VoIP

Communication is the lifeblood of any business and when it comes to selecting the right modern business phone system. When you look for a business phone solution, you’ll see various terms such as VoIP phone system, cloud communication solution, cloud telephony, etc. While most of these terms refer to the same system, they have differences that could impact your business operations.

In this article, we’ll look closely at VoIP and cloud telephony systems. We’ll cover:

• What is VoIP?
• What is cloud telephony?
• VoIP versus cloud telephony

Choosing the Right Business Phone System

Business phone systems offer many communication options for companies ranging from small business VoIP services to advanced PBX systems. In today’s digital landscape, these systems handle audio, video, and text communication efficiently. They’re cost-effective and allow you to connect with multiple customers simultaneously.

Both VoIP and cloud telephony have their advantages and disadvantages. So, your choice should align with your business size, budget, scalability needs, and existing IT infrastructure. Additionally, consider the long-term needs of your business to make a future-proof choice.

What is VoIP and How it Works?

Voice over internet protocol (VoIP), an integral part of modern communication, enables users to place calls over the internet.

Essentially, it leverages the internet to transmit your voice, making it a cost-effective and flexible way to communicate. In other words, it eliminates the need for traditional phone lines.

Services like Skype, Zoom, and WhatsApp use VoIP to enable voice and video calls over the internet. Your voice or video data is turned into small digital packets, sent over the internet, and delivered.

The ability to send calls through the internet opens the door for many communication features like international forwarding and call routing. In fact, VoIP is commonly used for international calls, especially for long-distance calling. Companies like Global Call Forwarding provide international VoIP numbers that businesses can use to communicate with their local clientele.

What is Cloud Telephony and How it Works?

Cloud telephony is a communication system hosted and managed through the cloud, allowing users to make and receive phone calls from any location.

It is an inherently cloud-based phone system where the infrastructure, services, and data are hosted in remote or cloud data centers.

Since it operates in a virtual space, this system also has several features including call recording, IVR, etc. This way, you can turn any device (smartphone, laptop, etc) with a robust internet connection into a cloud phone.

Many call centers and customer support centers use cloud telephony to manage incoming and outgoing calls. Instead of traditional phone systems, they use cloud-based systems that route calls to available agents, where they are located.

Learn more about how cloud telephony works here:

VoIP Versus Cloud Telephony

So, with both phone systems sounding the same, how exactly are they different?

VoIP sends voice calls over the internet or IP networks. This gives businesses the flexibility to manage their equipment on-site or use a cloud provider.

On the other hand, cloud telephony is a broader communication platform. It uses VoIP alongside other technology to send calls, call data, video, and messages over the internet.

The term cloud simply refers to how VoIP company servers collaborate. While most cloud telephony platforms use VoIP, not all VoIP systems are in the cloud.

A lot of small businesses may use a VoIP system that they manage on-site. In such cases, they own and manage the VoIP infrastructure and hardware within the office. In contrast, larger companies may opt for cloud telephony solutions where all the phone systems components are hosted in the cloud and managed by their VoIP provider.

Modern Business Communications

Effective communication is the linchpin that connects businesses to their customers and partners. As you can see, there is a spectrum of choices to enhance your business communication infrastructure.

VoIP and cloud telephony, while related, have nuanced differences that can influence your business operations. It is crucial to plan and make a future-proof decision.

Global Call Forwarding offers state-of-the-art business communication solutions, whether you’re a small enterprise or a global corporation. Take the next step and reach out to us to elevate your business communications.

Call us or chat with our experts online to unlock your business’s potential today!

Streamlining your business processes not only helps you achieve greater operational efficiency but also improves the overall quality of your service. And this, in turn, can lead to a more competitive edge in your respective market.

But, where do you start?

By removing unnecessary or time-consuming tasks from your team’s workflow.

One way to achieve this is by combining your business tools into one, centralized platform. This is where VoIP CRM integrations come in. This solution helps you and your teams save precious time, so you can improve the efficiency and effectiveness of your service.

In this article, we’ll cover everything you need to know about these integrations, including basic definitions, how it works, benefits, popular CRM software, and more. Let’s get started!

What are VoIP CRM Integrations?

Let’s define VoIP CRM integrations by breaking these concepts down.

A VoIP integration allows you to integrate your phone system with other business applications and software. This capability improves your team’s efficiency by combining your essential tools into one platform.

And a CRM is a software tool that helps you manage prospect and customer relationships by storing key information such as contact details, purchase history, interactions, behaviors, preferences, and so on. That’s why this technology is aptly named Customer Relationship Management. It’s typically used by sales and support professionals as a way of preparing for calls.

Now, if you combine these two concepts, you get VoIP CRM integrations, which link your cloud phone system to your CRM software. This allows for seamless communication and synchronization between these two technologies, enabling your teams to receive and place calls through their CRM.

How it Works

The main thing to note is that VoIP CRM integrations connect your VoIP phone system to your CRM to increase the functionality of both systems. It also enables automatic, two-way data syncing between these two platforms. So, you no longer need to toggle between applications to complete tasks or manually enter information into both systems.

But for this to work properly, you need a CRM tool and a VoIP provider that offers an integration solution for that specific CRM software.

So, what does a VoIP CRM integration look like in action?

• When calls come into your VoIP system, your reps will see a screen pop displaying important caller information pulled directly from your CRM. And if you’re looking to place a call within your CRM, this integration enables click-to-call so you can initiate a call by simply clicking on the customer’s phone number.
• On top of that, all call data is automatically logged within your cloud phone system’s control panel, even if the call occurred through your CRM. And agents can upload call recordings and notes to their CRM for more detailed customer overviews.

These integrated capabilities work together to increase operational efficiency and optimize your team’s workflow, so they can focus on providing the best service possible.

Top Features to Expect

Now every provider (VoIP or CRM) will offer different features with their integrations. So, as you shop around, you’ll need to identify what features work best for your communication needs.

Some of the top features of VoIP CRM integrations include:

• Click-to-Call — clickable link for each phone number within the CRM
• Customer and Call Notes — the ability to create and update notes during customer calls
• Screen Pop / Call Pop — ‘pop-up’ that displays customer information as a call comes in
• Call Recording — the ability to record and review inbound and outbound calls
• Softphone / Web Dialer — CTI software that enables customers make calls through a web-based dialer
• Caller ID Management — custom caller ID tool to display specific outgoing phone numbers
• Workflow Automation — features to improve and optimize workflows.

