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If your contract on your traditional phone branch exchange (PBX) is up for renewal, it might be a good time to consider cloud communications. You may have looked into cloud solutions in the past, only to determine that you could lose call quality or that it may cost you in terms of IT resources. Today, the transition to the cloud is seamless, with high-quality features and options for hosted solutions that take the pressure off your IT team.
Take a look at a few of the benefits of investing in cloud communications:
Support mobility: As employees spend less and less time at their desks, you need a communications solution that travels with them. Cloud solutions allow your employees to access the same set of features, whether they are sitting in their office, working at a coffee shop, or catching up after-hours at home. All they need is a valid log-in and a connected device.
Scalability: One of the great features of cloud communications is its ability to easily grow with you or to support any seasonality that affects your business. If you need to add users, it takes just a minute or two to expand your solution to accommodate more employees. It’s just as easy to scale back when your promotion is ending or when a special event has passed.
Rich features: With cloud communications, one of the options is to invest in Unified Communications as a Service (UCaaS), an expansive set of features that equips your team for collaboration and presents a professional image to your customers. UCaaS gives employees a single application through which they can access all communications formats, inviting innovation and improved productivity.
Reduced pressure on IT: When you choose a hosted version of cloud communications, such as UCaaS, you remove all concerns about hardware maintenance, software updates, and troubleshooting of the communications technology from your IT team. It’s all handled by the provider.
Predictable invoicing: Rather than a large initial capital investment, followed by surges of spending for updates and hardware maintenance, cloud communications is a subscription-based pay model with uniform billing each month. Payments can be categorized as capital expenses, and there are no surprise hardware upgrade costs.
Improved security and disaster recovery: When traditional phone lines go down, IP phones still function because voice calls go over the Internet. In addition, cloud communications providers build in redundancy in their backups and utilize encryption to protect data transmissions.
Are There Reasons Not to Transition to Cloud Communications?
You may be wowed by the features offered in a solution like UCaaS, but there are a couple of investments you may need to make before migrating to the cloud. First, you may need to upgrade your network to handle the increased traffic. There are online testing tools you can access to determine your network speed and performance.
Second, you may need to invest in IP phones. Talk with providers to determine whether the desk phones you’re currently using could be utilized with a cloud communications solution.
When you’re ready to evaluate cloud communications options, contact us at Access One. Serving businesses in the Chicago area and beyond, we can help you identify the best solution for your needs and your budget.