Raise your glass to a business’s most valuable tool — the telephone. As we all know, the telephone has undergone non-stop innovation since the dawn of the internet. While the two have always been intertwined, the internet and telephones became even more connected with the deployment of hosted voice systems and private branch exchanges (PBX). Both acted as a company’s private telephone network. Their significant benefit was cost savings. They reduced the number of individual telephone lines a company had to acquire while adding emerging features such as voicemail and call forwarding.
But, like rotary phones, the era of hosted solutions and PBX is over. Today, unified communications as a service (UCaaS) is the king of the telecommunications landscape. More than an evolution of telephone technology, UCaaS is the future of multi-method communications for companies large and small.
Why is UCaaS Superior to PBX?
Hosted voice services and PBX were traditional phone systems made better. Now, UCaaS achieves all that they did and more. Those legacy systems were limited to voice-only communications. Essentially, a basic phone call. In comparison, UCaaS offers voice, video, messaging, chat, file sharing, and contacts in a single platform. It provides a tidal wave of opportunities, enabling businesses to communicate across multiple channels from anywhere in the world to anyone, with quality and security.
The Benefits of UCaaS
Supports Hybrid Work Environments
Employees can move between office, road, and home without ever losing access to corporate communication tools. What’s more, UCaaS works across their devices — from desktops to laptops, tablets, and smartphones.
Empowers Integrated Collaboration
Forget about maintaining and using a hard drive’s worth of applications and files. UCaaS unifies them all. Employees can tackle meetings, messaging, and file sharing using a single UCaaS ecosystem.
Transforms Customer Service
UCaaS solutions integrate with CRMs, ticketing, business intelligence, and analytics tools. It’s more than one unified communications system; it’s that plus a tool that draws upon your other databases. Team members can see caller data, action history, and preferences in real time, enabling faster, personalized responses.
Improves Scalability and Lowers Costs
UCaaS lives in the cloud, not in your server rack. That makes it more affordable. There are no hardware, session initiation protocol (SIP) trunks to configure, or maintenance expenditures. Your business can scale up or down as needed, with no headaches.
Bolsters Security and Business Continuity
When things go wrong, your business doesn’t have to sweat. Communications redundancy and disaster recovery are baked into UCaaS offerings. How? UCaaS providers maintain multiple data centers with real-time failover capabilities. So if one region goes down, your communications stay up. Plus, security protocols such as TLS/SRTP encryption and multi-factor authentication are built in from day one.
Are There Any Concerns About Using UCaaS?
UCaaS is the best communication solution available for businesses. By any metric — cost, flexibility, integration capability, scalability, security, and others — UCaaS wins.
Where does UCaaS come up short? Nowhere, but some factors can hinder its performance.
Internet Dependency
Since UCaaS is cloud-based, it lives and dies with your broadband connection. If it falters, so do your calls, video conferences, and messaging. However, there are codes and quality of service (QoS) tools that mitigate those concerns.
Latency Issues
Every piece of data routes through a remote data center. The transfer of data over long distances creates opportunities for jitter, lag, or dropped packets. Here again, much of this concern can be overcome. Using a robust fiber-optic internet service line and Cat 6 Ethernet cables in your facility goes a long way toward ensuring low-latency connections.
Partner Selection
Not all UCaaS products are equal. Each partner has strengths and weaknesses. It’s critical to your research, and you should partner with the best provider for your needs. Yes, switching UCaaS providers is possible, but know that your phone numbers and potentially your workflows are wrapped into that ecosystem and might be challenging to unwind seamlessly.
Tool Integrations
UCaaS products can integrate with just about any database or platform you want. But there might be extra costs involved in creating custom APIs, deploying add-ons, or moving toward a different subscription tier. When choosing a UCaaS partner, assess what you already have and ask specific questions about the feasibility and cost of integrations.
CapEx vs OpEx
UCaaS is more affordable than PBX solutions since there is no hardware to purchase, install, and maintain. But don’t make assumptions. Do the math and make sure ongoing operational expenses don’t exceed your financial expectations. Add-on services such as call recording, analytics, or contact center features should be evaluated, and the costs projected up front.
Security Compliance
UCaaS is very secure — but regulated industries often require specific protocols and audits to prove compliance. Make sure you confirm a partner’s ability to conform to any industry-required security requirements.
UCaaS is the go-to choice for communications. If you’re not using it now, you should be planning to adopt it very soon. We advise you to enter your search with a clear idea of your objectives, needs, and expectations when evaluating UCaaS options.
Is Your Business Big Enough for UCaaS?
Yes. The answer is that simple. Any business, regardless of size, can benefit from UCaaS. There is no magic number. Knowing whether UCaaS is right for you comes down to your needs, not the number of employees.
How to determine if UCaaS is right for you
- Do you currently pay for a hosted or PBX solution?
- Do you have remote or hybrid staff?
- Do you have plans to grow your staff?
- Do you have plans to open new locations?
- Do you use multi-channel communications (voice, messaging, video)
- Do you need to comply with security protocols?
If your business relies on communications and you said yes to any of those questions, UCaaS is likely right for you to explore and implement.
Ready to Future-Proof Your Business with UCaaS?
UCaaS is a must-have for future-proofing your organization’s IT infrastructure and operations. Identifying and deploying the best way to achieve it comes from working with an expert. Matrix-NDI solves the challenges of your business operations by unlocking the full ROI of your technology investments. We design and install networks built for maximum speed and perfectly matched to bandwidth demands.
Why work with Matrix-NDI?
With on-staff Registered Communications Distribution Designers (RCDDs), coast-to-coast service coverage, and partnerships with leading data networking providers—including Extreme Networks, Nile, and others—Matrix-NDI delivers the expertise and reach to support your technology goals. We invite you to connect with us to see how our expertise, partnerships, and national reach can help solve your challenges.
Contact Matrix-NDI to get started. Let’s build smarter, safer, more connected spaces — together.