Benefits of VoIP CRM Integrations

Business communication improves across the board when you combine the power and convenience of VoIP with your CRM’s valuable customer insights.

Let’s have a look at how your business can benefit:

1. Increased Efficiency & Productivity

Reduce time spent searching for essential customer information and switching between platforms. With this integration, reps easily manage communication in one place. And with the ability to create new contacts, track leads, resolve tickets, and take notes while on the phone, agents can maximize their time leading to more productivity.

2. Improved Customer Experiences

Quickly reference relevant customer information and previous interactions during calls. This way, agents have the necessary context to personalize conversations and properly address the caller’s needs. And customers don’t have to repeat themselves, leading to a better caller experience.

3. Efficient Collaboration

Encourage distributed, remote, and cross-department collaboration with the ability to read notes, follow customer journeys, listen to recordings, and more. With all this available through one centralized platform – accessible from any device – your teams always remain on the same page.

4. Optimized Team Management

Gain better visibility into your team’s performance and progress by reviewing call logs, notes, recordings, and more. This makes it easy for managers to monitor and analyze the activity between leads and reps in real-time.

5. Easy Deployment

Set up your VoIP CRM integration and begin calling within minutes. No coding or developers are required with this solution.

6. Enhanced Functionality

Integrate essential calling technology into your CRM where you can:

• • Make and receive calls
  • Access international calling
  • Benefit from advanced calling features

With all tools in one place, you can optimize your inside sales efforts from any location.

7. Automated Accuracy

Reduce human error and increase focus on high-priority tasks with automatic data synchronization and click-to-dial capabilities. No need for double-checking!

Popular VoIP CRM Integrations

To help you choose the best solution for your business, let’s review the top CRM software that work well with VoIP:

Get Started with VoIP CRM Integrations

Connecting your VoIP phone system to your CRM is a game-changer for companies looking to streamline their day-to-day operations and achieve greater success in the modern business landscape.

Global Call Forwarding is constantly working to bring our customers more integrations to help them optimize business processes and unify communications. Currently, we offer users contact center integrations that work to improve your system’s efficiency such as cloud voice APIs and PBX integrations.

To learn more about our integrations, call +1 (561) 908-6171 or chat with our telecom experts online!

Looking for a way to streamline your team’s outreach efforts? Then, an outbound dialer may be the solution for you, as it helps your employees place calls faster. This technology goes by many names, including web dialers, softphones, manual dialers, power dialers, predictive dialers, and so on. But, the goal remains the same among all these variations – to increase the efficiency of your outbound calls.

In this article, we will discuss the basics of outbound dialers, including different types, features, benefits, and where to get these tools. Let’s jump in!

What are Outbound Dialers?

Outbound dialers are cloud-based solutions that enable users to make outgoing calls over an IP network. Since these dialers combine computer and telephone capabilities, they are a prime example of computer telephony integration (CTI).

Businesses and call centers typically use these web dialers for outreach purposes such as sales, telemarketing, market research, scheduling, and customer service tasks. This is because outbound dialers increase the efficiency of your outreach efforts by helping reps make more calls in less time. They also allow multiple agents to place calls simultaneously using the same phone line and outgoing caller ID.

Types of Outbound Dialers

When researching outbound dialers, you’ll find many types available, each with different capabilities and use cases. Let’s take a look at the 3 main types of outbound dialers; manual, power, and predictive dialers.

It’s important to note that using automatic and predictive dialers may get your business phone number marked as spam. This is because outbound dialers place several calls in a short timeframe, resulting in your number being flagged.

Moreover, predictive dialers include a high risk of abandoned calls. So, this solution might not be for you if you’re trying to improve conversion rates.

For those reasons, determine which dialer is right for your outbound calling needs and conduct thorough research on each tool. Remember to always start slow with automatic dialers, pay attention to the FCC’s call compliance regulations, and always use sound judgment when placing calls.

Additional Calling Features

Not only are there different types of outbound dialers, but some also include additional IP telephony features. These features will vary depending on your chosen provider and type of dialer. Here are the top outbound dialer features for businesses:

• Make international outbound calls from any location or device
• Caller ID management
• Advanced call routing
• Call recording
• Voicemail
• Ability to call with one click
• Assisted call transfers
• Fully integrated contacts
• Filter-based calling
• International call forwarding
• Call reports and analytics
• In-network calls
• CRM integrations
• Call monitoring
• Campaign tracking

How Can Outbound Dialers Benefit Your Business?

It’s easy to see the opportunity and benefits that outbound dialers offer businesses. At a basic level, these tools work to simplify your business’ outreach efforts and enhance your team’s performance. With that being said, let’s review outbound dialers’ 4 key benefits.

1. Increase Operational Efficiency

One of the biggest benefits of this technology is that it streamlines your calling processes by allowing reps to dial numbers faster. And since outbound dialers typically integrate with other business applications, there’s no need for employees to switch between apps or devices to place calls. This means your teams can avoid unnecessary workflow disruptions and increase available time, leading to a more efficient call process.

2. Boost Employee Productivity Levels

By optimizing your agents’ time, teams can connect with more prospects and customers daily, boosting their productivity levels. And since integrated web dialers minimize and, in some cases, eliminate menial tasks, your employees can focus on nurturing leads, driving conversions, and closing sales.

3. Work From Anywhere

Most outbound dialers are cloud-based. This means you can access them from any location or device. All you need is a stable internet connection and the proper login credentials to use these tools. This flexibility and mobility allow you to work from anywhere, making dialers a great solution for distributed and remote teams.

4. Craft a Better Caller Experience

Many providers offer users access to call detail records and call recording with their dialer software. These advanced communication features allow you to evaluate employee performance, caller experience, and overall service quality. This way, you can adjust your outbound services as needed to craft an even better experience for callers.

Where to Get an Outbound Dialer

To get started with this technology, you simply need to find a cloud communication provider that offers the type of outbound dialer you need.

