Last updated on May 24th, 2016 at 12:25 pm
As B2B companies grow, they will need to make smarter investments in sophisticated technologies that reflect their current status, find better ways to accommodate remote and mobile employees for recruitment and collaboration purposes and put measures in place to ensure business continuity and security. Communications technology is a critical component to meeting these business needs. While cloud-based Unified Communications (UC) solutions are not a silver bullet, they do offer businesses the ability to deploy advanced communications capabilities at a lower overall cost and increase mobility with less risk
As your business transitions away from on-premise technology, make sure you have a strong grasp of the following benefits of leveraging cloud-based UC and are prepared to maximize the business’ investment.
- Mobility for faster and more Economical access
Some of the greatest benefits of a cloud-based UC solution are the mobile, flexible and economical access they provide. The cost of communication with offsite employees, clients and vendors can add up, but a UC platform offers instant connectivity, easy access to employees and effortless communication.
To address the needs of remote and traveling employees, the list of UC features has grown rapidly, encompassing everything from presence and chat, to web conferencing, to softphones, a feature that lets you make and receive calls on any device using your business number. The ability to conduct business wherever you are and on any device ensures consistent collaboration and helps move projects forward seamlessly.
- Online management and instant scalability
Whether your business is scaling up or down, a cloud phone system can adapt quickly and without disruption. With cloud UC, these adjustments can be made via online portals. For the more intuitive, user-friendly portals, a centralized administrator can quickly re-route calls when business conditions change and instantly add or remove users, features and phone lines. This level of control removes the hassle and fees around configuration and installation.
In addition, if your business opens more offices or you hire more employees who work remotely, cloud UC allows you to make changes and monitor all offices from one centralized dashboard. The ability to add and remove new employees, services and equipment instantly without sinking costs in onsite equipment gives you more control over the bottom line.
- Enhanced security and decreased downtime
Communications is inarguably the most essential component of any business, so it is imperative that communication with clients continues uninterrupted by downtime. It’s always important to have a disaster recovery plan – but with the right technology in place, your business will be free to focus more on preparedness than recovery.
With UC based entirely in the cloud, you have the advantage of unlimited access to your entire system remotely—all features, settings and services can be accessed and managed through a secure online portal from any device. Added features, such as auto attendants, can be used to inform customers of office closures. Even when your physical place of business may need to close, communications with customers will rarely, if ever, be down, ensuring that your customer service access is reliable.
- Reduced upfront and maintenance costs
While UC can improve business performance, premise-based UC systems may require multiple vendors and present a different set of complications for IT staff. One way to alleviate the expense is to adopt a full-service, subscription-based UC solution that eliminates high IT management costs and includes phones, scanning, advanced features such as toll-free and unlimited calling and the latest mobile apps and tools—all for no capital expense. By moving communications solutions entirely to the cloud, organizations can seamlessly and cost-effectively support the same tools and features across locations through hot-desking, which allows employees to turn any phone at any location into their own.
- Access to flexible personalization
Businesses with on-premises communications systems may not be able to support the advanced features that users crave. However, not all cloud systems can support flexible access. Choosing a UC system housed 100 percent in the cloud and built around the user gives employees the flexibility to select the UC features of their choice that, then, follow the user to whichever device they choose—all without the need for IT staff to make changes to the device itself. This increased level of flexibility improves productivity and encourages collaboration.
Cloud-based UC has come a long way in providing the advanced mobility and functionality that B2B businesses need to stay competitive. When investing in modernizing and unifying your communications into one cost-effective solution, consider solutions that involve less capital and maintenance.
