Archive for February, 2009
10 Productivity Uses for VoIP
Recent research from the USA indicates that VoIP or Voice over Internet Protocol can help businesses to produce radically improved productivity gains. VoIP’s biggest advantage is the vast array of productivity improving features available to any company using VoIP. Here are just 10 uses for VoIP that could help your business to improve productivity:
ONE – Total Control
With the Call Manager feature, you can have a complete employee list for all staff members that are using VoIP. Call any of them with a single click, check missed calls and numbers dialed, call lengths and on some features you can also listen in. This means that if you use VoIP for your contact centre environment, you can maintain complete control.
TWO – Speed Dial
Set up limitless speed dial numbers allowing you to quickly make calls without searching for and dialing in long numbers. One click puts you straight through.
THREE – Do Not Disturb
Undoubtedly one of the most frustrating things in any office is never getting anything done because the phone is always ringing. You don’t want to miss calls, but you can’t have your productivity frequently interrupted. VoIP technology allows your voice calls to be directed to your voicemail without the phone ringing at all.
FOUR – Priority Calls
You may not want to be disturbed, but if you are awaiting a call from a colleague, client or superior, you can set priority alerts, allowing your phone to only ring if called by the person from whom you are awaiting the call. This means you can maintain your productivity levels without missing that vital call.
FIVE – Discussion
If you need to have a three-way conversation between yourself, a colleague and a client, you can have a 3-way VoIP conference call. Since the VoIP system uses the Internet, you won’t have to pay extra for this, nor will you pay extra for calls if your colleague and client are on the opposite side of the world. Improve your ability to interact with others using VoIP.
SIX – Messaging
How often do you receive an important voicemail message but you know that you have to delete it eventually? What if it contains vital information, and you can’t write it down? With VoIP, you can receive your voicemail messages as wav files in your email inbox. Now you can listen to them anywhere in the world, store or share those messages with others.
SEVEN – Out of Office Messaging
You’re out of the office working on-site with a client; you’re not due back in the office until next week. A new lead has just left a message on office phone, and you may miss out on an important chance to convert this lead into a sale. What do you do? With VoIP it’s simple. All you do is wait for VoIP to send you a message to your mobile letting you know that you’ve received a message. Then you login to VoIP on your laptop and check your messages. VoIP means never missing that important voicemail.
EIGHT: Call Chaser
Don’t miss a call. VoIP has two excellent features for this. Option one will divert your calls to all your selected numbers at the same time. Option two will dial each of your select numbers until you pick up. Now you don’t ever have to miss that important sales call.
NINE: Remote Office
When you turn on the remote office function, you can route all of your calls to an alternate phone. So if you want to work from home this week, you won’t miss out. Plus, when you make a call, your work number will appear in the recipient’s caller ID.
TEN: Selective Forwarding
You can establish criteria so that only the important calls are forwarded to your alternate number. This means that you can avoid unnecessary calls and still connect with the important ones.
The rewards of switching to VoIP are real, immediate and compelling. If your business wants to take advantage of the many productivity uses for VoIP, then contact Gradwell to find out how we can help you make the most of VoIP today.
ONE – Total Control
With the Call Manager feature, you can have a complete employee list for all staff members that are using VoIP. Call any of them with a single click, check missed calls and numbers dialed, call lengths and on some features you can also listen in. This means that if you use VoIP for your contact centre environment, you can maintain complete control.
TWO – Speed Dial
Set up limitless speed dial numbers allowing you to quickly make calls without searching for and dialing in long numbers. One click puts you straight through.
THREE – Do Not Disturb
Undoubtedly one of the most frustrating things in any office is never getting anything done because the phone is always ringing. You don’t want to miss calls, but you can’t have your productivity frequently interrupted. VoIP technology allows your voice calls to be directed to your voicemail without the phone ringing at all.
FOUR – Priority Calls
You may not want to be disturbed, but if you are awaiting a call from a colleague, client or superior, you can set priority alerts, allowing your phone to only ring if called by the person from whom you are awaiting the call. This means you can maintain your productivity levels without missing that vital call.
FIVE – Discussion
If you need to have a three-way conversation between yourself, a colleague and a client, you can have a 3-way VoIP conference call. Since the VoIP system uses the Internet, you won’t have to pay extra for this, nor will you pay extra for calls if your colleague and client are on the opposite side of the world. Improve your ability to interact with others using VoIP.