Global Call Forwarding is a leading IP telephony provider. We deliver a multitude of cloud-based phone services, including our own outbound web dialer – the GCF softphone. You can get and use our softphone by signing up for an outbound calling plan with us.

Ready to get started? Call us at +1 (561) 908-6171 or sign up online!

As a business, the difference between a good and bad service is being accessible and reachable at all times. So, needless to say, the best way to build trust in customers is to be available whenever they need you.

This means keeping those phone lines working at all times.

In this post, you will learn about the importance of building fail-safes within your business phone system and how to set up SIP failover.

SIP Failover for Business Phone Systems

In an IBM study on planned vs unplanned downtime, 49% of IT directors listed data recovery as a top technical challenge, while 53% ranked loss of revenue as a top business challenge. As you can see, there is no upside to a system shut down, even if it’s for a few minutes.

Phone systems powered by voice over IP (VoIP) and session initiation protocol (SIP) are cloud-based. This gives them flexibility and mobility, as they are not limited to one physical location or device. But since SIP phone systems rely on the internet, it is important to keep your IT processes running.

Thankfully, SIP and VoIP phone systems provide users with backup phone lines and routing mechanisms to allow business continuity.

To better understand SIP failover, we will look at:

• What is SIP Failover and Why Do You Need it?
• SIP Failover Solutions
• How to Prevent Phone System Failure?
• Phone System Disaster Recovery
• How to Set Up SIP Failover?

What is SIP Failover?

SIP failover is a backup operation that activates when your main SIP phone system fails. In other words, your phone service will fail over to the backup system or setup you have in place.

There are a few different reasons why your SIP phone system may fail:

• Power or internet outage
• Natural disasters
• Crisis or conflict
• Cyberattacks or DoS attacks, to name a few.

When disaster strikes, SIP failover automatically kicks in to ensure your business continues providing voice support with little to no downtime. Other terms for this action include SIP redundancy and VoIP failover.

Why Do You Need SIP Redundancy?

We are not always trained to consider creating backups for every process or system. But when it comes to your business, not having backup support in place can prove detrimental.

In the event your phone system fails, your business won’t be able to communicate with employees and customers — especially if they are all over the world. This will lead to significant downtime and delays if you don’t have SIP failover in place.

Consequences of business phone system failure include:

• Service and productivity interruptions where customers cannot reach out for support and employees may not complete essential tasks
• Inflated call volumes and hold times once your system is back up
• Diminished customer and caller experience
• Loss of consumer trust and business reliability
• Missed business opportunities
• Reduced sales and revenue overall

Benefits of Building Failover within Your Business Phone System

When you plan in advance, you can reduce the instances of your business phone system experiencing any interruption. SIP failover and redundancy strategies ensure your communication system has:

• Access to a proxy so you can maintain business continuity
• Reduced downtime and service interruptions
• Seamless caller experience
• Ability to offer reliable support to customers, even in the face of crises.

SIP Failover Solutions (Prevention and Recovery)

So, how do you create a reliable and redundant VoIP phone system? Let’s look at different SIP failover solutions available at the prevention and recovery stages:

How to Prevent Phone System Failure?

The first step is to prepare in advance so that you experience little to no downtime during an emergency. You can do this by building redundancy into your phone system itself.

So, how to set up SIP failover?

Here are some ways to prevent business phone system failure:

1. Set up backup systems, devices, and teams

Ask your in-house IT and operation teams to create and maintain backup systems and equipment. Build redundancy into your network via alternate routers, switches, access points, and so on. Support your LAN infrastructure with the needed backup power and include secondary connections. You can also add call groups and remote teams to function as backups in case your primary team is unavailable.

2. Use a provider with multiple layers of redundancy

A high-availability provider can offer continuous cloud phone service with 99.999% uptime. This is because they have multiple geo-redundant data centers spread globally – letting them route calls via different channels if one channel is unavailable. So, you can rest assured that your calls will still run through their network if there is a crisis.

3. Set up geo-redundancy with business calling features

Your provider should also offer you SIP failover capabilities to create custom backup solutions for your needs. For instance, you can set up routing strategies that automatically kick in if calls do not connect to the primary or secondary destination. Look for top features such as VoIP failover and sequential ring.

4. Create a recovery plan beforehand

Finally, create a plan that outlines what will happen in case of a disaster. This should be quickly implemented when the time comes. You can plan for different disasters or crises and have backup solutions in place. Check out our disaster recovery plan templates to get started.

Phone System Disaster Recovery

The best way to protect your business phone system against downtime is to build a resilient system and create a disaster recovery solution. Recovering from a phone system failure depends on the reason for failure: natural disasters, internet outages, security breaches, etc. Let’s look at how you might recover from SIP failures in these situations:

1. Natural disasters

If SIP failover is already set in place, calls should automatically forward to the next location or device in your list. If your business is in a location prone to natural disasters, it’s a good idea to have teams spread across different locations. You can also add a call center BPO as a backup option. This way, the other teams can continue conversing with clients while your main team stays safe.

2. Network and internet outages

Access your cloud-based phone service from other locations and devices. For example, you can log into your Global Call Forwarding control panel from any smartphone or internet-enabled device. You can then change forwarding and routing rules or update your greeting message to adapt to your current situation and apply them in real-time.

3. Security breach

Activate your incident response team. Identify the threat and take the necessary action. Refer to your disaster recovery plan and contact your VoIP provider for crisis support. In this case, it may be best to halt your service to keep company and customer data safe.

How to Set Up SIP Failover?

As you can see, there are a few different ways to set up failover for your business phone system. But while utilizing all may seem daunting and expensive, you don’t need to do everything.

If nothing else, you should have at least the following three failover solutions in place:

1. Redundant and reliable cloud phone service provider
2. Advanced routing and forwarding strategies
3. Phone system disaster recovery plan or solution

Voice Continuity with Global Call Forwarding

As a global cloud telephony provider, we understand the importance of remaining accessible at all times. This is why we have written extensively about VoIP reliability, SIP trunking best practices, and more. Our business voice redundancy guide provides actionable steps about how you can create a highly redundant phone system with multiple failover options.

Our goal is to help ensure your business can communicate with customers without any interruptions. Have questions about our failover solutions? Call us to learn more or chat with our experts today!

