Over the last few years there has been a big change in the way telephone technology has evolved and helped to shape how businesses operate both externally towards their clients and internally with employees. Perhaps the biggest of these changes is with the business telephone system and set up.
The ‘traditional’ way of doing things is to have a phone system on your premises. This equipment connects all your phone extensions, and links them to the public phone network, often using PSTN or ISDN telephone lines. These systems stay in service for 8 or more years. And whilst for most part they are solid and reliable, when things do go wrong (as they inevitably do) and the system needs repairing or updating, it can become very costly.
And then came Cloud
A Cloud-based telephone system, often called a hosted phone system, uses Voice over IP (VoIP) technology to connect all your extensions to each other over the internet and the public phone network. With a cloud-based telephone system you would still buy the telephone, setup and training, but instead of purchasing the telephone system processor, you simply pay a monthly rental for ports on the offsite telephone system. Your office telephones would then connect via the Internet using VoIP to the telephone system that is offsite.
A Cloud Phone system gives you everything a traditional phone system does without the ‘huge’ investment in telephone equipment. In fact, the entire Cloud-based telephone system is operated and maintained by your Voice-over-IP (VoIP) service provider.
Cloud also offers your business much more in terms of flexibility and added features. Cloud allows you to integrate your business mobiles with your fixed lines and your callers will only need to dial one number to reach your desk phone and mobile phone simultaneously, with a shared voicemail box for both. It can be used on any device, be it a smartphone, laptop, or desktop, making it much more flexible than a traditional landline. You can easily direct and redirect calls using your work telephone number. This means that if you are out of the office or working from home your customers will never know. A Cloud phone is the perfect technology if you have remote workers or employees who travel frequently.
The only requirement for a Cloud phone system is a good Internet connection. This will need to be stable and with high broadband speed otherwise any VoIP related communication tool will fall very short of the mark and will be unable to work effectively.
Cloud phone systems typically offer advanced security and telephony features such as: extension dialling, auto attendants, and conference bridges.
The benefits of a Cloud Phone System
- The up-front costs for small businesses offer vast savings over traditional PBX systems.
- Easy set up – Just plug your VoIP phones into the Internet and you are up and running straight away.
- You can log into a VoIP network from anywhere as long as you have an internet connection.
- Integrate IT with your email clients and CRM.
- Lines can be added or removed easily giving you infinite flexibility.
- Auto attendant – Allows callers to interact with a menu to choose an appropriate extension. Your business will suddenly seem more professional and impressive. It’s like having an electronic receptionist!
- Keep the same phone number – We can port your number to your VoIP services, allowing you to get your calls routed to anywhere you have an Internet connection.
To find out more about how Cloud business telephone systems could help you save money and improve customer communication, contact us today on 0800 505 3350. Alternatively visit our Cloud Phone Systems page where you can read all about our Hosted Cloud Phone systems that provide an extensive range of fixed and mobile telephony capabilities to suit your business.
