Your traditional PBX has served you well. In all
likelihood, it’s already paid for. So you have a
certain incentive to stick with it. That may
seem like a safe choice on the surface. After
all, changing your communications system is
a significant undertaking and entails a certain
amount of risk. However, it may be far riskier to
stay with an out-of-date and underperforming
on-premises PBX.
The longer you keep your PBX system, the
greater your risks and costs, including:
System outages and unplanned downtime that harm your business, reputation, and profitability
High upgrade costs associated with keeping server environments up to date
Losing ground to competitors with superior communications capabilities—just imagine what your outdated communications say about your business
Inability to replace critical components as dated technology reaches end of life
Attrition of in-house expertise required to maintain legacy infrastructure
However, the most potentially damaging issue with
your legacy PBX is that it just can’t keep pace with
soaring demand for innovative communications.
Communication technology is changing rapidly.
So are expectations for your employees and
customers. Ease of use and rich features are the
order of the day.
Trying to wrestle new functionality from your
old PBX is a costly and unending struggle.
Next generation on-premises converged
communication systems are more adaptable than
their predecessors, but they can cost millions
of dollars. Compared to cloud communications,
however, they’re prohibitively expensive. And they
still lack the agility, functionality, and hassle-free
advantages of cloud alternatives.
Increasingly, more companies are embracing
cloud communications not only across bundled
services for voice, messaging, video and
collaboration; but also through embedded
communication technologies integrated into
business applications and workflows to help
drive productivity. According to the 2018 Market
Analysis Research Report Cloud Communication
platforms will continue to experience strong
growth with an average CAGR of 26.8% from 2016
to 2021. Cloud communications, also known as
hosted voice over IP (VoIP), are prized for their
adaptability, elastic scalability, reliability, and cost
efficiency. Moreover, compared to other options,
they can accommodate the broadest range of
communication needs, including business phone
services, collaboration, contact centers, unified
communications, and mobility.
Most legacy communications systems are
comprised of separate solutions for essential
capabilities—often involving multiple vendors.
A typical system might include a PBX for core call
control, and different solutions for services such
as instant messaging (IM), directory/Presence,
web collaboration, video conferencing, and
contact center solutions.
Even companies hoping to centralize
communications on one vendor find that in
order to meet all of their needs, they still must
deploy individual solutions, such as WebEx and
Jabber. Disjointed capabilities such as these can
have a crippling effect on the productivity and
effectiveness of your entire organization.
For example:
Point solutions offer little cross-platform integration. As a result, business users encounter inconsistent experiences from one solution to the next, and often have to enter multiple passwords to access different services.
The siloed, multi-vendor nature of legacy systems introduces complexity at every turn—from deployment to management, and maintenance to troubleshooting.
Disconnected communications result in slow response times that erode customer satisfaction, diminish sales, and reduce revenues.
Vendor lock-in for devices and infrastructure trap you into paying more over time to replace components as they become out-of-date or deteriorate.
In addition, with cloud VoIP, you can eliminate
the enormous time and cost associated with
deploying, integrating, and managing disparate
multi-vendor technologies. You can consolidate
vendor relationships for unified communications
and also for such services as local, toll-free,
international calling and deployment solutions
such as MPLS and SD-WAN. Indeed, some cloud
communication providers simplify vendor
management to the point that even the largest
multinational enterprises are able to get all of
their communications services consolidated on
one monthly bill.
2. Easily scale communications
as your business grows.
Traditional communications platforms are too
rigid to accommodate growth. As businesses
undergo mergers and acquisitions, move offices,
launch new international locations, and hire
new teleworkers, your communications must be
able to adapt quickly. Regrettably, that’s not an
option with on-premises PBX. Scaling services on
these systems can be slow, labor intensive, and
expensive, involving countless nests of wires,
routers, and switches. For example, think of the
time and resources it currently takes you to
administer moves, adds, and changes (MACs)
for employees in just one location. Now imagine
having to do the same for multiple locations
spread across the globe, each with its own onpremises
solutions and unique needs.
Cloud VoIP enables far greater business agility
than traditional systems. Add new lines, phones,
and locations whenever you need. Or disconnect
them. Cloud systems require only a public
Internet connection—while also supporting
MPLS, SD-WAN and other private network
connections. So there are no phone wires to
run and no infrastructure to nurse. All the
complexity moves off premises, off your plate,
and into the cloud. Whether you’re opening a
new office in Boise or Berlin, employees can
have sophisticated communications services in
a matter of weeks versus several months.