More and more businesses are adopting cloud phone systems for more flexibility and mobility. Cloud phone services, powered by VoIP and SIP, bring you high-quality voice that is manageable from any location and device.

Here, we’ll look specifically at SIP termination services and why you should upgrade your phone system with SIP trunks.

Understanding VoIP and SIP Termination

Before we get started, let’s quickly recap the basics of SIP. Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) is a signaling protocol typically used to transmit voice and other unified communications via an internet connection. VoIP systems use SIP to send voice calls from one destination (your business) to another (customers). The only requirement is that your VoIP system remains connected to the internet.

To understand how SIP trunking works, we’ll go over:

• What is SIP Origination?
• What is SIP Termination + Benefits?
• How to Identify the Right SIP Termination Provider?

Let’s start by understanding what these terms mean.

What is SIP Origination?

SIP origination — like voice origination — refers to the process of handling an originating call and successfully delivering it to the destination.

In the case of a business, the originating call is an incoming call, while the destination it will be delivered to is your company. Your global SIP provider receives incoming calls made to your phone number and then routes them to your system without any interruptions.

What is SIP Termination?

SIP termination is the process of sending phone calls from one provider (usually a SIP trunking provider) to another PSTN or VoIP provider.

In this case, you use SIP trunks to initiate and make outbound calls to customers wherever they are located. SIP termination comes with standard VoIP and SIP trunking features such as outbound calling, advanced routing, caller ID management, and more.

But what is SIP trunking, and how does it fit within your business phone system?

SIP trunking is a cloud phone service that initiates and transmits voice messages from one destination to another. You simply plug these virtual SIP trunks into your existing PBX or traditional phone setup.

SIP then adds high-quality VoIP capabilities to your phone system so that you can make and receive calls from any location and device. It also enables you to use advanced communication features as mentioned above.

Related: What is VoIP Termination and Why Do You Need it?

Benefits of SIP Termination: Capabilities and Flexibilities

So, why does your business need to consider SIP termination as a part of your phone system?

From small businesses to large corporations, voice termination is a major part of providing proactive customer service and sales support. Your business requires a cost-effective and reliable way to connect with customers and prospects wherever they are located. So, you need a phone service that supports your team’s communication requirements.

Here’s what makes SIP termination, along with SIP trunking, a cost-effective and reliable business phone solution:

• Cost-effective for local and long-distance communication
• Competitive international calling rates
• High deliverability and crystal clear audio quality
• Large inventory of local, toll-free, and international phone numbers to choose from
• Access to call management and advanced routing features
• Eliminate the need for traditional PSTN or legacy phone systems
• Low cost of additional hardware and maintenance
• Added flexibility with access from any location or device

How to Identify the Right SIP Termination Provider?

While there are multiple SIP trunk providers out there, not all offer the same level of quality. So, it is important to take the time to understand which provider is a good fit for your needs.

When choosing the right SIP termination provider for your business, consider the following:

1. Research

Look at different global SIP trunk providers. Understand the scope of their service and features. Ask about network availability, reliability, and what makes them offer uninterrupted services.

2. Analyze

Compare providers based on pricing, plan capabilities, features, customer support availability, and so on. Look through customer reviews and case studies to see what current customers are saying about the service.

3. Reach Out

Contact sales to understand how they can help support your business’s specific needs. If you have a requirement or need that the business does not advertise, ask if they have any flexible or customizable solutions. Some businesses may be able to accommodate your request.

4. Test

Finally, ask if they offer a free trial, so you can test the service and experience the quality for yourself.

Related: 10 Best USA SIP Trunk Providers

SIP Trunking with Global Call Forwarding

Global Call Forwarding proudly offers carrier-grade global voice service, including SIP termination. You can use our SIP trunking solution to expand your business’ reach in various countries around the world, and take advantage of our selection of call management features.

Want to learn more? Chat with our experts today!

Customer service expectations have increased in the past decade, with more and more businesses being “forever accessible.” Many companies offer 24/7 support, while others are reachable via multiple communication channels. And some use customer service automation like chatbots and AI support to be ever-present when customers need them.

Because of these expectations and thanks to technological advancement — it is easier than ever to be there for your customers. Businesses like yours rely on having a constant stream of data and connectivity. So, what happens if your systems fail?

Specifically, what will happen if your business phone system fails and customers cannot contact their account managers? Or, interested prospects are not able to finalize purchases? They will simply go to a competitor who is easy to contact and more reliable. This is where building a fully redundant communication infrastructure becomes important.

In this guide to incoming business voice redundancy, we will look at why and how you must prepare your business to succeed and remain accessible at all times.

Using Voice Redundancy to Create a Seamless Caller Experience

Even with the growth of new support channels, conversations via email and phone account for about 81% of inbound communications. This means that most customers try to contact your company via phone.

Many businesses have redundancy and backup systems in place for different applications. But few make their voice or phone system redundant as well. It is essential to incorporate redundancy within your VoIP and network infrastructure to secure communication continuity in the event of disaster or outages. This ensures your employees continue communicating with each other and customers, even in a crisis.

In this guide, we’ll cover:

• Basics of Voice Redundancy (Definition & Types)
• Why VoIP Redundancy is Important (Consequences & Benefits)
• Solutions & Best Practices (Prevent, Monitor, Recover)

What is Voice Redundancy?

Voice redundancy is the process of implementing failover and redundancy by including backup systems within your network.

In other words, you integrate additional or alternate instances of devices, equipment, communication channels, routing strategies, and more within your VoIP infrastructure.

The purpose of redundancy in VoIP networks is to provide an alternative when your original network setup fails. So if your main phone system goes down, you automatically switch to the backup. This way, your business does not have to worry about downtime.

Most telephony providers offer increased reliability and new capabilities with their PBXs, VoIP systems, and call center software. These capabilities are often customizable – allowing you to create failover solutions that work best for your business.

Voice redundancy is also known as VoIP redundancy, failover redundancy, and VoIP failover, among other terms.

Understanding Voice Failover and Redundancy

One thing to understand is that failover and redundancy work alongside each other. And you can use different forms of redundancy to achieve VoIP failover in your phone system. But what does all this really mean? Let’s break it down.

