 Jitter – Is an undesired deviation during a data transmission, the higher the jitter the more likely voices will be delayed during a conversation. In a VoIP call, voices are converted to digital signals that are packetized. Think of as message envelopes, when you say the word Hello, The letter H and put to an envelope and sent, then the letter E and so on. The other party’s phone then transcribes these data into a form that we understand. Jitter causes these data to be delivered in an incorrect manner. For an instance in the word Hello the letter E comes first before the letter H. This is easily solved by IP phones with the use of jitter buffers because all data are sent with a sequence number. However, the more jitter your internet have, the more incorrect data are transmitted leading to delays.

Packet loss – Is the amount of data that are lost during the transmission. The average acceptable packet loss is below 2% because the network, server and other components of VoIP can still fill in the lost data, go higher then you will then start to notice that voices are breaking up.

Consistency of connection – Apart from speed, jitter and packet loss stability is also important. You don’t want an internet connection that goes from 1 megabit to 10 megabit and back to 1 megabit because it can affect the quality of calls.

If you are experiencing the above problems make sure to talk to your ISP because these are often cause by bad fiber connection. Have them check your lines and exchanges. Additionally it is advisable to secure a business grade plan because of the top level support priority and avoid contention because of overly subscribed home grade plans.

Today’s fast paced business world entails new requirements and marketing stunts. Before businesses send out flyers, snail mails, and do exert effort to find a good location. Although all of these aspects are still effective and important technology today has allowed a newer avenue of marketing a business. The internet serves as one of the biggest niches today and almost all enterprise have a website to capitalize on this technology.

Since the internet is global, businesses are able to cover a larger area of operation. In fact there are many online enterprises today that are running solely from their website but are enjoying success through proper deployment. However, like any business avenue the internet has a couple of requirements. Blatantly a well ranked website is needed to bring in the customers and a good office telephone system to accommodate these customers.

Top Reasons Acquire a Good to Phone Whilst Internet Marketing

Serves as the primary contact – A business that is marketing through the internet is often contacted by a customer via phone. It is a very rare site that they will grab your address and head directly to your office. If you are able to get all the elements of internet marketing then you can expect your phones to ring more than usual. A good office telephone will serve as the primary stream of contact thus it is just a must to secure one.

Helps establish trust – Customers are always picky and keen in observing every detail especially in the initial contact. Trust and rapport is very important during the initial phase of contact as it can be the determining factor to get a sale and a continuous pipeline of customers.

Tendering of products and services – Since you will be marketing online it will be a familiar site to get service request or orders outside of your locality. This means that everything is done via phone from the product or service introduction, ordering, arranging the freight and actual deployment. Thus, a good and reliable phone is a must have otherwise you will be unable to carry out all these processes smoothly.

Customer service - One aspect that all customers are keen about is the level of customer service or support that a business is offering. Customers want to be able to call their service provider or supplier for assistance at any given day and time. This is only possible if you have a good and reliable phone system, one that works 24/7 with almost no glitches and high levels of up time.

The demand for office telephones systems is in a constant rise, as the market continues to evolve more and more businesses are expanding their operations at time even engaging the international scene. Entailing this expansion is the need to overhaul or upgrade business communication systems and phones being the top priority.

As business communication systems today become smarter and smarter there are still basic features that all enterprise will need and should not be neglected. Below is a list of must have basic office telephone features.

Call forwarding and call transfer – part of running a business is being away in the office on several occasions, could be a meeting, a supplier check or a conference. Whatever it is you should still be able to receive important sales calls on your mobile. However, you don’t expect customers to call you on your mobile directly and it is often a big mistake to ask them to, so it is just a must for your office telephone system to have a call forwarding features so your attendant can just transfer the call directly to your mobile.

Additionally, call forwarding is also important during out of hours, weekends and or holidays so calls can be automatically diverted to your mobile, home phone or any other number so you won’t miss out on a possible sale.

Greeting message – Callers calling a business expect a professional service on your end and. A greeting message is often an edge to have as customers will think that they are calling a well established business. Not that you are trying to deceive callers but rather you are trying to earn their trust.

