Tag: VoIP

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Casserly Consulting Blog

Can You Afford to Ditch Your Telephone System for VoIP?

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Voice over Internet Protocol, or VoIP for short, might at first glance seem complex, but it’s really quite simple when explained properly. Unfortunately, misconceptions surrounding VoIP can become a barrier of entry for businesses considering a VoIP solution. We’re going to disprove some of these misconceptions and prove VoIP can be a valuable investment for just about any business in need of a communications solution.

“VoIP is Too Expensive”
Businesses often think that VoIP is more expensive than your typical telephone bill, but this isn’t necessarily the case. The purpose of VoIP is to actually reduce the costs of your telephone bill by eliminating unnecessary services and the costs associated with them. VoIP does this because it uses your Internet connection rather than a phone connection, meaning that you don’t have to have phone lines all over your office just to give each of your employees phones on their desks. All you need to use a VoIP solution is a headset or handset and a desktop/mobile app hooked up to the Internet.

“VoIP Isn’t Reliable Enough”
In reality, VoIP is only as reliable as your Internet connection. If your Internet connection isn’t reliable, then you have a problem as is, so why not use it as an opportunity to both improve connectivity and communications all in one?

“VoIP is More Trouble Than It’s Worth”
Considering that VoIP would be replacing your current telephone setup, it’s reasonable to suspect that the amount of effort put into this implementation would be considerable. However, that’s simply not the case–VoIP requires minimal setup, as it uses your existing network infrastructure. All you’re doing is connecting your phones to the Internet, which takes no time at all.

“VoIP Doesn’t Sound Good Enough”
VoIP often doesn’t sound any different from your typical phone line connection, and if it doesn’t sound as great as you want it to, chances are it’s (once again) an issue with your Internet connection–not necessarily anything wrong with the VoIP service itself.

“VoIP Isn’t the Right Fit”
VoIP can be the perfect fit for your business precisely due to just how customizable it is to your business’ specific needs. You can mix and match the additional features you desire to save money in the long run. All of the features from any old phone company would be a considerably larger investment, and some VoIP features aren’t even offered by your standard phone company in the first place.

VoIP is simply too good a solution to not implement or at least consider. If you want to hear more about VoIP, our IT professionals would be happy to assist you. To learn more, reach out to us at PHONENUMBER.

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Casserly Consulting Blog

The 3 F’s of a VoIP Solution

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Communication is pivotal to the success of your business, but it’s hard when you have a telephone system that seems like it was built for an age long past. A modern telephone system that utilizes the cloud is the ideal way to approach collaboration in the workplace. You have some options for this, but the easiest to take advantage of is a cloud-hosted Voice over Internet Protocol solution.

Compared to the traditional telephone system, a VoIP phone solution provides substantially more freedom to go about your business as you see fit, as well as the flexibility to adjust needs on a whim and the functionality you expect from an enterprise-level modern phone system.

Freedom
If all you’ve ever known are corded desk phones with a limited reach, then you don’t know the heightened experience of putting on a wireless headset and taking your business on the road. Traditional telephone systems are limited in scope because you’re tied to your desk or within a certain radius of your handset. VoIP phone systems can be used on any connected device, be it a desktop, a laptop, or even a mobile device. Since it’s a cloud-based application, your business can make use of it wherever and however it pleases.

Flexibility
When you implement a traditional telephone system, chances are you have a specific setup in mind that caters to your current needs. Now imagine that your organization is growing at a staggering rate and you don’t have enough phones for everyone. Knocking down walls, running cables, and changing your physical infrastructure just to add a few phones to your network is an overly complicated and expensive process. A cloud-based VoIP system allows you to add new numbers and users when they are needed. As long as your network can sustain the bandwidth (have the IT professionals at COMPANYNAME consult your Internet service provider for more information on this), you can add as many users as you need.

Functionality
A traditional telephone system is subject to the whims of phone providers. This in itself isn’t inherently bad, but the fact that so many of them bundle together unnecessary services makes for a frustrating and expensive system. For example, your business certainly doesn’t need 300 channels of cable television in addition to its phone system. Instead of bundling unnecessary services together, a VoIP solution offers you the opportunity to customize the solution to fit your specific needs. This includes additional options like instant messaging and video chat, in addition to all of the tried and true basics like conference calling and voicemail. Basically, you only pay for what you actually want and need, not what the provider thinks you want and need.