SIX – Messaging
How often do you receive an important voicemail message but you know that you have to delete it eventually? What if it contains vital information, and you can’t write it down? With VoIP, you can receive your voicemail messages as wav files in your email inbox. Now you can listen to them anywhere in the world, store or share those messages with others.
SEVEN – Out of Office Messaging
You’re out of the office working on-site with a client; you’re not due back in the office until next week. A new lead has just left a message on office phone, and you may miss out on an important chance to convert this lead into a sale. What do you do? With VoIP it’s simple. All you do is wait for VoIP to send you a message to your mobile letting you know that you’ve received a message. Then you login to VoIP on your laptop and check your messages. VoIP means never missing that important voicemail.
EIGHT: Call Chaser
Don’t miss a call. VoIP has two excellent features for this. Option one will divert your calls to all your selected numbers at the same time. Option two will dial each of your select numbers until you pick up. Now you don’t ever have to miss that important sales call.
NINE: Remote Office
When you turn on the remote office function, you can route all of your calls to an alternate phone. So if you want to work from home this week, you won’t miss out. Plus, when you make a call, your work number will appear in the recipient’s caller ID.
TEN: Selective Forwarding
You can establish criteria so that only the important calls are forwarded to your alternate number. This means that you can avoid unnecessary calls and still connect with the important ones.
The rewards of switching to VoIP are real, immediate and compelling. If your business wants to take advantage of the many productivity uses for VoIP, then contact Gradwell to find out how we can help you make the most of VoIP today.
Peter is recognised as one of the UK’s leading young internet and telecoms entrepreneurs, and was recently named by the Daily Telegraph as one of the Changing Faces of IT. Having established the company in his second year of University, in 1998, Peter has delivered a staggering year-on-year organic growth to grow the company. He remains actively involved in the day-to-day management of the business, including hands-on dealings with clients to drive product development, and a focus on marketing and PR to maintain company growth.
Seven Design Considerations for a Green Data Centre
IT departments are under increasing scrutiny and pressure to deliver environmentally-sound solutions. Large data centres are one of the most significant energy consumers in an organisation’s IT infrastructure, so any measures that you can take to reduce this consumption (and therefore also carbon dioxide emissions) will have a positive impact on your organisation’s environmental footprint.
The construction and operation of a green data centre involve advanced technologies and strategies, for example
- Reducing the power consumption of the data centre
- Minimising the footprints of the buildings
- Maximising cooling efficiency
- Using low-emission building materials, carpets and paints
- Installing catalytic converters on backup generators
- Using alternative energy technologies such as photovoltaic electrical heat pumps and evaporative cooling
The consumption of energy is considered the dominant – and often the only – factor in defining whether or not a facility is green. IT executives therefore need to start investigating alternative ways of building energy-efficient data centres.
By following these seven simple steps, IT executives can come closer to achieving their vision of a green data centre:
Seven Simple Steps
1. Think green
Environmental concerns are front of mind throughout society today, and you can also take a ‘green’ attitude towards your data centre, both in terms of current state and also future planning. Also, many data centre vendors and service providers are providing green alternatives – factor these options in when negotiating new contracts and planning upgrades.
Incorporate the green vision in your planning – your future will be impacted by legislation, standards and market demands in this area.
2. Virtualise and consolidate
A virtualisation and consolidation project is often a step in the right direction towards green computing. Research indicates that a server often only utilises between 5 and 15% of its capacity to service one application. With appropriate analysis and consolidation, many of these low utilisation devices can be combined into a single physical server, consuming only a fraction of the power of the original devices and saving on costs, as well as taking a step towards a more environmentally-friendly data centre environment.
3. Design a best practice floor plan
Adopting an alternating hot aisle/cold aisle layout is optimal and can correct many cooling problems in a typical data centre. By implementing a hot/cold aisle layout, equipment is spared from having hot air recirculated and thereby eliminating risk of an outage through device failure. Also, by having a common hot aisle, you have the ability to contain areas where heat density is high, such as racks with blade servers, and deal with the heat in a specific manner. This allows for multiple heat rejection methods to be in use within one data centre.
4. Use appropriate technology
In taking a green approach to your data centre, your evaluation of products is no longer just a price versus performance comparison. It is important to incorporate the total costs of the environment into the calculation, which then also includes costs for energy consumption.