Failover is the backup operation that activates your secondary setup when the primary system fails. Cloud phone service providers offer VoIP failover options customizable to each user’s needs. Failover is achieved by having redundancy built into your phone system.

Example of a failover solution — If your main SIP or PSTN devices cannot receive incoming calls, you can route calls to another destination.

Redundancy is how you set up your secondary system. Redundancy improves your phone system’s reliability by providing alternative, independent paths through which calls reroute. This works best when your provider has redundancy built into their systems as well. And providers achieve this by having multiple data centers in different locations and working with other carriers.

Example of redundancy — Your VoIP provider works with a global network of local and regional carriers across different service areas.

Together, failover and redundancy ensure

• Access to a resilient proxy for 24/7 accessibility
• Seamless caller experience
• Fewer interruptions for your business and your customers.

Types of VoIP Networks Redundancy

There are a few types of voice redundancy and different ways to implement it within your network. Let’s look at the top methods — high-availability vs fault-tolerant redundant systems:

High-availability works by using clusters of servers that monitor each other. These servers have failover protocols in place. If one server fails or stops working, backup servers activate and restart applications running on the failed server. This strategy does not need extravagant infrastructure, but may experience little downtime as the backup server starts up.

Fault-tolerant redundant systems utilize full hardware redundancy, where multiple physical systems mirror applications simultaneously. If one system fails, the other systems take over with no downtime. However, these systems are more complex and expensive.

Choosing between high-availability and fault-tolerant systems depends on a few factors:

• Business communication infrastructure,
• Communication and IT budget, and
• How much downtime you can afford.

Why is Incoming Voice Redundancy So Important?

In the early days of SIP and VoIP, technology was not developed enough for reliability and redundancy. Voice quality was relatively low and failover options weren’t easily accessible. So when a crisis struck, systems would go down and stay down. Needless to say, uptime was a major concern

It is no secret that businesses need to ensure that the phones are working and available at all times. In the time it takes to get your systems back up and running, you may miss out on calls from customers and prospects. And as a business, you know the costs that come with losing out on opportunities and not being able to support your customers.

This is what makes VoIP geo-redundancy important. And thanks to advancements in telecommunications, cloud telephony providers today have multiple layers of redundancy and offer various failover solutions.

Consequences of Business Phone System Failure

Every large enterprise or small business should aim for call continuity along with other business continuity strategies. System architects and operations managers know the importance of managing internal and external communications.

If your phone stops working and you experience significant downtime, you stand to lose valuable business opportunities. Communication is entirely halted. Employees are unable to complete their responsibilities. Customers cannot contact your business for assistance. Sales slow down. And using private phones to call customers may further damage your business’s professional image.

Recovery can take longer depending on your disaster and backup plans. This is why planning and preparing in advance helps your business navigate crises more effectively.

Business voice redundancy provides fail-safe solutions on different levels such as backup servers, multiple phone lines, automated and advanced call routing, and more.

Benefits of a Fully Redundant Phone System

When you set up VoIP redundancy and failover, you get

• Reliable phone service with high uptime
• Ability to failover to any internet connection and device
• Uninterrupted service and business continuity
• Protection against network disruptions and disasters
• Managed voice continuity (MVC)
• A fully redundant architecture

You can also enjoy these benefits when using a high-availability phone service provider.

Voice Redundancy Solutions & Best Practices

Redundancy is the key to failover and keeping your systems functioning at all times. Here are the 3 most important redundancy best practices and solutions to help you build a reliable phone system:

• Prevent
• Monitor
• Recover

Let’s look at them individually.

1. Prevention: How to Add Voice Redundancy

You can include business voice redundancy within your phone network on two levels:

1. Provider-level: Find a provider with high-availability or multiple layers of redundancy built into their systems. Ask about their network and how they provide reliability. Do they have multiple points of presence (POPs) and data centers? What failover capabilities do they offer with their service and can you customize them? How do they prevent network interruptions? Does their voice traffic automatically failover to another carrier if one carrier or route goes down? And so on.

2. Features-level: Use failover capabilities to create custom backup solutions for your network. Use your IT and operation teams to create and manage backup systems in-house. This might include setting up additional hardware and equipment. You can also organize teams and call groups to function as backups.

Then, create automated routing strategies with your phone service provider’s failover features. Use advanced routing features so calls forward or ring on other devices or numbers if the first destination is inactive. Top features include VoIP failover, sequential ring, and simultaneous ring.

2. Monitoring: Keep an Eye on Your Systems and Services

Next, proactively monitor your network, phone numbers, service lines, and call quality. When you monitor, you’ll know if a number or service line stops working. Then, you can troubleshoot and implement failover options such as

• Changing the destination
• Switching to a backup phone number
• Investigating the routing path

Your provider should be able to monitor their service and network, including your numbers. When finding a provider, it’s good to ask how they safeguard their network and call quality. Additionally, you want a provider who is responsive and easy to contact when you need support or troubleshooting help.

You can also monitor call quality on your own with a voice assurance solution like Spearline’s. This way, you are alerted to potential problems before they get out of hand and affect your business.

3. Disaster Recovery: How to Get Your System Back Up and Running

The last step is to recover when disaster strikes. And of course, this depends on the type of crises you face: natural disasters, network outages, data breaches, and so on. Create a disaster recovery plan beforehand that you can implement when the time comes.

With a natural disaster, your options may be limited and safety should be the top priority. If you have failover set up already, calls can route through different paths to different devices and locations.

With network or internet outages, you may need to change locations or devices. For example, you can access the Global Call Forwarding control panel online from any device. This way, if your primary phone setup fails, login to your account from your smartphone and make the necessary changes.

Add a new message to your IVR indicating slow service. Or, forward incoming calls to employees’ private devices. You can even enable employees to make outbound calls from their personal phones using the business phone number as the caller ID. This way, you maintain call continuity even if your primary setup stops working. Alternatively, you can outsource calls to a call center listed in your recovery plan.

If your phone system was hacked, leverage your incident response team to reduce the cost of a data breach. Once you have identified the threat, inform users on your network. Disconnect any devices and systems on the network. Contact your VoIP provider for support and crisis assistance.