Could your organization use hosted VoIP? COMPANYNAME can help. To learn more, reach out to us at PHONENUMBER.

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Casserly Consulting Blog

Why You’ll Want to Consider Hosted VoIP Telephony

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Today, communications are an important part of business, and with nearly every organization looking to reduce redundancies, a lot of businesses are starting to take advantage of Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) solutions, using the resources they already have in place to avoid paying twice over.

With today’s ISPs delivering faster and faster speeds to businesses, much of the bandwidth a business uses is lost. By choosing to utilize a VoIP telephony solution, your company gets more for less. You are paying for access to massive amounts of bandwidth anyway, why not cut your communications costs while you are at it? Today we will take a look at the various types of VoIP that are available and why the switch may be just the thing your organization needs.

What is VoIP?
Voice over Internet Protocol is just that. The ability to make calls, and have a feature-rich platform that provides all the services that your traditional phone system offers, for a fraction of the cost per user. If this seems too good to be true, consider that the VoIP market is growing rapidly (over 15 percent per year). It works through your organization’s Internet connection rather than through dedicated phone lines. So, instead of having to pay for a separate system or add expensive hardware, VoIP provides an organization the immediate cost reduction without a discernible shift in functionality.

Hosted VoIP technology can be hosted either onsite or in the cloud, but since you won’t have to pay for and maintain hardware with the cloud-based platform, the cloud-hosted version will save you money. It is still a completely managed and maintained PBX server, but instead of having the system in your office, your organization can access it through web-based applications typically available on both desktops and mobile devices.

Benefits of VoIP
We’ve already outlined the cost reduction that’s possible with VoIP, but there are some other benefits as well. They include:

  • Easier to Manage: If anything else, switching to VoIP eliminates a vendor that you have to manage. More than that though, VoIP doesn’t need special hardware, it can use the same wiring and switches as your LAN.
  • Unified Communications: Installing a VoIP platform likely means that you are able to unify your organization’s communications platform, giving your staff the option to communicate multiple ways at the click of a button.
  • Functionality: A VoIP platform can integrate with all types of business-management software to provide easy access to the communication capabilities that often make business run better. VoIP also has innovative features like Voicemail-to-email transcription, interactive voice recognition, and integrated chat.
  • Scalability: When you need another user, it’s as simple as adding a line to your VoIP plan.

VoIP makes a lot of sense for the growing business and the established enterprise, alike. If you would like more information, contact our professional consultants today at PHONENUMBER.

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Casserly Consulting Blog

VoIP Delivers Benefits That a Traditional Phone System Can’t

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Communication is a critical part of your business’ operations, but how can you ensure that you’re not holding your business back by failing to consider modern solutions to age-old problems? While your telephone system likely gets the job done, you shouldn’t let complacency keep you from striving for improvement. For telephony solutions, you can consider leaving behind your service provider and investing in a digital solution called Voice over Internet Protocol, or VoIP.

Traditional telephone solutions rely on telephone lines being installed throughout your office. If you are privy to the finer details of this particular process, you know that it can take quite a while to fine-tune your infrastructure to best suit your organization’s needs. Depending on the number of users, each handset needs to be hooked up to your organization’s phone infrastructure. This makes adding new users quite a pain, as you may need to move your office around in order to accommodate such growth. Furthermore, you may find that you don’t use all of the services provided by your telephone service provider. Many providers bundle together services, like television or Internet, without giving users the option to section off exactly what type of service they want. This means that you’re ultimately paying for services that you don’t want or need, which is a considerable waste of resources on your part.

Thankfully, VoIP improves the communications conversation. VoIP allows your organization to take advantage of more flexible telephony solutions by using your Internet connection to transmit and receive calls. It works in much the same way as your traditional phone solution, but with less reliance on your physical infrastructure itself. While you can acquire physical handsets for your employees’ desks, the main draw of VoIP comes from the fact that you can use the application in any way you see fit, whether it’s on your smartphone or your desktop.

