Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) phone systems offer your business a number of advantages over traditional phone systems. The benefits of VoIP range from greater connectivity and scalability to improved collaboration efforts internally between employees and externally with clients. If you are unsure about upgrading your aging telephone systems, consider the benefits of VoIP listed below. To help demonstrate the benefits of VoIP, we’ll be referring to elements of our Douglas Machine Inc. case study.

Brief Intro to VoIP

VoIP phones offer your employees the same look and feel as your traditional phone system. The phones used in a VoIP system are handsets with cradles and buttons just like other phones, but rather than connecting to the standard phone infrastructure, they connect your calls via Ethernet cables that carry the call over IP data networks.

Douglas Machine Inc. is an employee-owned company that opened its doors in Alexandria, Minnesota in 1964. The company specializes in manufacturing custom, semi-custom and standard packaging equipment. In 2009, the Director of Information Systems at Douglas Machine realized the time had come to upgrade the company’s aging phone system. Marco helped them realize the benefits of VoIP.

Reduce Telecommunications Expenses

Your company is already paying for IP data services from your local Internet provider. Typically, the greatest benefit of VoIP is the cost savings your company will enjoy, allowing you to ditch the monthly fees and maintenance expenses related to a traditional phone system. In the process, you’re company will have more capital available to invest in its core processes in order to remain competitive in your industry.

Easy Adoption

VoIP phone systems are easy to integrate into your company and reduce apprehension about technological upgrades among your employees. At Douglas Machine, the adoption of a new VoIP system was quick and easy. All it took to bring their employees up to speed with VoIP was a two-week transition period that included training.

Greater Feature Sets

There isn’t much a traditional telephone system can do. The greatest upgrades to standard phone systems in recent years have been the addition of caller ID and voicemail. Extensive feature sets are some of the greatest functional benefits of VoIP. Douglas Machine employees identified three major benefits of VoIP feature sets:

• Call History: Employees were accustomed to viewing missed calls, placed calls and received calls on their smartphones, but Douglas Machine’s traditional system lacked those features. Now they could view full call histories on their new VoIP system.
• Availability and Flexibility: The "Do Not Disturb" button allowed employees to block calls when workloads were heavy or meetings were taking place. Additionally, it was easy to place a call on hold and answer a second call.
• Softphones: Softphones allowed employees to login remotely and use the company’s secure network to place calls from their PC. In addition, Douglas Machine’s offsite employees needed access to their company voicemail, but with their previous system they couldn’t access it without being in the office.

Scalability

Last but not least, VoIP phone systems offer incredible scalability. Because VoIP systems connect via Internet Protocol and requires only an Ethernet cable to access the network, there is no need to run new telephone wiring or install new access points at workstations throughout the office. Douglas Machine added roughly 450 Cisco phones initially, 25% of which were Wi-Fi models. Those handsets met the company’s present needs, but allow Douglas Machine to easily upgrade in the future. Your company can add new handsets, remove them and adjust user access with just a few clicks of the mouse.

To talk with a specialist about a VoIP system for your business, request an assessment: