1. 24 Smart Business Columbus | April 2012
Insights Telecommunications
Insights Telecommunications is brought to you by Ohio.net
Virtual voiceHow VoIP can reduce infrastructure costs Interviewed by Chelan David
V
oice Over Internet Protocol, or VoIP,
is becoming increasingly popular
with businesses in today’s economic
climate. Significant cost savings can be re-
alized by using a VoIP platform to connect
employees virtually, freeing up costly of-
fice space in the process.
“VoIP is the utilization of Internet con-
nectivity to make phone calls. It can
transform the way you do business,” says
Michael Gray, a senior sales executive
with Ohio.net.
Smart Business spoke with Gray and
his client Ken Fanger, president of So-
lar Systems Networking, about VoIP, the
advantages such a platform provides,
and what advances are envisioned in the
future.
How does VoIP translate to tangible benefits
for an organization?
Gray: It depends on what a client’s
needs are. Typically, however, business-
es see benefits ranging from being able
to connect multiple people back to the
core office to being able to build custom-
ized call routing protocols to eliminate
any geographic restrictions they may
face. For example, remote salespeople
who telecommute are provided with the
ability to connect to their home office,
which saves in commuting costs for the
employee and overhead costs for the
employer. VoIP can benefit a business in
many ways.
Fanger: The biggest advantage for us is
we are able to use the VoIP solution com-
bined with forwarding to our cell phones
so we don’t have to have our people tied
to a phone system. We are a consulting
technology firm so we aren’t usually sit-
ting in the office. VoIP has helped us take
advantage of having people connected
and working while presenting one type
of sales face to the world. It makes it
much easier for us to manage all of the
virtual clientele that we work with with-
out having to have a physical location.
What advantages does VoIP provide in terms
of releasing businesses from office space?
Gray: VoIP frees business from having
to be tethered to a physical location. For
example, our organization has salespeo-
ple who telecommute and can work from
anywhere. When they receive a phone
call it appears as though they are in the
office although they might be a million
miles away. I have a client who was able
to realize savings of $250,000 per year
on office space and associated overhead
costs because they made the switch to a
VoIP platform.
Fanger: VoIP provides a virtual plat-
form so you can have employees and
phone numbers anywhere in the United
States. We have an employee who works
in Texas and has a local Texas number,
but it still connects to our VoIP solu-
tion. So when customers call in they
have a local contact, but access to our
company. It provides us a great opportu-
nity to reach out to new markets that we
couldn’t have reached any other way. We
are a six-person company so being able
use a cost-effective VoIP platform is vital
to our ability to grow.
How can a brick-and-mortar feel still be rep-
licated?
Gray: Customers can still receive the
live contact they crave. With VoIP, you
have the ability to transfer phones so
people can get a live answer. The envi-
ronment feels the same, but is conducted
through a virtual atmosphere.
Fanger: When a person calls in they
can’t tell the difference between the vir-
tual environment and a brick-and-mortar
structure. It’s nice because we don’t have
infrastructure costs, but when people
are calling our company we have a full-
functioning phone system that allows us
to do business in a manner advantageous
to us.
How has VoIP changed over the past several
years?
Gray: VoIP has become more dynamic
in supporting other applications such as
smartphones and tablets. It gives com-
panies the ability to essentially hand
off a smartphone to an employee which
equates to an extension within their
world. The need for an actual desk phone
is going away. We are moving away from
a phone-line environment to a cloud-
based, virtual phone model.
Fanger: We’ve been using VoIP for six
years. The feature sets have been grow-
ing and there is more functionality, which
allows us to stay in touch within our or-
ganization. Also, it now works really well
for adding to smart devices units.
How do you envision it evolving in the future?
Gray: I see VoIP becoming more of a
cloud-based application, which would
lead to it being able to work better with
devices such as smartphones and iPads.
It will be more software based in the
sense that traditional handsets will no be
longer be applicable in our world. VoIP
will be much more dynamic and will con-
tinue to provide businesses with a brick-
and-mortar feel, but without the physical
brick-and-mortar overhead.
Fanger: VoIP will definitely move to-
wards combining phones with different
types of applications, such as customer
relationship management. As people em-
brace devices such as the iPhone and
iPad, there will be greater integration be-
tween work applications. <<
Michael Gray is a senior sales executive with Ohio.net. Reach him at mgray@ohio.net or (330) 658-1777.
Ken Fanger is president of Solar Systems Networking. Reach him at kfanger@solsysnetwork.com or (440) 243-3207.
Michael Gray
Senior sales executive
Ohio.net