Phone Systems that Move Ahead of the Curve

How Phone Systems, VoiP & Internet impact real business

Tuesday, July 31, 2007

Business VoIP Solution: How to choose wisely

Every year there are going to be more providers offering Business VoIP solutions and like any booming industry you're going to have many companies in it to make money off the boom. Companies that see VoIP as a buzz word that generates revenue rather than a technology that must be perfected at all costs. The problem is how do you know which company is perfecting their business VoIP solution and which company is just trying to ride a wave? There's a few clear cut factors I will discuss here briefly that should help you spot important tells in the world of business VoIP.

The first tell, which is a major tell, is the software they use to power their feature sets. A business VoIP service provider can go down one of 2 roads. They can buy a pre-packaged software that limits them to those feature sets or they can custom develop their own software package that is infinitely adjustable. If a business VoIP provider uses pre-packaged software chances are it's going to be either Broadsoft or Sylantro. You should ask your business VoIP provider what software they use to power their feature sets, and if they say broadsoft or sylantro, it's a clear sign that they have purchased a pre-packaged solution designed to bring them to the market as quickly as possible. The problem is with a pre-packaged solution you the customer are at the mercy of NOT your business VoIP service provider, but really you're at the mercy of Sylantro or Broadsoft. In essence the Business VoIP service provider is simply "reselling" Sylantro or Broadsoft with no control or power to really make changes to the system. Think about it this way, would Google ever dream of buying software that powers search, or do they want to perfect search by constantly developing their own? The answer is clear!

A business VoIP solution that has it's own custom software developed for the purpose of long-term perfection is going to be a company who has inifinte control over every aspect of the VoIP system. When you deal with a business VoIP provider who is developing their own software you are dealing with the actual source, not a reseller of some pre-packaged stuff designed to allow companies to jump into the VoIP boom as quickly as possible and start billing people. This means support will be better, knowledge over the system will be better, and future features and customizations will be infinitely possible. Aside from these obvious benefits of dealing with a Business VoIP provider that is a master of its own product, there is a clear tell that a company who has the staying power to develop their switch from scratch, as opposed to buying a pre-packaged and re-sold solution from a bigger company, is in it for the long-term and the ultimate perfection of business VoIP systems. Which kind of company would you rather have your phone service with?

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