Three way calling feature – This feature will come handy both for internal and external processes. Internally you can conduct small phone meetings, trainings and or seminars. Externally, you can conference customers and staffs as needed. For an instance your sales staff is having difficulty closing a sales he can then ask permission from the customer to bring in one of the senior sales representative to service him better.

Caller ID – Obviously this feature is a requirement for any business. It will help you identify who is calling your business and serve as a reference too just in case you missed out in getting a contact number or mistyped it.

Voice mail – All businesses try their best to get to all phone calls, however, it is sometimes inevitable to miss some of it. This is where a voice mail or a message bank comes really handy. Just make sure that your recordings prompt callers to leave their name, number and a detailed message so you can get back to him accordingly.

Today businesses are torn between two options when it comes to a business communication solution. The constant battle between traditional telephony and VoIP phone systems leaves business owners confused to which solution to go for. Everyone is quite familiar with a traditional PBX; often the case is it is the VoIP solutions that are not known.

A business grade office telephone using VoIP solutions is called a cloud PBX. Basically cloud means the internet, similar to what cloud computing is, and PBX stands for private branch exchange or simply phones. Combine them together and it means internet office telephone systems. At first glance you may think that both options are just the same but in reality is a big difference separates the two. A cloud PBX uses servers and a network instead of hardware. This means that all the PBX components except the handsets are located in the cloud and is accessed using the internet. You can somehow compare it to a website.

By using servers and network instead of a hardware, the system is able to offer flexibility and cost effectiveness to customers. Flexibility because you can literally customized a cloud PBX based on your requirements. Think of it like one of the open source programming software where you can literally command the computer do what you want, the same way the system can be custom programmed to tell the phones what you like to happen. Additionally, since there is no hardware involved you can adjust your phone system capacity as needed.

Cost effectiveness because instead of using traditional trunk lines in routing a call it uses a SIP trunk. On average businesses can save up to 70% on phone bills depending on the usage and the size of the system. Apart from cheaper calls, line rentals and also relatively cheaper compared to traditional solutions. Pushing the savings even further is the features. Traditional Telecommunications Company may charge you monthly even for the most basic feature like caller ID and call forwarding, but with the latter, all features are already included and complex requirements may just require a one-time set up fee.

However, a cloud PBX doesn’t work like magic. For a successful deployment business need to secure one of the most important requirement and that is the internet. Frankly speaking, if you are unable to secure a fast and stable connection then the solution might not be for you. All VoIP solutions are reliant to the quality of the internet. If you are able to secure this one requirement then you can expect business grade call quality every time you make or receive a call.

Answering services is now becoming a booming in today’s busy and fast paced business sector. Basically the main role of answering service providers, from the word itself, is to answer calls in behalf of a business. Typically these types of services are hired by company that is too busy to pick up their phones but cannot afford to send customers on message banks. It is then a must for these service providers to secure a reliable and suitable office telephone system that will cater all possible needs of various customers.

Below is a list of must have office telephone functionalities

Call forwarding – Answering service companies pick up calls even out f hours, this means that an office telephone system must be able to forward a call automatically to a mobile, a home number or any number. The office telephone system should also offer the option either forward calls automatically when not pick after a certain number of rings or enable an override code that will activate the feature.

Call announcement and caller ID – Answering service companies often take calls for multiple businesses so it is a must to know where the call is coming from to answer accordingly. Call announcement means that a recording will be played to notify whoever picks up the call where is it coming from, the same way caller ID will tell where it is coming from. However, although both features serve the same purposes it is a must to have it hand in hand. Remember like mentioned above, calls be diverted to mobile, that means you won’t be able to determine through caller ID which business is that call for. The same way caller ID provides the info throughout the call just in case you forget.

Line sharing – lines or channels is the trunk or the mechanism that allows a number to receive a phone call. This means that if you 2 lines connected to a number you can receive 2 phone calls at the same time on 1 number. However, answering service companies often needs to share lines across numbers. To explain it better here is an example. You have 5 Sydney numbers and 5 lines, what line sharing means is that you can pull the lines to where it is needed. Sydney number A can then use all 5 lines or not, the same way Sydney numbers B to E can use all lines. This method is effective for an answering company because not all business they’re servicing is as busy as the other one.