Imagine being able to take your workplace phone number on the go so that you won’t miss a thing; or being able to dodge extra costs for long-distance calls. Imagine ditching the expensive services that you’re forced to pay for, like cable television, when all you use is your Internet and phone. By implementing VoIP, you’re eliminating unnecessary expenses that would otherwise place restrictions on your ability to effectively communicate and afford the comprehensive solution your business inevitably needs. With COMPANYNAMEs VoIP solution it’s easy to add user accounts, and since you’re using your Internet connection instead of telephone wires, you’re saving quite a lot of money that could be better utilized if spent elsewhere.

Of course, you still have to be wary of your bandwidth, as you’ll be putting additional strain on your business’ Internet connection in order to use VoIP, but this is only a minor hurdle that a managed IT provider like COMPANYNAME can help you work through. To learn more about VoIP, call us today at PHONENUMBER.

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Casserly Consulting Blog

For Better Business Communications, Choose VoIP

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VoIP, or Voice over Internet Protocol, has become the only practical choice for a forward-focused business’ telephony needs. Any one of those who have adopted it could share a reason that they leverage it. But what is VoIP, really? How does it work, and why is it so popular among businesses? Read on to find out.

To understand VoIP, it may help to understand how the traditional telephone operates. When someone speaks into the receiver, the vibrations from the sound energy hit a part of the phone called the diaphragm and are converted to electrical energy. This energy is transferred through the phone lines to its destination: the recipient’s telephone handset. Once the energy is there, it is reverted to sound, and the first person’s voice can be heard.

VoIP works in a similar way, albeit more advanced. There are actually multiple methods to using VoIP, but we’ll focus on using VoIP through an IP phone.

Just as with the traditional telephone, the process begins when someone speaks into a receiver. However, instead of being converted into electrical energy, the sound of your voice is compressed and compiled into digital packets, which are then sent to the recipient via the Internet. By sending it over the Internet in this way, there is no longer a need to pay the phone company additional funds, lending VoIP its first benefit of cost savings through consolidation.

VoIP phones also allow you a better means of control over your telephony as a whole. With a plethora of features included that would only be available from a phone service provider for a premium price, you have considerable management capabilities. From voicemail to contact lists to conference calling to so much more, the right VoIP solution can lend you advanced business communicative abilities without the advanced prices.

Clearly, there are cost savings to be enjoyed through a VoIP system, but the benefits don’t stop there. Reach out to us at PHONENUMBER to learn about some other ways that VoIP can augment your business operations.

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Casserly Consulting Blog

Cost Savings Are Just The Start of VoIP’s Benefits

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Business owners and managers are always looking to save a buck. Since the cost of doing business continues to climb, looking to the cloud for their business-critical applications is one way to spread computing costs out over time. The cloud offers several solutions to help the modern business keep their costs down, and nowhere can these costs be mitigated more than with a business’ communications.

Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP), specifically hosted VoIP, can help you reduce your communications costs in many ways, including:

Hardware Costs
A hosted VoIP solution makes it possible to get a powerful business phone system without having to go through the headaches and expense associated with installing new phone lines. Anyone who has ever run telephone wire from a distribution hub through the walls of a building knows that, in certain cases, it’s an arduous job. By hooking directly into your company’s broadband network, you can easily add and remove VoIP users on demand.

Additionally, deploying a hosted VoIP system removes the need for PBX hardware altogether. As the major expense in any traditional business telephone system, a PBX system can have huge costs, even thousands of dollars, per user. Even for a smaller PBX roll out, you are looking at a substantial capital investment that is transformed immediately into an operational expense once you choose to introduce a hosted VoIP solution.

Fee Structures
The largest expense for any telephone system is the minutes the phone is being used. Every traditional phone bill will feature costs for long distance calling, which the way it is set up most of the time, are calls that can often be local. Getting rid of this recurring expense is one of the most effective ways hosted VoIP is able to present any business with cost savings.

