As if it isn’t already difficult enough just deciding to move to cloud communications… you’re then faced with thousands of choices for a provider. They all seem to have similar features, pricing, and even support. However, are they really all offering the same thing? Do you need a degree in telecom to make this decision?

Good news! No degree required! Here are some ways to spot inconsistencies when comparing provider quotes to insure that you are getting what you actually need.

• What features are included in the seat cost? 
  • Seat bundles often include a lot of features and add-ons that you may not need. Understand what is included in each package and make sure to select the option that will benefit your business. Work on the road a lot? Make sure to get a mobile option. 
• Are they estimating taxes and surcharges?
  • Many providers don’t show taxes and surcharges in an effort to present an attractive, quote, leaving customers shocked when they open their first bill. Always ask for a breakdown of any additional fees. 
• Offering a free phone?
  • Often, providers will advertise a free phone. Take a look at the fine print. Nothing is ever free and you may see it reflected in another line item on your quote. Also pay close attention to the model of phone they are quoting, most likely it is the garden variety.
• Configuration…this is a big one. 
  • Do you have to build your own call flow or do they offer a specialist that builds it out for you while making recommendations on best practices? Understand your comfort level with setting up your system and make sure the provider is able to meet your expectations.
• Technical support:
  • Is it really 24/7/365? Is live support offered all day and night or only during normal business hours? Are they just offering a ticketing system after hours or a chat box on a website? Providers may offer different levels of support based on your company size. Find out the hours and location of their call center. Ask for a copy of the escalation process in the event that there is an issue. 
• Promotions!
  • I can’t tell you how often providers show a discount, but in fine print it says after 12 months your price goes up, then after 24 months it changes again. If they are giving you a promotion, make sure you understand the term of the discount and how your price will change when it expires.

Most importantly, find a provider that will take the time to answer your questions, understand your business, offer customer support whenever needed and is clear and concise about what they are presenting to you.

If you aren’t sure about a quote and want a second opinion… send it over and let my sales support team take a look. They can point out any holes in a quote and help you to make the best decision for your business! 

Many businesses today rely on contact centers to engage their customers. Whether it’s providing customer service, product support, or capitalizing on sales opportunities it is up to you to find and build a system that best suits your business. Here at NetCarrier, we’ve answered that need with a product suite that fits virtually every market vertical. This product suite includes our Contact Center Enterprise and Contact Center Lite solutions.

Contact Center Lite is a product developed in-house that is fully integrated within our Hosted Phone System, nCloud Connect. It provides everything an inbound call center needs built under the same roof as your phone system. What that means for you, is that you have the ability to manage your phone system and your call center within a single user interface. 

Contact Center Lite gives you the ability to intelligently route callers to the proper department based your employee’s skillset. One example of this would be installing a Spanish customer service queue adjacent to your English customer service queue. Doing this will allow any Spanish speaking customers to navigate to your Spanish queue with no hassle. The same can be done for splitting your departments into higher support levels. Creating a level 2 support queue is made easy with our user interface. As always, our service delivery team builds out the call flow based on your needs and our technical support team is available 24/7/365 to assist you in any changes needed to keep your contact center at its maximum potential.

A plethora of other features are available with your Contact Center Lite suite such as custom music on hold to help increase the customer experience. This can include messages from you to the customer to let them know of any current events or simply that their call is important to your business. Queue callback which allows your customers to leave the queue and request a call back from your agents later. Call queue recording so you can easily maintain quality assurance. There’s even supervisory monitoring allowing supervisors to silently monitor calls for coaching new employees, or barge into a call to assist in resolving a customer’s issue on the spot.

While Contact Center Lite most certainly can meet your business’ needs, Contact Center Enterprise will drive your contact center into the next level. Contact Center Enterprise is a product suite that goes beyond your traditional call center. Aside from traditional inbound call queues this product allows you to take on email, chat, and SMS queues all within the same user interface. On top of inbound contact you’ll also increase your outreach as well, with products like outbound call campaigns, outbound notifications for appointment reminders, and automated queue call back.

Contact Center Enterprise also keys into the needs of management and their need to stay on top of operations and staff. With tools like schedule manager, not only will you be able to track employee time in and out, you’ll be able to run reports on employee break time, idle time, and even talk time. With that comes reporting of any metrics you need, whether that’s inbound traffic, average speed of answer, or simply hold times. We also made it possible for you to schedule those reports so you don’t have to spend your Fridays pulling all of your weekly reports. Simply have them emailed to all pertinent parties.

No matter your needs, nCloud Connect can customize a solution to give your call center the necessary tools for a stellar customer experience.

If you work as part of a large team of people, you can understand how conversations with customers can sometimes be repeated.  Imagine you, the customer having to explain themselves more than once to different people within the organization. This can be frustrating! If only there could be a tool that helps store those conversations, shows monthly billing costs at a glance and provides detailed information regarding the authorized personnel on your account….well good news, there is! In fact, the NetCarrier sales team utilizes a Customer relationship management (CRM) tool every day to ensure the customer relationship is managed properly.  

The CRM tool the sales team uses at NetCarrier allows us to directly upload emails which pertain to a particular customer.  It allows users to see the conversations and pull files directly from the web-based system so that everyone is up to speed with what was discussed with the customer.  This is especially useful if a member of the sales team is out of the office or on an appointment.  