Depending on the extent of the breach, you may be able to send calls to a different location. Otherwise, it may be better to halt service to ensure that customer and company data are not further compromised. When the time is right, inform customers about the breach so that they can take the proper steps to protect themselves.

How Does Global Call Forwarding Offer Business Voice Redundancy?

We know that outages and downtime can hurt your business. So, our voice redundancy solutions are designed to keep your business running smoothly.

Global Call Forwarding has a wide global network of reliable Tier-1 carriers with multiple POPs across the Americas and APAC. This enables us to provide high-availability solutions with multiple layers of redundancy as well as hard-to-reach phone service across the globe.

We also have an in-house-built secure voice communication app working on all platforms. And our control panel is accessible online through web and mobile devices. This way, you can stay connected from any part of the world and through any device.

More importantly, we utilize the highest quality voice termination to give you high quality and value.

All this lets us offer you reliable service with 99.999% uptime. Work closely with our dedicated account managers to find the right solution for your business phone system.

Call us today at +1 (561) 908-6171 or chat with us online!

Want to see our service in action? Read about how we helped EaseMyTrip provide uninterrupted support to international clients.

Effective communication systems are at the heart of successful businesses. SIP provides your business phone system with a dependable, cost-effective, and modernized service. While this service offers a ton of capabilities and benefits for your business, it’s normal to experience SIP-related issues every so often. We’ll discuss typical SIP problems and our recommended solutions.

Identifying and Troubleshooting Common SIP Issues

SIP trunking uses the internet to route calls, making your business communication easy and affordable. SIP provides reliable and stable communication services. But as with any technology, even SIP encounters technical issues. Although this service usually has a low downtime, it’s great to know tips for troubleshooting SIP problems.

Understanding Your SIP Trunk Phone System

It’s helpful to understand how your SIP system works to properly identify any upcoming issues. Before we get into common SIP problems and their solutions, let’s first review the basics of your SIP trunking service.

Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) works with VoIP to transmit and maintain multimedia communication through the internet. SIP trunks convert communication data into digital packets. The service then delivers the packets to your desired destination, also referred to as a packet switch network.

One SIP trunk includes several channels. Every channel represents one call, whether it is inbound or outbound. A SIP trunk with multiple channels enables you to simultaneously place or receive multiple calls. Additionally, SIP trunking works with most devices and can even be integrated with your PBX.

Now on to common SIP problems and solutions. We’ve divided SIP issues into two main categories and included our recommended fixes:

As we begin to discuss SIP problems, keep in mind your selected SIP service and settings. Also, you can review our glossary to familiarize yourself with the terminology used in this article.

Audio Quality SIP Problems

Communication is vital in any business. So, poor audio quality can negatively impact business calls. The first step in solving an audio VoIP problem is to identify the issue. Audio quality issues could be anything from jitters, echoes, and delays to broken audio. Keep in mind that some solutions apply to multiple SIP problems. Let’s take a deeper look at each issue, possible causes, and solutions.

1. Echoes

Phone echoing occurs when voice audio repeats at a later interval. Usually, the caller experiencing the echo isn’t the one creating it. Echoes trigger caller frustration and affect caller experience for both parties. The main cause of phone echoing is hardware problems or a slow internet connection.

Solution for Echo in Audio

The quickest way to eliminate an echo is to take your phone off speakerphone or lower the volume. Speakerphones use multiple microphones and speakers to transmit your voice. Since this function uses several microphones, voice audio is sometimes reflected back and causes echoing.

Keep an eye on your equipment. If you have a faulty microphone or headset, it can also contribute to echoing. Outdated or damaged equipment within your SIP or VoIP infrastructure — such as an old switch, headset, router, or cables — generates audio quality issues. Replace your old equipment or legacy phone system to help reduce unwanted feedback and audio interference.

Related: Modernizing Legacy Phone Systems: How and Why to Upgrade?

2. Delays or Latency

Voice delays are a significant pause between when you say things and when the recipient hears you. This is also known as audio latency or lag. Latency leads to callers talking over each other or prolonged pauses in the conversation. The common cause of voice delay originates from a low internet speed.

Solution for Audio Delay

If you have audio quality issues, check your current bandwidth power. Bandwidth affects both the upload and download speeds of your internet connection. For one SIP channel, your minimum bandwidth speed should be 100 kbps. This rate should increase depending on the amount of SIP channels or trunks you have. Contact your internet service provider (ISP) to ensure your network meets these bandwidth requirements.

If you’re still having audio trouble after checking your bandwidth power, review your Quality of Service (QoS) settings on your router. QoS enables you to prioritize different kinds of traffic on your network.

3. Broken Audio

When words or voices continuously cut in and out, you’re experiencing choppy or broken audio. Inconsistent audio increases miscommunication between parties. The usual source of broken audio is packet loss. Packet loss occurs when certain pieces of data are not successfully transmitted. Typically, network or internet connection problems contribute to packet loss.

Solution for Broken Audio

Although WiFi is usually strong enough for basic internet access, Ethernet may be a better option for your VoIP phone system. An Ethernet cable increases internet speed, lowers network latency, and offers a more stable connection. This is a possible solution to packet loss that causes broken audio and jitters.

Streaming services take up bandwidth power and contribute to internet traffic on your network. When making or receiving calls, consider closing the streaming services to increase call audio quality.

Related: 10 Best USA SIP Trunk Providers

4. Jitters

Call jitter occurs when voice audio is missing or jumbled. Similar to broken audio, audio is lost and never delivered to the recipient. But unlike broken audio, voice data has the potential to be delivered out of order. This affects the overall quality of the call and often leads to miscommunication. Packet loss also triggers this issue and originates from a poor internet connection.

Solution for Jitter in VoIP Calls

Again, poor internet connection and insufficient bandwidth contribute to many common SIP problems, including audio quality issues. A stable and strong internet connection sets you up for the best audio quality. Double-check that you have the appropriate amount of bandwidth available to power your devices and services.

A jitter buffer intentionally delays incoming audio data packets so that the caller receives clear sound. You can use either a static or dynamic jitter buffer. A static buffer is set up through your hardware by the manufacturer. Whereas, a dynamic buffer is software-based and easy to modify to the needs of your network.