Broadband Internet is relatively inexpensive, basically mandatory, and available through multiple regional carriers, allowing your organization to buy the resources you need, again, as operational expense, not capital outlays. Moreover, the VoIP service rates are very competitive with the rates that you’d pay if utilizing a traditional phone system, without the need for constant management and maintenance of the system as a whole. A VoIP subscription is typically paid per user, which also provides efficient scalability and organizational flexibility in regards to your telephone system.

Mobility
Another way VoIP helps the modern business stretch its dollar is by adding a mobile aspect to their phone system. Many VoIP systems have mobile applications available through the Android or Apple App Stores. This provides organizations the mobile flexibility they need from their business phone system without paying a pretty penny for individual phones and service plans. Since these applications can be run over Wi-Fi, or through the organization’s virtual private network (VPN), it can save plenty of financial resources normally spent on the deployment of a typical mobile strategy.

VoIP provides all of the most important options that traditional phone systems provide, while adding mobility, and removing the enormous upfront capital costs, long distance fees, and operational maintenance that traditional business telephone systems bring. If your business is looking to cut costs, considering a VoIP system is a good place to start. For more information about VoIP or for to learn more on how to leverage other enterprise communications systems for your business, call the IT professionals at COMPANYNAME today at PHONENUMBER.

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Casserly Consulting Blog

3 Reasons VoIP Is An Improvement Over Traditional Telephony

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Do you still rely on a traditional telephone system to keep in touch with clients and internal departments? This can be a severe issue for your operational budget. While your employees might be accustomed to having the physical phone on their desks, virtual phones are becoming a major contender to replace them for all different types of businesses.

Voice Over Internet Protocol, also known as VoIP, has a surprising amount of benefits over its traditional contemporary. Here are some of the best features of VoIP that make it a dynamic and flexible choice for your organization.

Flexibility
Have you ever had to step away from your desk while you’re on the phone? With the static lines tied to the corded phones of old, this was an impossibility. Even if it is a cordless phone, chances are that it’s limited to a certain range, even within your office. VoIP can completely change the way you look at a telephone solution.

VoIP has options that lets your employees take their duties on the road, allowing them to communicate with any connected device. You can use VoIP applications on a laptop, smartphone, or even a desktop. All you need is the right software installed. Your employees can take their conversations on the road, be it for a business trip, a walk down the street, or burning the midnight oil at the home office to meet an important deadline.

Functionality
Knowing what your phone system can do is incredibly important. Sometimes your phone system will come with various other services like your Internet or television packaged together. When this happens, service providers tend to nickel-and-dime you for everything they can get for simple conferencing solutions. Depending on what your services come attached to, you may need additional features that aren’t already included.

VoIP allows your organization to spend fewer resources on services that you may not want or need, and free up more funds to spend on what you absolutely need. For example, you can get all of the services that you want and need with VoIP, including call forwarding and conference calling, but without going all-in on a service that forces you to pay for television or other services. This helps your business be more productive and lucrative without dropping more than necessary on unused services.

Cost
Your traditional telephone system will wind up costing you more in the long run thanks to its plethora of services and features that don’t do anything for your bottom line. Since these companies require various services to be purchased in a bundle, they cause more trouble than they are worth–particularly in regard to long-distance charges. It might seem like you’re getting a great, varied service, but you’re just spending money on things that you don’t need.

Unlike traditional telephone systems, VoIP lets your organization benefit from significant cost savings. Since you’re only using your business’ Internet connection, you’ll spend less on implementation fees and running wires around your office. All you need to think about is your bandwidth, but that’s easy enough to figure out compared to all of the headaches that come from a traditional telephone service. We can help you work out a plan where you get all of the services that you want, all budgeted into a monthly payment that works for your specific needs.

Does your business need a new communications solution? COMPANYNAME can help. Your organization can take full advantage of VoIP to augment communications and change the way you do business. To learn more, reach out to us at PHONENUMBER.

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Technology

What’s Behind so Many Businesses Switching Their Phone Systems to VoIP?

b2ap3_thumbnail_voip_is_great_400.jpg The office telephone has been a staple in the business environment for generations, but the extent that each organization uses their telephone will vary. Factors like the number of users, telephone handsets, and wiring required will influence how much use you get from your telephone solution. However, these questions don’t have to be as difficult to ask if you consider the many benefits of a hosted phone system.