5. Take a green perspective on ILM
Information Lifecycle Management (ILM) is the optimum allocation of storage resources that support a business. Every element of information in an organisation has a useful lifespan, and this can range from a voice conversation to certain legal and medical records. By implementing an ILM strategy, you have the ability to create greater efficiencies in data storage, which in turn lead to greater efficiencies in elements such as power consumption.
6. Investigate liquid cooling
To meet the challenges of blade servers and high-density computing, more organisations are realising the need for effective cooling and heat management solutions. Many are welcoming liquid cooling systems into their infrastructures to achieve better cooling efficiency, while others may find it difficult to fathom pipes of running water snaking through the plenums of their data centres.
7. Utilize greener energy sources
Many energy utilities are now offering greener options for customers, with power from sustainable sources. For example, in the United States, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has formed the Green Power Partnership, which encourages and assists organizations to buy green power and reduce their impact on the environment. Major economies in Asia have accepted the Kyoto Protocol to control carbon emission however only Japan has committed to a reduction by 2012. The awareness on social responsibility and opportunity to save operational cost has raised the bar on awareness and willingness to adopt a more green approach towards utilities.
The construction and operation of a green data centre involve advanced technologies and strategies, for example
- Reducing the power consumption of the data centre
- Minimising the footprints of the buildings
- Maximising cooling efficiency
- Using low-emission building materials, carpets and paints
- Installing catalytic converters on backup generators
- Using alternative energy technologies such as photovoltaic electrical heat pumps and evaporative cooling
The consumption of energy is considered the dominant – and often the only – factor in defining whether or not a facility is green. IT executives therefore need to start investigating alternative ways of building energy-efficient data centres.
By following these seven simple steps, IT executives can come closer to achieving their vision of a green data centre:
Seven Simple Steps
1. Think green
Environmental concerns are front of mind throughout society today, and you can also take a ‘green’ attitude towards your data centre, both in terms of current state and also future planning. Also, many data centre vendors and service providers are providing green alternatives – factor these options in when negotiating new contracts and planning upgrades.
Incorporate the green vision in your planning – your future will be impacted by legislation, standards and market demands in this area.
2. Virtualise and consolidate
A virtualisation and consolidation project is often a step in the right direction towards green computing. Research indicates that a server often only utilises between 5 and 15% of its capacity to service one application. With appropriate analysis and consolidation, many of these low utilisation devices can be combined into a single physical server, consuming only a fraction of the power of the original devices and saving on costs, as well as taking a step towards a more environmentally-friendly data centre environment.
3. Design a best practice floor plan
Adopting an alternating hot aisle/cold aisle layout is optimal and can correct many cooling problems in a typical data centre. By implementing a hot/cold aisle layout, equipment is spared from having hot air recirculated and thereby eliminating risk of an outage through device failure. Also, by having a common hot aisle, you have the ability to contain areas where heat density is high, such as racks with blade servers, and deal with the heat in a specific manner. This allows for multiple heat rejection methods to be in use within one data centre.
4. Use appropriate technology
In taking a green approach to your data centre, your evaluation of products is no longer just a price versus performance comparison. It is important to incorporate the total costs of the environment into the calculation, which then also includes costs for energy consumption.
5. Take a green perspective on ILM
Information Lifecycle Management (ILM) is the optimum allocation of storage resources that support a business. Every element of information in an organisation has a useful lifespan, and this can range from a voice conversation to certain legal and medical records. By implementing an ILM strategy, you have the ability to create greater efficiencies in data storage, which in turn lead to greater efficiencies in elements such as power consumption.
6. Investigate liquid cooling
To meet the challenges of blade servers and high-density computing, more organisations are realising the need for effective cooling and heat management solutions. Many are welcoming liquid cooling systems into their infrastructures to achieve better cooling efficiency, while others may find it difficult to fathom pipes of running water snaking through the plenums of their data centres.
7. Utilize greener energy sources
Many energy utilities are now offering greener options for customers, with power from sustainable sources. For example, in the United States, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has formed the Green Power Partnership, which encourages and assists organizations to buy green power and reduce their impact on the environment. Major economies in Asia have accepted the Kyoto Protocol to control carbon emission however only Japan has committed to a reduction by 2012. The awareness on social responsibility and opportunity to save operational cost has raised the bar on awareness and willingness to adopt a more green approach towards utilities.
