Why Cloud-Based Is Better: Hosted PBX Or On-site PBX
Cloud-based services have seen a rapid rise in popularity in recent years and cloud-based phone systems are no exception. Learn why here.
Today, there are fewer and fewer businesses holding out against the technological advances of cloud computing and accompanying cloud-based services. When it comes to business phone systems, though, there are still a few exceptions. If yours is a business continuing to use old hardware in favour of near-term convenience at the expense of the long-term results, read on to find out why this isn’t the greatest idea. Here are some of the main arguments for embracing the move to a cloud-based phone system.
Cloud Phone Systems are More Cost-Effective and Easier to Manage
There are almost countless advantages of a cloud-based phone system or hosted PBX versus the on-site equivalent. Meanwhile, there are few benefits to continuing to shell out on maintenance fees for your on-site hardware.
Whilst your on-site PBX and telephony equipment require space and the frequent attention of trained, expensive technicians, they’re also more expensive for the average call.
Call rates with VoIP providers and others offering cloud-based phone services are almost universally lower than those offered by traditional phone system providers. With Alto, for example, international calls to mobiles in the US cost only 1.5p per minute. On the standard BT international rate, it would cost you 6.0p per minute. That’s a saving of 75% with Alto.
Plus, since you’re not paying for the upkeep of any hardware (everything is done via software hosted by your provider), you won’t have to pay fees for maintenance or configuration. Choose a provider with a reputation for great customer service, and you’ll have access to maintenance, configuration changes and advice whenever you need it at no extra cost.
Finally, by virtue of being hosted in the cloud, your phone system is configurable and accessible from anywhere. All you’ll need is a device with an internet connection; enter your account’s login details and you’ll be free to make whatever changes you need. Forgot to set up a Time Diary for the Easter break? With a cloud phone system, you’ll be able to log in from home, create your new call route and assign it in mere minutes. Such simplicity and flexibility are inherent to all good hosted PBX services.
Hosted VoIP Offers More and More Powerful Phone System Features
Modern VoIP providers are beginning to transition into UCaaS (Unified Communications as a Service) solutions. It’s not uncommon for platforms to now provide business instant messaging, video conferencing and secure file sharing services in addition to the cloud-based phone system.
These additional, powerful avenues for collaboration and communication between staff can only benefit your business, reducing the unnecessary communication friction often felt by large, multi-site corporations and those incorporating flexible or remote working policies.
These new services aside, there are other features specific to business phone systems that only become available when you switch to a cloud-hosted PBX. These include auto-sync call recording, automatically backing up to your choice of cloud storage service and VoIP apps (aka softphones) that allow you to take and make business calls professionally from a personal device as if it were an office phone. That means the same business phone numbers as caller ID and the same features like call listening, forwarding and barging. Click-to-dial features are possible too, saving sales and recruitment professionals over 100 hours a year (or around 30minutes a day) in time spent manually typing in phone numbers and correcting errors. That’s just a shortlist of such features exclusive to hosted PBX services.
Software-based Systems Can Integrate With Other SaaS Platforms
Perhaps most excitingly, these software-based phone systems can integrate tightly with SaaS platforms like your existing sales CRM, or even full software ecosystems like Microsoft 365. Microsoft’s Teams platform is an example of a unified communications service, offering tight integration with all Microsoft products including Outlook, Exchange and Office apps, plus a phone system, business instant messaging and video conferencing.
It doesn’t stop there, though: as an example of the greatly increased flexibility you get with hosted telephony and UCaaS, Teams users who don’t like Microsoft’s phone system but enjoy the rest of their product ecosystem and the experience of Microsoft Teams itself, can choose another phone system provider’s service to replace Microsoft’s in the back-end. With a Teams Direct Routing integration, it’s possible to essentially fuse two powerful and popular services together, like Microsoft Teams and Alto’s VoIP phone system.
Conclusion
What we’ve discussed here represents just a small sample of what’s possible when you take your business digital and embrace cloud-based telephony, but even this small sample makes a strong case for adopting a cloud phone system.
Alto offers all of the features praised in this article, including VoIP apps, business instant messaging and secure file sharing UCaaS features, cloud-sync call recording and more. If you’d like to try out these features first hand for free, you can sign up for a free VoIP trial or, if you’re sold already, start comparing our voice plans. Ours is a monthly subscription service; we’ll never lock you into a contract, so there’s minimal risk in getting yourselves set up and trying the service on for size in a more formal capacity.