We’ll discuss some of the best reasons for using a Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP), and what it can offer your business.

Fewer Costs
A traditional telephone system is provided by your local telephone company. Sometimes these agreements include services that aren’t needed by your organization, like television or otherwise. This can be frustrating, as all you want is the ability to use a telephone, and instead you’re forced to go all-in on some entertainment package that you won’t use.

VoIP doesn’t demand that you sign up for any extra services. In fact, you actually wind up saving money thanks to VoIP using another service that you’re already paying for–your Internet connection. With VoIP, your voice is transferred over the Internet rather than through the traditional telephone lines. Just keep your bandwidth in mind, as VoIP will likely use up more resources than your other network-connected services.

A Simplified Infrastructure
There’s a reason why you take so much time to plan your cabling infrastructure before implementation, and that’s because it’s not easy to make changes once you’ve set your network up. Of course, this also requires that you anticipate growth, which isn’t always easy. For all you know, your business can grow substantially over your first few years in business. How can you anticipate such growth?

While VoIP can’t predict the future, it can help you adapt to change with one-time setup costs. You won’t have to tear down walls or run new telephone lines just to accommodate new employees. All you have to do is contact your VoIP provider and add new users to your system.

More Flexibility
How many phone numbers do you have? Chances are that, as a business owner, you have your personal cell phone number, as well as your in-house number for company affairs. You wouldn’t be the first professional to think that it would be extremely convenient to have all of your numbers on one single device. Thankfully, VoIP offers a solution for this dilemma, too.

With VoIP, you and your employees have a great way to access your work-related phone numbers and contacts. Since VoIP can be used on desktops, smartphones, and even the traditional telephone handsets, it’s a customizable experience that lets you use your phone solution in the way you prefer. Plus, the extra accessibility allows your employees to be productive off the clock too, which can be great for getting ahead.

No matter how you look at it, VoIP can be a valuable investment for your organization. To get started, reach out to us at PHONENUMBER.

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Technology

The Case for Hosting Your Phone Solution In-House

b2ap3_thumbnail_on_premise_phone_system_400.jpg Traditional communications solutions are all well and good, but they’re quickly growing antiquated and outdated with the inception of more dynamic solutions. Some organizations have found that cloud-hosted VoIP has advantages over an on-premise telephone solution. While there’s a certain degree of truth to this, an on-site system still presents value.

When you host your own VoIP solution, the biggest difference to consider is the fact that you’ll be managing your own hardware. An in-house system is stored in the server room or another dedicated part of your infrastructure. Alternatively, when you use cloud VoIP, the system is stored off-site, hosted and maintained by an outsourced provider.

Keep in mind that when we talk about on-site VoIP systems, we’re not referring to the traditional landline telephone system that many organizations still use. Rather, we’re talking about a virtual phone system that uses your Internet connection rather than a landline cable infrastructure to send and receive calls. Though VoIP is a service that can easily be outsourced to a third-party provider, it’s possible for you to host an in-house system on a dedicated server… assuming you have the staff to properly manage and maintain it.

Regardless, there are still some benefits to consider regarding on-site VoIP hosting rather than going through a cloud provider. Here are a couple of them.

  • Control: In comparison to a hosted solution, your business has greater control over an in-house phone system. You can easily add new users and phone numbers rather than going through support to do so. This also means that you’re in a greater position of responsibility, so it’s important that you have the staff on-site and ready to maintain your system, should you choose to go this route.
  • Use your existing infrastructure: Consider for a moment how much effort went into building your current infrastructure. You already have a network, servers, and other important hardware hooked up to it. What’s a little more in the form of your in-house VoIP system? If you wanted to add VoIP to a cloud infrastructure, you have to go through the hoops of configuration and setup, which is something that you may not have control over with a hosted solution.

If your organization is considering revamping its communications infrastructure, look no further than COMPANYNAME. We can help your business get the most return on investment from your phone solution. To learn more, reach out to us at PHONENUMBER.