5. No Sound

This issue occurs when your call successfully connects, but you can’t hear anything. In some instances, the other caller may not be able to hear you. Lack of sound results in a constant exchange of “Hello?” and “Can you hear me now?” which is really aggravating for both people on the call.

Solution for No Sound in SIP Calls

Firewalls provide your network with security to prevent unauthorized network traffic. However, your firewall may be preventing your audio packets and SIP in general from working properly. To fix this, make sure firewall and PBX ports are open to your provider’s recommended settings. For Global Call Forwarding users, open ports 10,000 to 60,000.

SIP Connection Issues

SIP trunks and VoIP calls make business communication both reliable and efficient. However, users may sometimes experience SIP problems when making, receiving, and connecting calls. Here are some common SIP connection issues and solutions:

6. Inability to Make Calls

Outbound calling is an essential part of operating a business, especially for call centers. It can derail your company’s efforts or business transactions if you cannot place outbound calls. Some services clearly indicate if outbound calling is disabled or unable to connect with a message or icon.

Solution When Unable to Make Calls

First, make sure you have the outbound calling feature added to your account. To check if you have this feature, reach out to your service provider or IT support. Global Call Forwarding users can review your enabled services in the Control Panel or speak to your dedicated account manager.

If you have outbound calling enabled, double-check your SIP credentials. Make sure to confirm the validity of your SIP user ID, password, and domain information with your provider.

Additionally, check that your SIP trunk is set to the proper codec. Codecs both compress and decompress data to reduce file size and consume less bandwidth power. Different codecs provide various data transmission times, known as bitrates, and bandwidth requirements. Contact your SIP provider with questions about correct codec names.

For our users, use codec G.711 for all SIP trunks. The Global Call Forwarding network supports the G.711 codec, which provides the best VoIP call quality and uses no compression.

7. Dropped Calls

When calls randomly end or stop in the middle of your conversation, you experience a dropped call. Businesses or call centers with high call volumes might also experience dropped calls after a specific amount of call time. Dropped calls tend to create caller frustration for both parties.

Solution for Dropped Calls

Dropped calls typically originate from a poor network connection or limited bandwidth power. Analyze your internet speed, connection, network traffic, and available bandwidth power to identify areas of improvement to your network. Consider contacting your ISP or looking for a VoIP quality test online to obtain this info. Additionally, take a look at your QoS settings and make sure to prioritize all voice calls.

Ensure both your software and hardware are updated as needed. For software, consider turning on or allowing automatic updates.

8. Missed Calls or Not Receiving Calls

Calls that go straight to voicemail or don’t properly come through your phone system are considered missed calls. This is another common SIP problem that could affect your company. When you miss calls, you miss business opportunities. So, let’s solve this issue.

Solution for Missing Calls or Not Receiving Calls

If you’re not receiving calls as intended, ensure your firewall isn’t blocking your inbound calls. Simply access your firewall to authorize or manually add your provider’s IP address.

Setting up a friendly trunk can also solve this issue. A friendly trunk allows the call to proceed to the next step in your SIP system. It’s best to ask IT support for help with friendly trunk configuration. But if you’re a do-it-yourself person, you can configure a friendly trunk using open-source PBX software like FreePBX, Elastics, or Asterisk.

Solve Your SIP Problems with a Reliable Service

Selecting the right VoIP provider will help eliminate persistent SIP problems. Look for a SIP trunk provider that understands your business’ communication needs and offers reliable services.

Global Call Forwarding delivers a clear-cut SIP trunking service. We offer 24/7 support and a dedicated account manager for every user. This dedication helps avoid VoIP problems before they begin. Our affordable and straightforward plans provide a stable and reliable service with no roadblocks.

Call us today to learn more or request a demo!

An in-depth guide to VoIP infrastructure for business communication. Learn how an efficient VoIP architecture can set your business up for success by making voice calling reliable, crystal-clear, and cost-effective. We will cover:

• What is VoIP and VoIP Infrastructure?
• What to Consider for a VoIP Infrastructure?
• 5 Common VoIP Network Diagrams

Optimizing Your VoIP Infrastructure

When adding VoIP functionality to your virtual phone system, you need to consider the best way to design your communication infrastructure to increase reliability, reduce costs, and maintain high call quality. Optimizing VoIP infrastructure means preparing your phone system for success and giving your employees the right tools to do their jobs effectively.

What is VoIP?

To understand VoIP infrastructure, we must first understand voice over IP (VoIP) and how it works. Voice over IP is a common and popular technology that enables communication between two parties over the internet instead of traditional phone lines. With traditional lines, voice traveled via electrical signals and copper wires; this meant the farther the voice traveled, the more you paid.

On the other hand, VoIP converts voice into digital signals and transmits voice messages over the internet instead of traditional copper lines. And so, you can place long-distance and international calls without paying high calling rates. Additionally, since these calls run over the internet, the voice quality is high and reliable. All of this makes VoIP a solid communication solution for businesses that want to expand their services worldwide.

So, what is VoIP infrastructure?

VoIP infrastructure is the setup of your backend voice infrastructure and how calls will move between a business, its offices, and customers. It refers to the connection, bandwidth, software, hardware, phone equipment, VoIP phone service, softphones, internal connections, and external connections that will make up your business communication system.

What to Consider for a VoIP Infrastructure?

When planning out your VoIP phone system, you need to consider different layers of VoIP infrastructure to determine your needs. These are the main VoIP requirements to pay attention to:

1. VoIP Phone Service

First, you need a reliable VoIP phone service that will give you the features, services, and coverage you need. Peruse and compare different VoIP providers so that you understand what they offer and how they can help you build a robust and cost-effective phone system.

2. Business Phone Numbers

You might even need to purchase cloud phone numbers or port your existing VoIP number to your new service. Most VoIP providers offer business phone numbers such as toll-free, local, and international numbers from different countries worldwide. These numbers come with international call forwarding so that you can forward them to your team’s location anywhere in the world. You can buy multiple numbers for target countries and forward incoming calls to your main office, regional and remote teams, or call center.

3. Hardware Phones and Equipment

Based on your communication needs and business setup, you may require some hardware and equipment. This usually includes physical desk phones that work with VoIP such as Grandstream or Polycom, computers and laptops, headsets and microphones, etc.

