The VoIP Communication Triumvirate: Planning Ahead for a Positive VoIP Experience

Reliable, consistent, high quality VoIP business communication is the result of teaming three key elements in your business:  your system network, your phone service and your phone system.  Each of these three components takes part to ensure you have maximum uptime for your telephone communication, all calls to your business get through, and the quality of voice to and from your location is pristine. 

We begin a series of articles that will highlight each of these components to give you a better understanding of the importance each plays as a member of the VoIP communication triumvirate. Maybe you have already considered or implemented these suggestions, or maybe you are just starting to think about changing or upgrading to VoIP. Whatever the case, our series will provide pertinent information to consider regularly as you continue to improve your existing business communications.

Part One: Your Phone System Network

Our first article will review what business owners can do to ensure an ideal network for VoIP. As the backbone of your phone system, and most likely your entire business operations, there are steps you can take to ensure that your network is healthy and operating at maximum capacity.

1.  Enlist the help of a networking expert. That’s right – an actual expert. Don’t hire your Uncle Bill who may have dabbled in cabling or your 18-year-old niece who is a whiz with computers. Talk with your colleagues and business contacts, and do a little research to locate a reputable, dependable networking professional. Larger companies may hire such a professional to their staff or keep them on retainer, where smaller businesses may consider hiring them on a project basis. Develop a positive working relationship with this expert, and have them help you assess your network on an ongoing basis to identify areas of improvement.

2.  Create a model server room. Your server “room” may be a renovated closet or a larger space up-fitted to your specifications. Whatever space you allot, take the time to make it ideal. Make sure the space is temperature-regulated. Servers run best in a constant cool temperature with no moisture. Place servers on a table or shelving unit, or in a server cabinet or equipment rack, adequate to support the weight of the servers and networking equipment and to provide access to both from the front and back. Do NOT set your server on the floor and set other appliances, books or items atop it.  Dust and sweep the space regularly. Excess dust can clog server fans, causing them to overheat. Finally, make sure each server is connected to a commercial strength UPS battery back-up.

3.  Make cabling “home run” to the server/equipment room. Evaluate your network cabling. Within the server room, your cabling should be neatly organized and easily accessible. Make sure that all equipment and cabling is properly labeled. Doing so now will make it easier to troubleshoot future support issues, whereas a messy and chaotic cabling job will lengthen the resolution of support issues. From the various locations in your office, cabling should be “home run” to the location of your network equipment. Make sure cabling is neatly run to all switches, your phone server and any routers. Cabling should be tested and patch cords should be factory made to ensure an optimum cabling configuration.

4.  Understand your network traffic. Both volume and quality of bandwidth directly affect VoIP. Ask your networking expert to explain which traffic is local to the LAN and which must travel over your Internet connection. Also, log what applications are on your network, such as Microsoft Office or your accounting software, as well as any critical virus or spam protection software. With this knowledge, examine your business functions and needs, as well as those of individual users, throughout the day.  

For example, are you primarily sending standard business e-mail? Do you copy very large documents and image files around the network? Do you need to transfer large documents outside your network that must go across your Internet connection?

Use this information to work with your networking resource to better understand your network traffic, select adequate bandwidth and reduce the possibility for latency, packet loss and jitter.

5.  Use high-end PoE switches. With a VoIP phone system, phones should not be powered by a power strip under your desk. Instead, they should be powered centrally from the server room. As such, high-end Power over Ethernet (PoE) switches, backed up by a UPS battery, are required. These switches should also be designed for Quality of Service (Qos), which, as it pertains to voice, is a measure of the reliability, consistency and overall perceived audio quality of a call. Attempting to daisy-chain smaller, economy-priced switches from the server room will result in poor call quality.

By following these VoIP rules of thumb, you have a better chance of setting up your VoIP network right the first time – once and done. You will also build a stronger foundation from which you, with the assistance of the networking professional you choose, can maintain a stable and secure VoIP network in the future. Having an expert to help you plan, implement and maintain your VoIP network will provide peace of mind and ease of daily operations.

Part Two: Your Phone Service

We continue our exploration of the communication triumvirate this month by exploring phone service—taking a holistic view of phone service and your phone system so you can increase the efficiency and functionality of your communication services and reduce the cost of running your business.

VoIP Changes the Landscape

The movement away from traditional phone service toward Voice over IP has meant that the local network and Internet connection, which previously had little to do with phone traffic and voice quality, now take on a major role in ensuring consistently clear communication for your business. Additionally, phone service providers are no longer the primary source in delivering telephony features to the end user; VoIP phone systems themselves now offer much of that functionality. This shift is accompanied by a change in cost structure.