And because cloud systems often combine
multiple capabilities, you can rapidly scale
not only phone services, but everything your
enterprise requires—phones, conferencing,
contact center, unified communications, and
mobile capabilities—incrementally or all at once.
3. Add new communications
features your business needs
to survive and thrive.
In today’s hyper-connected world, employees demand an entirely new realm of communication features
that last century’s PBX systems were never designed to support. Consider mobility. By 2020, mobile
workers will account for 72.3% of the US workforce according to a new IDC report.
With PBX, executing a BYOD strategy is a painful endeavor. Using these systems, it’s often not feasible
to bring even such basic communications features such as “find-me follow-me” call forwarding and
voicemail notification to mobile devices.
Beyond mobile, traditional PBX also makes it hard to incorporate other popular features such as
video conferencing and Presence, or to extend communications into other business applications. For
example, sales and support staff are far more productive when the CRM applications they rely on are
“communications-enabled,” with built-in web dialing and automatic communication slogging capabilities.
However, adding such features with traditional systems, when it’s possible at all, often requires
expensive customization and professional services. New features may also be tied to hardware, which
limits choice and increases costs.
The versatility and agility of cloud communications make them ideally suited for deploying the full range
of features that empower people to be more productive and effective anywhere business takes them.
In a cloud-based system, even highly sophisticated features such as mobile collaboration, hot desking,
monitoring (barge, monitor, whisper), and CRM integrations, are readily accessible and simple to use.
What’s more, cloud solutions enable seamless, continuous communications experiences. For example,
from a single application and a single workflow, employees can easily locate contacts, check Presence,
and access click-to-chat, click-to-call or even click-to collaborate features.
And unlike legacy PBX, cloud communications make it easy for companies to deploy new features
centrally and remotely over the Internet, and with minimal IT assistance. In addition, with cloud systems,
new features support a corporate BYOD strategy, substantially reducing IT costs.
4. Gain critical visibility and insight
into your communications.
When it comes to gauging the effectiveness of business communications, traditional PBX
implementations leave you in the dark. They
offer little in the way of reporting or analysis. For
starters, the fragmented, proprietary nature
of these patchwork systems makes it very
difficult to perform analysis. What scant insights
you can extract from legacy technology are
so slow and cumbersome to produce and so
piecemeal as to be all but unusable in any
practical sense. Without access to timely,
relevant data, you lack critical insight and
accountability over your investments in your
communication systems.
In contrast to legacy systems, cloud
communications are cohesive across the full
spectrum of individual services. They also use
open technologies, so they integrate readily with
advanced analytics and reporting capabilities.
With the visibility and transparency you get from
cloud communications, you can replace hunches
and guesswork with data-driven insight to make
more informed business decisions.
5. Maintain communications
at all times, even during
unforeseen disasters and events.
Of the many shortcomings of traditional PBX systems, their lack of adequate disaster recovery and
business continuity may be the most serious. On-site legacy systems are not designed to provide
continuous connectivity in the event of outages from natural disasters and other events.
For example, disruptions due to aging PBX infrastructure components, transportation strikes, and major
construction projects can shut down all or part of a PBX system without warning. The costs from service
disruptions can be severe, ranging from tens to hundreds of thousands of dollars an hour. Moreover,
communications failures can place employees and customers at risk and cause lasting damage to your
company’s brand and reputation.
Cloud VoIP assures high availability, disaster recovery, and business continuity by design. Unlike
traditional on-site PBX, there is no single point of failure in a cloud implementation.
Instead, the best cloud communications systems are hosted on redundant, geographically dispersed
data centers. If one server in one part of the world fails, connections are continuously maintained
on other mirrored servers in the system, so there are no service disruptions. In the event of a loss of
Internet connectivity, for example during fires, earthquakes, or severe weather, calls in a cloud-based
system can automatically route to mobile phones. No matter what happens, employees can still connect
with customers using their business number.
In addition, if headquarters locations go offline, cloud VoIP offers the flexibility to connect via the Internet
remotely (e.g., via a Web browser and desktop and mobile apps from home or branch locations).