More Small Businesses are Choosing VoIP

Small businesses must have very tightly controlled budgets, as every dollar spent is critically important. Because of this, a growing number of businesses are switching to Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) business phone systems, which offer higher quality than comparable landline phone packages with prices up to 50 percent lower. Modern VoIP systems are much more reliable than those from only a couple of years ago, and hosted VoIP systems allow businesses to have all of the advantages of an on-premises PBX without needing to actually own or operate the device.

A recent report from Software Advice, which surveyed over 350 small businesses confirmed that there is a largely increased awareness of VoIP and it's advantages. While VoIP may sound like it is too good to be true, VoIP telephony uses far fewer resources and less infrastructure than traditional telephone networks. Because it is so much cheaper to send signals through the Internet instead, business VoIP providers can charge far less money.

The survey found that hosted services are a major bargaining point for small businesses, with zero respondents claiming an interest in on-premise IP-PBX systems. A PBX will cost companies thousands of dollars initially just for the device and installation, while maintenance fees quickly eat up the remaining funds.

Hosted PBX services transfer this maintenance over to the VoIP provider, who can afford to spend a greater proportion of resources maintaining the PBX devices. Since hosted services are usually available for under $20 per month per phone line, small businesses almost always save money by switching to hosted VoIP.

The small business owners also showed a gradual decrease in reliance on traditional telephony, with only 31 percent still using a landline. The fact that well over half of the buyers noted that this would be their first experience with VoIP suggests that interest in the VoIP market is rapidly increasing as it enters the consciousness of more and more small business owners.