There is an increasing recognition that SMBs don’t require a dedicated premise based small business phone system such as a PBX or key system. They can now access more comprehensive business phone services through hosted phone service providers.
Hosted business phone services are growing in popularity and some would argue that within a few years premise based PBXs will only be used by large scale enterprises with the resources required to manage the technology.
The main reasons for SMBs signing up for outsourced phone services include:
- Little or no capital expenditure required, always a compelling argument for a small business operator. Hosted phone services are typically billed monthly based on usage, which means that the cost of a service has a relationship to the level of business activity.
- As a consequence of #1 there is no requirement for a financial commitment to a rapidly depreciating asset, which is also the case with most investments in office equipment and technology.
- Because SMBs can avoid the necessity for making a long term financial commitment to the acquisition and support of technology, they also achieve greater freedom and flexibility in responding to changing business conditions.
- In purchasing technology there is always a requirement to consider future growth requirements. There is always at least a fifty percent chance that such growth projections are either too optimistic or too pessimistic and the result is either unused capacity or excess capacity. In the case of hosted services an SMB need only pay for what is actually used.
- There is no hardware or software to install. As a result all maintenance and administration is done off site by specialists without a requirement for end user involvement.
- The opportunity cost of managing technology is enormous. Consider the loss of time associated with resolving PC issues and updating software. Large enterprises can afford to employ desktop specialists, but in the case of SMBs it’s usually the owner or a key employee who must defer a critical task to resolve technical issues. Premise based phone systems are even more demanding as a technical issue with a PBX can block all in-bound and out-bound phone calls.
- Purchasing technology is always a gamble for people who are not experts in a field. The risk of selecting inappropriate, superseded or wrong technology is eliminated by using an outsourced small business phone service. The service provider is responsible and accountable for making decisions on technology and complying with service level commitments. As a consequence the small business owner has no need to become involved in decisions about technology.
- SMBs rarely have the resources required to invest in effective backup phone systems. They are vulnerable to power outages and natural disasters. Hosted phone services on the other hand can provide substantial resilience and disaster recovery facilities that support business continuity in a wide range of situations.
- Outsourced business phone systems enable SMBs to access the same features as large enterprises. They level the playing field by making it possible for SMBs to project a professional corporate image as well as capturing an increased of volume of inbound calls and enquiries.
- The increasing popularity of the hosted small business phone service model is attracting more service providers who must compete for customers by offering more and better services to differentiate their offerings. Such competition is healthy and will inevitably result in even sharper pricing that will make the option of premise based PBXs even less attractive.
Inevitably there will be a shakeout amongst the suppliers of hosted small business phone services. Not all providers will manage to balance the demands of growth with the maintenance of service levels, but in the medium to long term it’s a sustainable model that will become the default option for all SMBs.
Author: Chris H Green
Article Source: EzineArticles.com
Provided by: Canada duty tariff
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