SMB trends for hosted VoIP services

VoIP, unified messaging, products and services

We recently had a chance to talk with Greg Brashier, COO of Virtual PBX, about his perspective on SMB trends for hosted VoIP services. Our interview followed analysis and results from a recent Virtual PBX survey that asked more than 600 SMBs about virtual office use -- along with the perceived effectiveness, costs, and technology needed to support a virtual business.

The most popular drivers for using a virtual office included: employees' flexibility (61%), business cost savings (54%), geographic distance of staff (42%) and the desire to reduce commute time, cost and pollution (41%). More 60% of respondents work from a virtual office almost all the time, while 27% work two to 10 days a month outside the office.

CASE STUDY: VoIP phone service reaps savings, features for staffing firm

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We recently had a chance to talk with Greg Brashier, COO of Virtual PBX, about his perspective on SMB trends for hosted VoIP services. Our interview followed analysis and results from a recent Virtual PBX survey that asked more than 600 SMBs about virtual office use -- along with the perceived effectiveness, costs, and technology needed to support a virtual business.

The most popular drivers for using a virtual office included: employees' flexibility (61%), business cost savings (54%), geographic distance of staff (42%) and the desire to reduce commute time, cost and pollution (41%). More 60% of respondents work from a virtual office almost all the time, while 27% work two to 10 days a month outside the office.

CASE STUDY: VoIP phone service reaps savings, features for staffing firm

The survey showed that virtual workers are apparently addicted to cellphones -- 87% survey takers use mobile devices for business communications. Also popular are landlines, used by 49%; VoIP phone lines, used by 25%; and computer-based VoIP soft phones, used by 20% of respondents.

In our follow-up interview to the survey, Brashier brought up several topics we found interesting. First, we talked at length about how different providers offer support for a "blended" portfolio of user devices that allows call termination either on VoIP phones, mobile devices, traditional analog phones, or a blend of all three.

One "buyer beware" flag that Brashier raised for the SMB was the need to understand how rate plans are structured for calls that are "off-net" to an analog or mobile device. Most providers allow, for example, a call to the subscriber's VoIP number to ring on a virtual office landline or a mobile phone. However, some providers require subscribers to first buy a physical phone and a reserved VoIP number before the follow-me/find-me service can work -- other providers may not require it. Some may count the entire length of the "off-net" call as a "concurrent session" while other providers might not.

The bottom line is that when planning for the virtual office as a participant on a hosted solution, buyers should understand all rate plan and service quality implications for remote users.

The next topic we discussed with Brashier was about where the industry stands with SIP interoperability. But that's a whole other issue we'll examine in detail over the next few newsletter editions.

Read more about voip & convergence in Network World's VoIP & Convergence section.

Steve Taylor is president of Distributed Networking Associates and publisher/editor-in-chief of Webtorials. Larry Hettick is a principal analyst at Current Analysis.