Office phone systems are a must have for any business. It is used for internal communications as wells as external communication. Businesses that have a good and reliable system are able to carry out their sales and support processes effectively. Thus, the market for office telephone systems continually grows and more and more providers are opening each year. However, the reality is not all service providers out there are capable of delivering a good service and as a business you need to be careful to avoid being ripped off. To guide you in this important decision below are some important general consumer guide points in purchasing a phone system.

General Consumers Guide

The price – The first thing will come to almost every business owner’s mind is the price. Office telephone systems aren’t cheap as hotcakes. However, this does not imply either that you need to spend a fortune. Business owners are advised to collect as many quotes or as many price sheets as possible for comparison purposes and then on, you can create a baseline data on the average price. The baseline data will let you know if a provider is overcharging you or if it is at a reasonable level.

Quality of hardware – Whether you opt for a traditional phone system or favor the newer cloud PBX office telephone system a hardware will still be present. General notes of checking hardware are relatively easy. Inspect the PBX and or the handsets thoroughly, make sure that the build quality and materials are of high grade. Apart from physical inspection you might also want to look into the firmware that it is running on and make sure that it is compatible with the provider’s network.

Quality of calls and lines – This is where it starts to get tricky, lines or calls is not something you can inspect physically. You can check this by calling the company several times and grade the call quality accordingly. If possible, ask for a trail period, so you will experience firsthand what the call quality is.

Quality of service – Apart from the actual phone system, business owners should also consider the overall service of a provider. A good customer support and process suggest a well managed company and thus can imply that it is safe to sign with that provider. Additionally, office phone systems are no magic so problems will surface from time to time and you would want to be able to call your provider and report the issue.

Level of flexibility – more often than not, business owners tend to neglect this point thinking that they everything place already. However, would you want a phone system that will require an upgrade every time you wish to add a handset or perhaps a feature? It’s costly and time consuming system and cannot be called a solution if that is the case. It is advisable to opt for a communication solution that is flexible enough to increase the capacity and or modify it without any upgrades or overhaul. This will not only save you business money but also save your precious time.

Today businesses are torn between two options when it comes to a business communication solution. The constant battle between traditional telephony and VoIP phone systems leaves business owners confused to which solution to go for. Everyone is quite familiar with a traditional PBX; often the case is it is the VoIP solutions that are not known.

A business grade office telephone using VoIP solutions is called a cloud PBX. Basically cloud means the internet, similar to what cloud computing is, and PBX stands for private branch exchange or simply phones. Combine them together and it means internet office telephone systems. At first glance you may think that both options are just the same but in reality is a big difference separates the two. A cloud PBX uses servers and a network instead of hardware. This means that all the PBX components except the handsets are located in the cloud and is accessed using the internet. You can somehow compare it to a website.

By using servers and network instead of a hardware, the system is able to offer flexibility and cost effectiveness to customers. Flexibility because you can literally customized a cloud PBX based on your requirements. Think of it like one of the open source programming software where you can literally command the computer do what you want, the same way the system can be custom programmed to tell the phones what you like to happen. Additionally, since there is no hardware involved you can adjust your phone system capacity as needed.

Cost effectiveness because instead of using traditional trunk lines in routing a call it uses a SIP trunk. On average businesses can save up to 70% on phone bills depending on the usage and the size of the system. Apart from cheaper calls, line rentals and also relatively cheaper compared to traditional solutions. Pushing the savings even further is the features. Traditional Telecommunications Company may charge you monthly even for the most basic feature like caller ID and call forwarding, but with the latter, all features are already included and complex requirements may just require a one-time set up fee.

However, a cloud PBX doesn’t work like magic. For a successful deployment business need to secure one of the most important requirement and that is the internet. Frankly speaking, if you are unable to secure a fast and stable connection then the solution might not be for you. All VoIP solutions are reliant to the quality of the internet. If you are able to secure this one requirement then you can expect business grade call quality every time you make or receive a call.