Archive for the ‘Basic Business lines’ Category

AT&T/T-Mobile Merger – What it means for SMBs

Since 2007 AT&T’s mobile data volumes have increased an astonishing 8000% – more than any other wireless provider. In addition to adding thousands of cell sites, purchasing spectrum in the open market, and a number of other measures, AT&T acquired T-Mobile USA in a heavily debated $39 billion cash and stock deal earlier this year in order to keep up with the astronomical demand on its mobile networks.

The FCC filing that sought permission for AT&T to purchase T-Mobile USA from Deutsche Telekom reported, “The network synergies of this transaction will free up new capacity – the functional equivalent of new spectrum – in the many urban, suburban, and rural wireless markets where escalating broadband usage is fast consuming existing capacity.”

AT&T defended the merger, stating reporting that if the capacity constraints for both AT&T and T-Mobile USA are left “unaddressed, [it] would translate into more dropped and blocked calls, slower speeds, and access to fewer and less advanced applications.” In addition, the acquisition enables AT&T to deploy fourth-generation LTE mobile services to approximately 55 million people – roughly 97% of Americans.

Great news! The multi-billion dollar merger will strengthen AT&T’s position in the small and medium-sized business market. According to AMI-Partners, (which specializes in Internet, IT, telecom, and business services strategy, venture capital and market intelligence) T-Mobile will help AT&T – specifically among businesses in particular vertical industries, such as construction, and companies that employ less than 10 staff members.

Those who opposed the merger believe that it will create a dualopoly in the mobile operators market. According to AMI-Partners, AT&T and Verizon Wireless currently control three out of four customers in the SMB market. Prior to the merger, AT&T had control over 28% of the market, T-Mobile controlled 8%, and Verizon Wireless came in with the largest share at 32%.

AMI-Partner’s manager of SMB Cloud Services, Brian Galgay, says the acquisition “creates differentiated SMB sales for AT&T and has an enormous upside potential… Compared to AT&T or Verizon, these T-Mobile SMB customers reported greater interest in adopting hosted services from a service provider, as well as indicating greater interest in purchasing multiple, adjacent SaaS applications.”

Galgay explained that what initially attracted significant sectors of the SMB market to AT&T were the specialized mobile workers and early adopters of technology that benefited from iPhone technology. Annually, AT&T and Verizon Wireless SMB customers spend around the same amount; however, AT&T SMB customers are said to be more “IT-savvy, focusing more budget on newer technologies beyond smartphones, such as … tablets.”

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The Advantages of Business-Class Telephone Systems

Your company’s telephone system not only affects your staff’s productivity, but can also be a potential client’s first impression of your business. For this reason, having the proper phone system can help your business get on the right path to achieving their goals.

All too often business owners – especially small start-ups and home-based offices – think that they can make do with their existing telephone system because they are not a major corporation. The truth of the matter is that no matter the size or location of your business, it should behave like a business. That’s where business-class telephone systems come into play. Business-class telephone systems provide:

Basic Business Lines Business Lines offer clear, reliable connections for voice, fax or voice-grade modem traffic to the Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN). This service offers a host of productivity-enhancing optional features—a la carte or in convenient feature packages—that make it easy to save more when you buy more. Business Lines are a great solution for small offices. With over 24 features to choose from, XO Business Lines offer the functionality you want and need.

  • A professional image – business-caliber telephone systems offer features that traditional home-based telephone systems don’t. For example, XO’s Basic Business Lines provide features (such as call forwarding, transfer and waiting, selective call acceptance, forwarding and rejection, as well as countless other features) that show your customers and potential clients that you run a competent, systematic business.
  • Flexibility – a business-class telephone system server is capable of handling a large number of phone lines and extensions. In the event that your business needs to reposition itself in a more formal office locale, simply take your server with you, plug it in and you’re ready to go!
  • Decreased calling costs – a business-class telephony system lets you use the Internet to make national and international calls for considerably less than traditional home-based telephone systems.
  • Increased productivity – advanced features, such as on-hold music, caller ID, custom menus, web-based system administration, computer integration, email message delivery, etc. can significantly improve your productivity levels.
  • Enhanced customer service – in order to provide the best service possible for your customers, it is important to be available to them as much as possible. Features like computer integration let you bring up a caller’s information instantly and therefore cut costs by reducing the amount of time spent on each caller.
  • Simplified management – modern business-class systems usually have intuitive interfaces that simplify your ability to adjust your settings to keep up with your business’ needs.
  • Quality and durability – business-class phone systems generally offer superior versatility, reliability, and scalability over traditional consumer phones. These attributes lead to greater quality and performance, which in turn provides you with a professional image for your business and allows you to recoup the higher cost of a business-class system faster.
  • Improved mobility – today’s business phone systems give you the ability to integrate your PDA or cell phone for receiving calls and other system features when outside of the office.

Additional Resources
To learn more about how a business-class phone system can help you achieve your company’s goals contact one of our professional account managers today!

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Business Trunks

In order to be successful, businesses need a trustworthy and efficient method of communication to reach colleagues, clients, and potential customers around the world.  Business trunks provide a reliable telephone solution that is cost effective and ideal for conducting multiple voice calls.

If you’ve ever called a commercial office before, odds are you’ve used a business trunk line; it’s a service that lets you connect multiple communication lines through a single channel by using the hybrid key system. This key system connects your lines to the central office and the public switched telephone network.

Since business trunks use technology that’s easy to acquire, the installation of the infrastructure is simple, and the materials are inexpensive. The most advanced piece of technology business trunks use is a high-speed digital connection known as an ISDN – this hardware connection is becoming a standard for hybrid key systems across the world. They are capable of using both analog and digital handsets, and are the reason why the system is called a hybrid system.

Don’t limit your line to single-way traffic, business trunks are highly capable of carrying inbound and outbound data, and can efficiently conduct two-way traffic throughout the line with ease.

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Basic Business Lines

We live in a fast-paced world with next generation technological advances where businesses rely heavily on emerging new technology. However, the most innovative, economical, and trustworthy communications channel available continues to be a basic business line.

In general, basic business lines are “plain old telephone service” (POTS) lines. These supply simple voice-grade communication avenues that are used mainly for telephony, modems, and other machines that require a connection to the public switched telephone network. This is technology that’s been tried and tested by small, medium, and large-sized businesses over the years. Basic Business lines have become the backbone of some of the most successful businesses today.

What basic business lines offer

Basic business lines give users a variety of essential features that have become necessary functions for any business to survive. A basic business line should have the following characteristics:

  • Easy set-up. This is one of the simplest of the methods of communications available in the world today, making the set-up an easy task.
  • Competitive pricing; some services offer discounted packages.
  • Uniformity throughout the industry. Since this is an established method of communication, a basic business line should have an established market structure that is featured throughout the industry.

Connection options

Some features that are included in a basic business line are standard; this includes a variable, ringtone-dependent call transfer method, call forwarding of call waiting calls, and a basic user-friendly call transfer option throughout a trunk-line.

If you’d like to keep track of people who call you, a caller ID function is ideal. Providers should also feature a caller ID blocking service – this will help you ensure that only calls that are relevant to your business’ best interests get through the line.

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