Datacraft is the leading independent IT services and solutions company in Asia Pacific. Datacraft combines an expertise in networking, security, Microsoft solutions, storage and contact centre technologies, with advanced skills in consulting, integration and managed services, to craft IT solutions for businesses.
Business Voip: Business Getting a New Jewel
The VoIP technology has been praised from the very beginning but the laurels it has got is far less than what it deserves. It is such a tremendous find that praising it for as long as a century would be insufficient. This might sound as an overstatement for some, but those who have been really benefited by the Business VoIP solutions would instantly agree. For a flourishing business, VoIP is a stepping stone without which the communication expenses would have hit hard.
VoIP is known for its cost-effectiveness. It has taken the burden of communication in the the huge organisations on its shoulders. The fact that it works on the signal reception strength makes the calls through VoIP come down to a ground level. The decrease in the call rates through VoIP is mammoth. Imagine the cost of an overseas call getting down to a level of an overseas Email!
Not only on the monetary grounds, VoIP technology has myriad other features that helped it establish a firm foothold. It has allowed us to imagine life without the frustratingly long cables and wires, the poor voice quality and the large number of intervening exchanges. VoIP has bid a farewell to all these annoying drawbacks of the traditional PBX.
The only inevitable factor for getting a VoIP connection is the Internet connection. As explained earlier, the calls through VoIP travel the way the Emails do. The only difference is that VoIP needs the speech signals to be converted to digital data before transferring them through the Internet protocol enabled network. The security and the cost remains equivalent to that of textual exchange of messages.
The industries which are balancing their existence entirely on communication are the biggest gainers. The VoIP business plans are made for organisations who have call centres wherein the callers from all over the globe are contacted for assisting them on matters related to a certain product. At such places, VoIP is like a life guard saving the entire business from the excruciating expenses of communication.
The business VoIP has enormous other usages such as call diversion, call waiting, call routing, 3-way calling, caller ID etc. Huge organisations where there are separate departments for different functions, find business VoIP service quite useful as it becomes easy for them to divert the calls to different departments with ease. One can get into a 3-way conversation as well when needed which was quite hard to get in conventional fixed line telephones.
Thus it wouldn’t be wrong to say that communications have reached higher standards with the arrival of VoIP. Business opportunities are now even more lucrative and worth a try. The VoIP business is the most profitable one lately as more than half of the world is after it. Technology has gone extra miles by inventing VoIP for business. The business VoIP is one of the longest leaps of science as it has made ’staying in touch’ a lot easier.
VoIP is known for its cost-effectiveness. It has taken the burden of communication in the the huge organisations on its shoulders. The fact that it works on the signal reception strength makes the calls through VoIP come down to a ground level. The decrease in the call rates through VoIP is mammoth. Imagine the cost of an overseas call getting down to a level of an overseas Email!
Not only on the monetary grounds, VoIP technology has myriad other features that helped it establish a firm foothold. It has allowed us to imagine life without the frustratingly long cables and wires, the poor voice quality and the large number of intervening exchanges. VoIP has bid a farewell to all these annoying drawbacks of the traditional PBX.
The only inevitable factor for getting a VoIP connection is the Internet connection. As explained earlier, the calls through VoIP travel the way the Emails do. The only difference is that VoIP needs the speech signals to be converted to digital data before transferring them through the Internet protocol enabled network. The security and the cost remains equivalent to that of textual exchange of messages.
The industries which are balancing their existence entirely on communication are the biggest gainers. The VoIP business plans are made for organisations who have call centres wherein the callers from all over the globe are contacted for assisting them on matters related to a certain product. At such places, VoIP is like a life guard saving the entire business from the excruciating expenses of communication.
The business VoIP has enormous other usages such as call diversion, call waiting, call routing, 3-way calling, caller ID etc. Huge organisations where there are separate departments for different functions, find business VoIP service quite useful as it becomes easy for them to divert the calls to different departments with ease. One can get into a 3-way conversation as well when needed which was quite hard to get in conventional fixed line telephones.
Thus it wouldn’t be wrong to say that communications have reached higher standards with the arrival of VoIP. Business opportunities are now even more lucrative and worth a try. The VoIP business is the most profitable one lately as more than half of the world is after it. Technology has gone extra miles by inventing VoIP for business. The business VoIP is one of the longest leaps of science as it has made ’staying in touch’ a lot easier.
