Traditional telephony is giving way to digital telephony and specifically Voice over IP (VoIP). VoIP is one of the cogs in the larger system of unified communications. The use of VoIP does not require the organisation to install separate cabling from the main corporate data network. End users can use the same cable for the phone line as they do for their data thus providing substantial savings in setup costs.
The cost of a VoIP call is also far much cheaper than a traditional telephone call. But cost is just one of the advantages businesses can draw from VoIP. VoIP has several other features that traditional telephony does not support including portability – the ability to move with the service to any place as long as there is an internet connection.
However, implementing VoIP is not always smooth sailing. There are many organisations that have ended up with an underutilized and, at the worst case, a business-impeding VoIP implementation. In addition, impartial advice is not easy to come by given that a number of advisory firms are at the same time vendors of specific VoIP product brands.
This conflict of interest has seen businesses stuck with implementations that look good on paper but do not provide any tangible return in cost and operational efficiency. At Milan Industries, we are careful not to look at the implementation of VoIP through rose coloured glasses. We look at your current infrastructure, business processes, long term strategy and budget to advise on the most realistic approach to unified communications for your business.
As we do this, we also look at the cons and have no qualms letting our clients know when VoIP might in any way not deliver the value intended. We will admit that we do have contacts with the top providers of VoIP infrastructure. However, such contacts are primarily to serve the interests of our clients in the sense of negotiating better deals when purchasing unified communications software and hardware.
We also go beyond VoIP and unified communications to provide practical advice based on best practice for Virtual Private Network (VPN) implementation. The VPN and unified communications must ideally be considered concurrently – the efficiency of your unified communications plan can only be as good as the strength of your VPN vis a vis your business requirements.
TheMilan Industries team is consistently customer-centric with our every contribution tempered with the perspectives of the client and, where applicable, the client’s client. While there is inevitably a fee for our services, you are likely to incur a far greater cost in the long term, if you go ahead with a unified communications plan on your own or if you engage a company that does not have an exemplary track record in unified communications.