The communication needs of companies have varied over the years. In the 90s, business communications depended on advertising in traditional media and the telephone was used to communicate with suppliers. Although, for a large company it was relatively easy to carry out a large telephone marketing campaign to improve sales or have the necessary infrastructure to serve customers almost in a personalized way. Telephone switchboards, both analog and digital, managed to change the rules of business communication.
The technological advances of the last years have supposed an authentic revolution in all the fields of our society. Telecommunications have not been an exception and the y VoIP telephone exchanges have been gaining followers and occupy, by their own merits, their own space in large, medium and small companies, as well as in the pockets of many users, without many of them being conscious.
Discover the advantages of VoIP telephone exchanges, what different types you have in the market and why they can help you turn your SME into a strong competitor.
The first thing: what is a VoIP PBX?
The most obvious point is always the most necessary. What is VoIP? It's Internet protocol in which we can transmit phone calls from the conventional fixed or mobile network to the Internet and vice versa. This protocol is originally older than the http protocol, which allow access to the web as we know it.
Why do you need a VoIP PBX in your company?
The advantages of having a VoIP PBX instead of a traditional switchboard for a SME are many, and have exceeded the simple need to call by phone.
- Easy to install: compared to the installation of a traditional switchboard, VoIP telephone switchboards are much simpler to install.
- The system is scalable: in a traditional switcboard, if you need to make an increase of lines you would need to know if you have space in the physical 'switchboard'. If there is not, you must buy a new one and install it, with the added costs that implies. In the case of software-based VoIP PBXs, you simply have to expand the memory of your PBX.
- VoIP calls are cheaper: the savings can reach 90%, especially if you have to make calls outside of Spain.
- Faults easy to repair: faults are much easier to solve because they tend to be software problems. Sometimes, restarting the system is enough.
- Multiplatform: Many of these switchboards are based on software and the cloud, some of them can be installed on mobile devices, which gives a huge freedom of movement to continue using the line to workers.
- Added value: the conventional telephone exchanges hardly have added services - such as the answering machine or a phone book-. The VoIP exchanges not only include answering machine or call waiting customizable, but they can be synchronized with the CRM of the company, the calendar and agenda of Exchange, Google or iCloud, among others.
- Reuse conventional terminals: VoIP PBXs allow conventional digital DECT phones to be reused with just one adapter, in addition to being able to user modern terminals that are in themselves small computers, with all the added value services that we expect.
Types of VoIP exchange: from the most basic to the most advanced
You already know the advantages, which are not few, of the VoIP telephone exchange. Knowing how many alternatives you have available can help you to decant your decision towards one type or another switchboard.
Without going any further, in our mobile devices we already incorporate this VoIP technology. Some instant messaging services such as WhatsApp, Facetime or Telegram are applications that allow you to make voice and video calls over VoIP among your users. Obviously, these solutions are very practical for the home user, but absolutely insufficient for a company. Google Drive, on the other hand, includes VoIP services included in its pachage. Hangouts, for example, allows voice and video calls between users, but does not allow calls to phones.
VoIP solutions that are needed in companies, both large and small, are other and don't pass not only because of the need to receive and make calls to other workers or users of the platform, but to conventional phones. Here services such as Skype come into play, which can be a good temporary solution.
But if you are looking for an advanced, complete service that brings competitiveness and added value to your company, the choice should go through solutions in Cisco or Asterisk VoIP PBXs. Both are powerful solutions, customizable but based on different software systems, which offer very similar features. While Cisco provides a comprehensive solution for companies and works on a closed software platform; Asterisk is a free code system, adaptable to each company and customizable.
The VoIP PBX: the communication of your SME prepared for the future
The VoIP PBX can give you SME the boost it needs to improve communication between your company and your customers and suppliers. It is not only about having the best possible communication, it is about being able to attend to all calls and claims, all the questions without answers and being able to react to eventualities.
The best solutions in VoIP PBX, including the open source siwtchboard Asterisk, are turn your SME into a company capable of competing with the bit and stand out in the sector.