Before the advent of VoIP phone systems, businesses depended on the phone company to augment their systems with capabilities. Phone service providers have developed a host of functions over the years including caller ID, call blocking, call waiting and hosted voice mail. Each of these components incurs add-on fees to your monthly phone service expenditure. Today, quality VoIP systems have changed the landscape offering those functions (and more) as built-in features so businesses need not be “nickel-and-dimed” with monthly phone service fees ad infinitum.

Customized Phone Numbers Broaden Your Company Footprint

VoIP implementation opens up a nation (literally) of possibilities in giving your business greater penetration in markets all over the country. Businesses have the ability to purchase phone numbers cheaply, for pennies a month, in markets where they make or receive many calls. This capability boosts operations efficiency, customer service and c all tracking. It allows businesses to save the cost of 800 numbers and exhibit a local presence in their key markets. Correspondingly, customers may feel more comfortable dialing a local number for their vendor’s products and services. Whether a business purchases phone numbers to give the appearance of existing in local markets or actually has physically remote offices, VoIP technology can tie these entities together to ensure a consistent customer interface, seamless backup between locations and efficient management and tracking of the entire call flow process.

Security is Fundamental

As your phone system now interrelates to the Internet, a firewall is critical to ensuring security for the voice assets in your business. VoIP is another application on your network, and a well thought out plan for your overall network security should cover VoIP also. Many security measures that are appropriate for traditional phone systems apply to VoIP, such as using strong voice mail passwords, restricting privileges on extensions that are in common areas, and training users on phone call “phishing” scams.  Read more about ensuring a healthy network in our previous Sound Bytes issue posted on our website at:  Part One: Your Phone System Network.

Assessing Your Bandwidth Requirements

Making the shift to VoIP provides a great opportunity to get in touch with your true phone system requirements. To determine the appropriate bandwidth your business requires, it is useful to have a good understanding of your current call volumes and breakdowns of local, long-distance, incoming, outgoing, domestic and international calls. You will need to determine whether devices that require analog phone service such as modems, fax machines, credit card machines, security alarms, elevator phones and door access devices can be migrated to VoIP. These devices should be identified ahead of implementation so they are addressed in your conversion plan.

Whether your business supports two phone lines or two hundred, having the right configuration ensures that your customers are not met with busy signals, conference calls take place as needed, and remote users are seamlessly integrated with your phone system.

Alternate Access consults with our customers to help them determine bandwidth requirements and the phone service (and phone system) features that best fit the business. Our comprehensive understanding of phone service offerings can help avoid common pitfalls that businesses face and often find room for cost-savings. The phone service contract is a prime example.

Beware of Contract Pitfalls

Many companies don’t realize that a transition to VoIP can be done in phases. For customers who are locked in to long-term contracts with phone service providers that preclude using VoIP for external communications, there is still an opportunity to implement VoIP internally and save on wiring cost in your implementation. VoIP enables more efficient use of your infrastructure because you no longer need two separate networks for voice and data – making it easier to manage too.

In addition, various options abound for how local, long distance and toll free calls are billed, and often businesses do not take the time to determine whether a measured rate (based on duration and distance) is better or worse than a message rate (based on volume) or a flat rate for their business. The answer is, “it depends.” In fact, we frequently talk to companies that renew their phone system contracts as a matter of course, without reviewing the charges, and end up continuing to pay their old rates, which are substantially higher than current ones. So if you are jumping at a short-term deal from your phone service provider and not conducting due diligence on your contract, you may be shortchanging yourself for the long run.

Here are a few examples of how Alternate Access can achieve cost savings for customers:

Example #1: We have a longtime customer who we installed nearly 10 years ago with an analog system. Over the years they have used the same phone service vendor and each time their contract comes up for renewal, they automatically sign it and keep moving along. Recently we conducted a phone service audit for them and were able to realize a 4-fold reduction in their expenditure. Their phone service savings means they will have a payback period of 5 months with their upgraded VoIP system that provides all the functionality they are accustomed to and more.

Example #2: We recently worked with a client who spends $1133 on a month to month contract with his phone service provider. By implementing a new, VoIP phone system with full functionality from Alternate Access, we can save him $300 a month, including BOTH the cost of the phone system and phone service, and the company will have faster Internet service to boot!

Example #3: Unfortunately, one prospect signed a 3-year phone service contract before coming to Alternate Access. He got locked in to a $1500 monthly phone bill. Had he come to us before signing his contract, we could have shown him a way to cover his phone service and the cost of a new phone system for just $850 per month.

Each of these customers fell victim to the way that Local Exchange Carriers to do business. Their prices are typically rigid and high, making any reduction in services or termination of a contract costly or impossible.

What these customers lacked was not only the knowledge and discipline to decipher their contracts, but more importantly the insight to take a holistic view of their communication costs. We can help companies understand how implementation of a VoIP phone system and selection of the appropriate phone service vendor and contract options can increase functionality while potentially lowering ongoing communication expenditures.