4. Software and Softphones

You can also go the other route and use a cloud-based softphone. Softphones let users make and receive calls from devices such as computers, laptops, tablets, smartphones. You can use a softphone from a web browser or as a computer or smartphone app. They provide more flexibility and mobility as users can connect from any location or device, and they don’t need a desk phone at all times. Most VoIP providers offer a softphone with their service but make sure you check when finding a new provider.

5. IP-PBX System & SIP Trunking

If you already have a VoIP-enabled phone or an IP-PBX system (3CX, FreePBX, Cisco, etc.), then you can simply connect your VoIP phone solution to your existing phone system. This means you do not have to plan out or re-adjust your VoIP infrastructure for a new service.

You can also integrate SIP trunking within your cloud PBX or IP-PBX system. Bring Your Own Carrier (BYOC) is a service where you bring your own VoIP or SIP trunking carrier and plug it into your existing phone system. This way, you get to choose and control what carrier and service quality you want for your phone system.

6. VoIP Bandwidth

To make VoIP work, you need a VoIP service and an internet connection with a suitable bandwidth to handle your business’ call volume. This makes VoIP bandwidth an essential part of your VoIP infrastructure. When finding a new provider, check with them how much bandwidth will be required to manage your call volume. This is usually determined by the number of phone lines needed, how many calls occur simultaneously, and other applications using the internet.

7. Internal and External Connectivity

Call management is crucial to operating a business efficiently. VoIP can span across different locations and teams, connecting them all together via one centralized hub. And so, you need to determine how your teams will communicate internally and externally what VoIP features will help manage this communication. In other words, how will your teams communicate amongst themselves and with your customers and vendors?

Small businesses might handle all communication within one office and use phone, chat, and email to collaborate. But they may have to manage incoming calls from customers in other regions and countries. Similarly, medium-sized businesses might have teams spread across key target markets and need to regularly manage incoming calls from global customers. In these cases, you will need to consider how your VoIP phone system will handle these calls and route them effectively to the right department or agent.

8. VoIP Security

Lastly, you want to understand how secure your VoIP network is and how to maintain security across the whole system. Have a conversation with your provider; ask them how their service is encrypted and what ensures network security. Additionally, ask how you and your teams can keep your systems safe. If you manage remote teams, make sure you have a BYOD policy in place so that employees know how to keep their devices and, by extension, your business information secure.

5 Common VoIP Network Diagrams

When you choose to switch over to a VoIP system, you want to design a high-performance, low-cost one that meets your business needs and infrastructure. And so, we’ve listed down some common VoIP diagrams to illustrate visually how a VoIP phone system is set up.

Here are some examples of VoIP network architecture:

1. Cloud-Based Phone System

A cloud-based VoIP phone system runs over the internet and connects across different locations and countries. Most cloud or hosted VoIP systems are hosted by the provider. In other words, your VoIP provider hosts or manages the servers and technology. This means that your business does not need to worry about operating and maintaining servers. You only need a deskphone and an internet setup to make your VoIP phone system work.

This is what a standard VoIP architecture looks like:

• The business will likely have one VoIP service provider and an internet service provider (ISP) offering cable internet, DSL, or fiber working through a router.
• Each workstation or desk will have one Ethernet network drop and a network switch.
• The switch then connects to all necessary devices such as your deskphone, computer, softphone, etc.

2. IP-PBX System With SIP Trunking

Most businesses might already have a PBX system installed for their communication needs. In this case, switching to a VoIP infrastructure is relatively easy as you simply need to integrate it with your IP-PBX system.

A PBX is a private phone network connecting all phones within a business. You can connect this PBX to your PSTN lines, foreign exchange office (FXO) ports, or SIP trunks. A common combination is using SIP trunks within an IP-PBX system. SIP trunking allows your teams to make and place calls simultaneously without the need for physical lines connecting to the system. Since PSTN is becoming increasingly outdated, SIP trunking is often a PSTN replacement solution.

This is what an IP-PBX with SIP trunking VoIP system looks like:

• The business will likely have one ISP offering cable internet, DSL, or fiber working through a router.
• They will also subscribe to a SIP trunking service.
• Users will then have to plug in their SIP credentials into their PBX system, which connects to other phones, computers, softphones, etc.

3. Single Office Location

This VoIP architecture is for small-to-medium-sized businesses that primarily operate from one location.

• The business will likely have one internet service provider (ISP) offering cable internet, DSL, or fiber.
• Each workstation or desk will have one Ethernet network drop and a Power over Ethernet (PoE-enabled) switch for VoIP implementation.
• Connect VoIP phones to the network drop.
• If you opt for softphones, connect computers or laptops to the network drop instead.

4. Multiple Office Locations (Global Offices)

Medium-to-large-sized businesses with multiple locations will need a more complex VoIP architecture setup.

• The business will likely have more than one ISPs offering cable internet, DSL, or fiber.
• Each workstation or desk will have one Ethernet network drop and a Power over Ethernet (PoE-enabled) switch for VoIP implementation.
• Connect VoIP phones to the network drop.
• If you opt for softphones, connect computers or laptops to the network drop instead.
• VLAN tagging will limit network congestion.
• Connect offices to each other via business phone numbers and call forwarding. Example: You can automatically forward calls from one office to another during certain hours or set up failover forwarding in case of an emergency or disaster.

5. Remote Employees

Businesses with remote employees or employees spread across different regions can use this VoIP architecture to maintain business continuity through one central hub. Since employees will have different providers and network equipment, this setup is more complex but also flexible.

VoIP infrastructure for remote employees:

• Hosted VoIP phone systems make it possible for users to connect from any location as long as they have an internet connection.
• You can send employees deskphones and computers to use for business purposes.
• Alternatively, you can have them use VoIP softphones which they can download on their computer, laptop, or softphone.
• Connect remote employees to each other via business phone numbers and VoIP forwarding.

A crucial element to keeping remote VoIP calling secure is to educate your employees about keeping their internet and devices safe. Create a technology policy that details how they should use business-related technology and what best practices to follow.

Add VoIP for Better Call Quality

Want to bring VoIP functionality to your phone system? Learn more about business VoIP solutions offered by speaking with our experts.

Call us at +1 (561) 908-6171 or request a demo today!