Use Your Savings to Pay For New Technology

These days, it’s a brand new way of communicating; encompassed around promises of lower costs, free long distance and the axioms of: “Talk AnyWhere,  AnyTime and AnyHow”.  

VoIP, better known as 'Voice over Internet Protocol' is quickly becoming the de-facto new telephone system technology for businesses.  But why?

It all has to do with the bottom line.  Every company wants profit, it is what gets CEO’s moving in the morning and keeps them at work till every employee is producing and selling the company’s  widgets with the vigor that keeps that CEO happy.  But, behind every great CEO shouting the message to Sell! Sell! Sell!, is an accountant or CFO with the constant reminder of Costs! Costs! and more Costs, “find a way to reduce your costs or those costs will find a way to reduce your profits” .     

So let’s answer the two burning questions, a) what is this VoIP and b) how can it help companies reduce their communication costs.

A couple years back, a few smart people came up with the idea for everyone to use a computer to access corporate information and communicate with each other via text rather than talking every time. This idea brought forth what is now known as the “Network”, a web of wires, switches and routers interconnecting all the PC’s and servers together.  

An ever evolving myriad of applications and services are growing at an exponential rate; all designed to provide easier and more efficient ways for everyone to communicate; after all, whether it is an email, an invoice, a purchase order or even an article for a newsletter, the primary goal of these networks is to communicate.  

This data is being transmitted across these networks using an Internet Protocol known as TCP/IP, or IP for short, which is a set of rules that allow different systems to speak to each other and ensure that the data is transferred securely and intact.

Most corporations have been implementing, until recently, two separate cabling infrastructures within their offices; one for data and the other for voice.  Traditional telephone systems require a separate cable, separate communication equipment and a separate set of administrative skills to manage the system and a completely different set of skills to implement it.  Corporations looked at bottom line costs and started to question if they could put in just one system, one cable, have one management skillset, and a single implementation….. VoIP addresses this need.  By digitizing voice traffic, across a company’s existing Ethernet data network the following advantages are available.

Offices connected by a wide-area-network (WAN) can enjoy the benefits of using a single telephone system, including extension dialing, seamless call transfers, free site-to-site long distance calling, a single receptionist, auto-attendant and voicemail system, etc.

• Enhanced collaboration with employees at different locations feeling like they are part of the same organization.
• Presence; allows users to see if another user, at the same or different location, is on the phone, in a meeting or away from their desk before they make the call.
• For network administrators, VoIP means they only have one network to maintain instead of two. There is still separate phone system hardware to maintain – but only one network.
• The Move, Add, Change (MAC) process also is greatly simplified, as VoIP systems are configurable through a web interface that can be managed by the in-house administrator.
• Enhanced office anywhere functionality allows for users working from home to use the at home phone line and appear as they were at their desk.
• Softphone, answer, manage your calls from your computer, get rid of the hand set on the desk and reduce costs.
• Voicemail to email, VoIP enables the PC to become the center of the communication system.

Ahead of all of the potential savings from the various advantages combined, the biggest advantage for a VoIP system comes from the savings to be derived from one of the largest variable cost centers in companies today….the cell phone.  This indispensible little device has revolutionized the way we work and communicate with others.  It is virtually impossible to find someone without one of these mini computers attached to their belt. We can talk, email, text, join video conferences, even use presence. There is simply no excuse anymore to be out of touch.

But, it comes at a big cost in comparison to traditional phone lines. It is not uncommon for individuals to receive bills as high as $500 per month, multiply that across an entire mobile sales force and it is enough to make every CFO cringe. There seems to be no way to budget for this expense as every month users are billed for the outbound and inbound minutes they use, inclusive of any exorbitant long distance charges incurred.

VoIP offers an excellent solution to combat these fluctuating monthly costs. It enables corporations to turn cell plans into a fixed costs at a much lower monthly rate with enough savings to pay for a new VoIP telephone system many times over.

The way VoIP accomplishes this is it will take every outbound call from the cell phone and turn it into an inbound call to the cell, utilizing the company’s core trunk lines to complete the call. This ability, not only allows the user to give the appearance that they are calling from a corporate number with complete logging and tracking of the call but also allows them to take advantage of fixed rate inbound plans from the cell phone carriers which can be as low as $15 / month.