Taking a Holistic Approach

Most phone system sellers know phone systems. Phone service vendors know their phone service. But, the relationship between your phone system and phone service is integrally related. Alternate Access knows phone systems AND phone service. We take a holistic view of your telephone communications to help customers select the right service and avoid contractual pitfalls that lock them in to long-term costly plans.

As an Alternate Access customer, it behooves you to speak with us prior to your current service contract expiration—90 to 120 days prior, in fact. That way we can walk you through your phone service considerations and review your contract options in the context of your phone equipment. We can help you weigh short-term gimmicks that appear to lower your price but have long-term consequences, and help you get the best service for the dollars you spend. It is not unusual for customers to save 30% to 50% off their recurring phone charges once they implement recommendations from Alternate Access.

Part Three: Your Phone System

We complete this series by exploring your phone system. Whether you have an older system that needs an upgrade or just purchased a new system, there are steps you can take at each stage of the life of your phone system to ensure the highest return on your investment.

Get the Most Benefit Out of your Phone System

Your phones system is a strategic asset for your business. Make that asset work for you by following two requirements:

                  1) Set up the system to take advantage of its capabilities.

                  2) Use the capabilities of the system. 

There are several steps you can take to ensure that your system is set up to optimally use all capabilities. At the outset each user should properly record a professional greeting and voice title. Also, it is best to set a company standard for passwords and require all users to set their unique passwords based on the standard. Finally, when you purchased your system, Alternate Access set up an auto attendant, work groups and call routing paths for you to ensure calls land where needed. If your needs change over time, be sure to update your routing structure (Alternate Access can help you or do this for you) so that it is most efficient for your business needs.

In order to ensure that you and your staff are using the full capabilities of the system, take advantage of the many resources that can further your knowledge about your system. Alternate Access offers training courses for the phone and graphical user interfaces of its phone system products. If your team is rusty or you have new employees coming on board, a refresher course may be what is needed.

Make sure to read the monthly tips in each issue of the Sound Bytes e-newsletter. These tips will help you learn how to use your VoIP phone system to enhance customer service, increase employee productivity and reduce operational costs. Also, make sure you take advantage of any additional knowledge resources your phone system offers, such as “Tip of the Day” features or online help components. Encourage your staff to share their knowledge with each other. The more you use features of your phone system, the better it will serve your specific business needs.

If you are on a support contract, Alternate Access offers one hour of free “how-to” phone support each month. Take advantage of this perk to ask questions that can help take your phone system usage to the next level.

And there is no harm in thinking outside of the box. Check with Alternate Access if you think you need a function but can’t figure out how to implement it. If the system has the capability, we can make it happen for you.

Finally, listen to your staff and customers. Sometimes it is the silence that tells us what we need to know. If callers are getting through to the right person efficiently; if your staff returns calls on a timely basis; if your sales people are making or taking the requisite number of calls—then you can be assured that your communication asset is working for you.

Assessing Older Systems for Life Expectancy

Customers with systems over 3 years old should evaluate their phone system to determine how soon a complete system upgrade is required. Most systems over 3 years old are comprised of Industrial Computers and Dialogic Telephony Boards, which are out of warranty. In the event of a catastrophe, customers with these components may face costly repairs and the potential of extended downtime, as replacement parts are often difficult to find.

If your system is more than 3 years old, have a discussion with an Alternate Access representative to determine when an upgrade is needed. Alternate Access has options for upgrading your existing system or even migrating to a new system.  If you are a TeleVantage customer, contact us right away to learn about immediate upgrade savings in the “Back on Track” program announced in this issue of Sound Bytes.

Of course, if you are facing an upgrade, you will want to choose a system and supporting hardware that meets your business needs today and provides room for future growth. As an existing customer, Alternate Access knows your business needs, and our staff will help you select the best phone system to reach an optimal return on your business investment – whether you are a small operation in a home office, a multi-site business requiring interconnectivity, or a bustling call center with 100 agents.

Realizing How VoIP Enhances Your Total Business

Customers with newer IP phone systems are already realizing the benefits of their strategic investment. VoIP phone systems in general offer a breadth of functionality that traditional phone systems do not. Features that cost extra on traditional systems, such as unified messaging, are integrated into VoIP systems – providing users increased functionality at a fraction of the cost.

VoIP customers also experience greater flexibility in how they access their phone system. Whether working from your company’s headquarters, your home office, a laptop softphone, or a cell or other phone while traveling, VoIP gives you access to your system’s functionality wherever you are located.

Your VoIP phone system impacts all areas of your business – from the receptionist to the sales team to the most top-level executive. So, no matter the age of your system, follow the recommendations in this article to make sure you are getting the biggest bang for your buck across the board.