A rundown of consumer vs business VoIP
There are many similarities between consumer and business VoIP. Find out which one is right for you.
Although the surface features of consumer and business VoIP may look alike, they are world’s apart when it comes to efficiency. Real-time communication has an endless number of options, but only a few makes sense for the end user.
Consumer VoIP
The two most popular consumer-based VoIP options are Zoom and Webex. Both have shown great promise as being compatible with Elastic Sip Trunking. This is an important difference that makes a consumer VoIP option useful for business.
When talking to employees about company software, chances are they will already be familiar with the most popular consumer-based options. This is the type of transition that’s helpful with on-the-job training.
But for the technical details only, consumer VoIP prioritizes quality over volume. This counts for products like Skype, Facetime, Google Voice and more. Since it is built for individual use, minimal call functions with social media addons are its core strength.
Business VoIP
When you take Zoom and Webex to the next level with business offerings, expect it to handle small, medium and large corporations. Call routing, CRM sales enablement and many other enterprise phone systems make up the bulk of its features. If the company has a BYOD rule in place, then additional security policies will protect both sides.
That means an extra layer of protection like VMware will encrypt the companies access on login and logout. Despite this top tier security, VoIP access remains unaffected in both quality and consistency. For a business, it isn’t uncommon to have three to eight layers of software between the client and the consumer.
Third party tools tied to VoIP business services are constantly being developed and tested. This is different from consumer level VoIP in its implementation since it has to coincide with various locked down systems.
Why it matters
Consumer VoIP can’t handle the workload needed by businesses. The security alone has enough exploits to keep the IT department busy for years. This has nothing to do with the lack of security for consumer VoIP, as it is efficient enough for its individual use.
But business level VoIP has different expectations both in security and its usage rate with multiple users. With the UI, consumer and business VoIP choices look the same. But underneath the hood is an entirely different line of code that makes all the difference in the world.
The future of VoIP
Consumer VoIP apps have already plateaued when it comes to ease of use. This is the next step for business level VoIP, and a good reason why most companies try to keep to a familiar UI.
There have been little issues with VoIP uptime keeping their promise to businesses of 99.999% availability. But better coordination with carriers and ISPs can further improve call quality on both ends. As some local regulations begin to relax, collaborations will give businesses the best chance at a VoIP gold standard.
Stay connected with VoIP
The most popular standard for voice and video calling over the web is VoIP. That isn’t going to change, and it is only going to get better with time. Whether you are a consumer or business, there is a service tailor made to broaden your experience.