4.17 million people in the United Kingdom have switched from their outdated landline telephony services to a hosted VoIP service. With the ability to reduce communications costs, improve reliability, and link your mobile phone into your hosted VoIP phone systems, as detailed by Enterprise Networking Planet, voice over IP services have proven to be extremely beneficial, both to the private citizen looking to get better service at lower costs and the business owner looking to bring their company into the future.
As with the industries surrounding any other great technology, the VoIP industry is saturated, both with high quality hosted VoIP services and cheap imitators looking to make a quick quid off of their low end services. If you aren’t sure how to choose a hosted VoIP service that fits the former category, while entirely avoiding the latter, keep these three things in mind on your search.
Three Things to Consider when Choosing a Hosted VoIP Service
- Choose Hosted VoIP Solutions with the Right Specialty
- Know the Features You Need, and Find the Company That Offers Them
- Look for a Service with Redundancy Systems
As About.com writes, not every VoIP provider works with the same clientele. Some focus on providing VoIP services to residential clients and small business owners, with others working almost exclusively with enterprise-level businesses. If you want to find a service that knows exactly what you need, choose one that has experience working with other clients like you.
Tech Republic, a popular online technology community, writes that VoIP services can offer a number of added technologies on top of their IP based communications. Easy call screening, simplified conference calling, unified communications: these are just a few of the most common services offered. When choosing a VoIP provider, you should know exactly which of the added services you want to bring to your company. From there, you can narrow down your search by focusing on those companies you know have exactly what you need.
One of the biggest worries among businesses thinking of making the switch to VoIP services is, “well, what if the internet goes down?” It’s not exactly an irrational worry. That’s why Inc. recommends looking for a hosted VoIP service with redundancy systems. That way, if your main server goes down or internet service cuts out temporarily, you can switch over to a back up, ensuring you can keep the lines of communication open with your business partners and customers.
Are you a tech professional working in the VoIP industry? What tips would you give business and residential clients looking for the best services? Share your advice with us in the comments below. Find more.
