Switching from a hardwired phone system to VoIP can save you money and help you work more efficiently, whether it’s in an office building or at home with a remote work setup.
Whether you’re new to VoIP or already use it for your work, we’ll talk about how VoIP technology can optimize your remote work setup and how to optimize your VoIP setup for remote work!
Need to set up a VoIP solution to keep your remote workers connected? Book your demo today.
5 Reasons to Implement VoIP Into Your Remote Work Setup
If it’s time to upgrade your remote work setup and wondering what the best solution is for you and your team, it’s not surprising that you’re looking into VoIP.
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Scalable, Fast Systems
Traditional phone systems need expensive hardware, and adding a line is pricey and time-consuming.
However, VoIP streamlines that process, letting you scale up and down whenever you need. For example, if you’re sharing your remote workspace with others, you can easily add them to your VoIP service instantly.
Or, if you needed multiple VoIP lines but need less now, you can scale down your lines without losing out on what you spent setting up new physical ones.
Related: Remote Work Revolution & Unified Communications
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Location-Independent Work
With VoIP, setting up an efficient remote office phone system is easy. You can communicate with your team, send documents, and start video chats from anywhere with internet access.
You can keep connected with your colleagues no matter where everyone is working.
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CRM Integration
Your CRM holds all of your customer data, and you need it to improve their experience. VoIP services can connect with your CRM, so you have access to that data and context on every call.
You can auto-dial right from your CRM and see everything about a customer before speaking with them.
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Metrics Monitoring
If your employees work remotely, how do you know they’re being productive without physical oversight? You can rely on VoIP metrics.
VoIP systems can record calls and report data like call volume, availability, and missed calls to ensure your team is taking care of business.
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Collect Data
Business is all about data. VoIP services can help you collect essential data and hold it in one place for team leaders to review.
So, VoIP allows you to make better decisions by providing crucial data on employees, expenses, customer satisfaction, and more.
5 Ways to Optimize Your Home Office With VoIP Technology
Alt-text: A woman using her computer in a remote work setup
If you want to get all of the VoIP benefits in your home office or ensure your employees are getting great call quality when working remotely, you need to optimize your VoIP technology with the right provider.
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Analyze Your Internet
Before doing anything else, you’ll need to determine what needs optimizing to utilize VoIP effectively in your remote office.
The first thing we recommend is to run a VoIP quality test to determine if your existing internet connection can handle a VoIP service.
There are various online tools you can use for free to test your VoIP speed and network. These tests simulate a certain number of calls over your network and estimate the quality you can expect.
Latency, jitter, packet loss, etc., can all affect how well your network handles VoIP calls.
Related: VoIP, Network Security, and Your Business
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Get the Right Hardware
With so many things running on the cloud and VoIP relying on various digital technologies, it’s easy to overlook your hardware.
Old hardware combined with new VoIP equipment can lead to poor call quality. Your router is the best place to start.
Many people keep using their current router when switching to VoIP in their remote offices, and while it’s not always a problem, some routers aren’t configured to make quality calls.
Your VoIP provider can recommend the best router to optimize your remote work setup for VoIP. Most VoIP companies sell hardware that’s compatible and optimized for their services; buying from them directly isn’t a bad idea.
In addition, you’ll want to check your headsets, handsets, cameras, microphones, etc., to ensure they work well with your VoIP service.
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Evaluate Your Traffic
The number of simultaneous calls, the call type, and the call volume all affect your network traffic and your VoIP call quality.
If you’re the only one working in your remote office and don’t have others in the household taking up bandwidth, this likely won’t be an issue. For example, one person making calls on a network is vastly different from multiple users performing tasks at the same time.
Generally, you want upload speeds of at least 1 Mbps, but we recommend more if you want to have anything else running on your network simultaneously.
You can either:
- Increase your bandwidth by upgrading your internet plan
- Lower your bandwidth usage by pausing downloads, stopping YouTube, etc. during calls
- Increase your device’s memory by upgrading its RAM
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Create a Virtual Network
While not always necessary for a remote setup, a virtual local area network (VLAN) can be a great solution if you have a lot of network traffic.
Besides VoIP calls, think about what else runs on your network — open tabs in your browser, CRMs, databases, and other business software. And if you live where you work, there’s likely one or more people streaming TV, playing on their phones, or doing something else that takes up your precious bandwidth.
Slight delays might not make a difference when it means taking longer to load an email, but they can result in serious call quality issues when making a call with VoIP.
Setting up a VLAN allows you to route all VoIP traffic into its own network, helping to ensure your call won’t drop because someone just opened Netflix on the living room television.
Related: VoIP Benefits for Small Businesses
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Assess Your VoIP Provider
Alt-text: A man wearing a dress shirt using a VoIP app on his phone
All VoIP providers and services are not equal. Like with anything in life, some are better than others.
If you haven’t made the jump to VoIP yet, this step is even more crucial. If you have a VoIP provider, it’s time to ask if the problem is with your network or with your provider.
So, if you have a great, reliable internet connection and solid hardware but still experience poor call quality, it could be because of your service provider.
At SE Telecom, we work with top VoIP providers like RingCentral, which powers the communications for hundreds of thousands of businesses.
Ready to optimize your remote work setup with VoIP? Visit us today.