Recently I’ve been losing favor with the voice-over-IP (VoIP) stalwart Skype (News - Alert). While it once was my preferred choice for overseas calls, both free and relatively reliable, lately I’ve felt that its voice quality has been on the decline. Knowing what I know about the VoIP industry, I’ve even been wondering if there have been some poor decisions by Skype owner Microsoft (News - Alert) when it comes to its VoIP network prioritization practices.
That’s because while VoIP once was known for its call quality issues, this may not be the case anymore. VoIP no longer is subject to the dreaded delay in the middle of a call, or the annoying echo, or that R2D2-like gargle that many of us remember from back in the day (and are sometimes experiencing again with Skype, sadly).
The network has come a long way when it comes to VoIP. There is now data prioritization for the best VoIP providers, and this completely eliminates the call quality issues that once plagued VoIP and made businesses wary of adopting the technology.
Now VoIP is more likely to be better than its analogue counterpart than it is to be worse. With VoIP, calls can actually arrive in high-definition, delivering crystal-clear calling, which in turn enhances other technologies such as VoIP call recording.
So instead of VoIP being a cost-saving measure that comes at the price of reduced voice quality, it now is an asset for businesses in that it delivers better communication. While most customers won’t consciously recognize the added quality during a call, for many there will be a subtle difference that just makes the experience seem better somehow.
Delivering a better customer service experience is increasingly important in 2014, as the walls that separate businesses have come down. With the Internet and globalization, competition is more fierce than ever—and it is harder to have a truly differentiated product, with even Apple (News - Alert) not being exempted from this trend.
The customer experience, therefore, becomes vitally important in setting a company apart.
Little things like better voice quality can help. And like call recording.
Even more than better voice quality, call recording can make a huge difference to the business that embraces VoIP. That’s because call recording enables the opportunity to pick out poor customer service experiences through the use of speech analytics, and it is a supreme tool for training employees. It is one thing to tell an employee how to better handle a hard call, it is another to play back an example of a success in practice.
Businesses that want to stay ahead need to use technologies such as VoIP and call recording. If they don’t, another business will.
Which is exactly what is happening with Skype right now. The company is playing a dangerous game with its seemingly reduced call quality. With so many other services out there that are similar, it can ill-afford to make its customers dissatisfied.
Edited by Alisen Downey