For more information, visit: Business VoIP featured by one of the best VoIP provider.
Advance Hosted Call Centre Technology
oBelyx is a call center software that provides rich features and unparalleled benefits making it the best call center solution without any expense on hardware and logistics. You can connect all your virtual call center agents from any corner in the world.
oBelyx call center software is a VoIP based distributed call center solution. Our turn around time in terms of setting up a virtual call center is a fraction of other call centre software solutions. oBelyx is an On demand call Center that is easily scalable at no additional cost with agents spread geographically over different locations. It is a VoIP call center solution that can be offered in a hosted model. Built on TAG, the architecture does not have any servers as a single point of failure.
It’s a maintenance free hosted call center solution that is currently running successfully with reputed big telecom companies. Our virtual call center solution has passed the gruesome tests in these big reputed telecom companies with minimalistic issues. oBelyx call center solution slashes the infrastructure cost of setting up a call center by over 80% making it the most preferred choice for virtual call center solutions.
oBelyx is a Call Center software technology platform provider. It’s a Multi-tenant VoIP call center system that leverages Software as a Service (SaaS) Model.
oBelyx call center solutions overview:
VoIP based full call center software that focuses on pooling client (PC) resources into a Telephony Application Grid (TAG), thus greatly reducing the need for expensive or cumbersome centralized application or media servers.
Large reduction in CAPEX infrastructure cost with implementation time of less than a week and flexibility to scale to any number of agents in any location, It’s truly virtual call center software.
Key Differentiators
Ease of installation
Highly scalable virtual call center software
Ease of bundling – Internet bandwidth, VoIP minutes,
Applications
Scale from small to very large call center solutions
Sophisticated capabilities only available to large call center
Reports, Analytics, Leads Management,
Click-To-Call
Flexibility to meet seasonal demands
Customer Focused voip call center
Ease of deployment – online
Easy to scale call center solutions
No hardware installation maintenance required – virtual call center software
Real time reporting.
Our call center solution is ideal for service providers who want to offer a hosted call center service under their umbrella in a matter of days. The call centre software is scalable to any number of seats with minimal hardware and infrastructure expenditure offering a VoIP based call center solution with dependability, reliability, efficiency and high availability for Contact Centers.
oBelyx call center software is a VoIP based distributed call center solution. Our turn around time in terms of setting up a virtual call center is a fraction of other call centre software solutions. oBelyx is an On demand call Center that is easily scalable at no additional cost with agents spread geographically over different locations. It is a VoIP call center solution that can be offered in a hosted model. Built on TAG, the architecture does not have any servers as a single point of failure.
It’s a maintenance free hosted call center solution that is currently running successfully with reputed big telecom companies. Our virtual call center solution has passed the gruesome tests in these big reputed telecom companies with minimalistic issues. oBelyx call center solution slashes the infrastructure cost of setting up a call center by over 80% making it the most preferred choice for virtual call center solutions.
oBelyx is a Call Center software technology platform provider. It’s a Multi-tenant VoIP call center system that leverages Software as a Service (SaaS) Model.
oBelyx call center solutions overview:
VoIP based full call center software that focuses on pooling client (PC) resources into a Telephony Application Grid (TAG), thus greatly reducing the need for expensive or cumbersome centralized application or media servers.
Large reduction in CAPEX infrastructure cost with implementation time of less than a week and flexibility to scale to any number of agents in any location, It’s truly virtual call center software.
Key Differentiators
Ease of installation
Highly scalable virtual call center software
Ease of bundling – Internet bandwidth, VoIP minutes,
Applications
Scale from small to very large call center solutions
Sophisticated capabilities only available to large call center
Reports, Analytics, Leads Management,
Click-To-Call
Flexibility to meet seasonal demands
Customer Focused voip call center
Ease of deployment – online
Easy to scale call center solutions
No hardware installation maintenance required – virtual call center software
Real time reporting.
Our call center solution is ideal for service providers who want to offer a hosted call center service under their umbrella in a matter of days. The call centre software is scalable to any number of seats with minimal hardware and infrastructure expenditure offering a VoIP based call center solution with dependability, reliability, efficiency and high availability for Contact Centers.
Shane is the head of content department of Param Network, a Delhi based IT firm that offers a one stop solution for all your offshore outsourcing related needs.