When choosing a CRM, it is important to look for features such as outlook integration, a user friendly interface, mobile application, and report generator specific to what matters to you. We were able to find a web-based CRM tool which allows every registered user the ability to research or update information without the need to download software to their computer.  The mobile feature is also a great tool for our sales team as we are always on the go.  The ability to have customer specific information at your fingertips is a very valuable feature to have.  This tool has especially been helpful for the sales team with projects, forecasting sales goals, and organizing customer information in an easily accessible format. 

Not only does the NetCarrier sales team use a CRM tool, we also use a quoting tool to generate price quotes and contracts.  Using a quoting tool reduces the amount of time it takes to generate a quote or contract, which allows the sales team to focus their time and efforts on renewing existing customers or assisting other.  Generating quotes accurately and quickly is important in our fast paced highly competitive industry.   

Recently, I was tasked with assisting in the rebuild of our quoting tool we use a NetCarrier. Ensuring that your quoting tool is up to date and that you understand all the ways you can utilize the application is important to the success of your quoting tool as well as your CRM. By implementing these applications, my team was able to focus their time on additional responsibilities while still assisting the sales team. We were able to increase our turnaround times and minimize the amount of manual work required. When you have a reliable quoting tool that takes minimal time and effort to maintain, the possibilities are endless!

If you’re a current business owner you should probably ask yourself, when is the last time I evaluated my phone system? I suggest this because it is extremely common for companies and their owners to go long periods of time without really analyzing their phone system to see if it is maximizing their business’s potential.  Traditional PBX Systems can work well and have for many years, but as they say “Father Time is undefeated”.  In this scenario that means many of the traditional PBX systems have come to the end of their life.  End of life for a phone system can actually mean three things, (1) The phone system is old and simply incapable of performing the necessary functions (2) The phone system is just antiquated and falling short when it comes to productive features (3) The manufacturer is no longer in business which means they don’t offer support, software updates or equipment parts.  In our business, this is often where I come in.  As a Channel Sales Specialist it is my role to work with our current customers and help them transition from a traditional PBX phone system to a cloud based phone system. NetCarrier’s cloud based system is called “nCloud Connect”.  

What is “nCloud Connect” you may be wondering?  nCloud Connect is our own proprietary UCaaS (Unified communications as a service).  We take pride in our platform’s ability to take customer phone systems to the next level.  As an in house sales representative I work with the customer to discuss how their needs may have changed since the last time they reviewed their phone system.  Two of the biggest things I have found to be most prominent during this process have been customers’ ability to work remote and being able to quickly scale their phone system as their business grows. 

Regardless of what business you are in, everyone has felt the impact of the pandemic.  As we hopefully continue to work through and eventually out of these times it has become more and more important for business’s to have the latest technology to stay competitive within their markets.  nCloud Connect offers your employees a mobile application on their cell phone that mimics their desk phone, video calling, instant messaging and many other collaboration features that help businesses to accomplish this.

 In addition to this, nCloud Connect has an extremely user friendly portal which allows for new users to be configured within moments.  We pair this with our 24/7/365 technical support team who is always available to assist with adding users, ordering new equipment, and addressing questions. 

Last but not least, we circle back to myself and the sales team once again.  As members of your account team we always strive to offer financially pleasing deals to honor your years of loyalty as a customer.  When you are ready to make the transition from traditional PBX system to nCloud Connect, we work with you and provide a cost analysis to show how this change will impact your monthly spend for a phone system.  If all goes to plan, we would love the opportunity to offer savings during this process, because who doesn’t like to save money?! 

Many people share the same fear….do I upgrade my technology? Will this involve hours of time and research? Am I going to have to spend more money? We understand how daunting this can be, that is why we are here to assist and make the transition as seamless as possible so that your phones are always ringing!

If you are a current NetCarrier customer looking for more information on whether it is time for you to upgrade your system, reach out to us at 215.966.3396 or info@ncloudconnect.com. Check out the features that may benefit your industry at https://ncloudconnect.com/ncloud-connect-business-solutions/

From real estate agencies working out of newly constructed shared offices, to manufacturing companies with expansive warehouse and machinery space, to large law firms in historical buildings, we encounter a variety of network configurations and needs for customers in the SMB market.  With so much potential variation, its critical to determine how the existing network is setup as well as what their future network needs are going to be.  More often than not, this isn’t an easy task.  Physical cabling, bandwidth, firewall, and switching requirements are all things that must be evaluated, preferably well ahead of any install date.  While an in depth breakdown is beyond the scope of a short blog post, I’d like to give a brief rundown of some important things to consider when evaluating a hosted VoIP solution with a customer.  

Is the cabling in the building up to date?  

The short answer is, most customers will already have Cat 5E cabling in their building and that’s all they will need.  This is the current standard and is more than enough for the average SMB customer.  If a customer is in a very old building and has Cat 3, then they should really consider getting the building rewired if at all possible.  Cat 3 only supports transfer rates up to 10Mbps and this is going to prove insufficient for most customers.  Higher bandwidth cabling like Cat 6/6a supports up to 10Gbps transfers and is likely overkill for almost all SMB customers currently.

What are the bandwidth needs, now and in the future?  

Going right along with the physical cabling is the overall bandwidth needs.  Many small businesses don’t need anything more than what is commonly available in their area, typically between 100Mbps and 1Gbps.  This is assuming the location is not in a rural area where internet options are typically much more limited.  It is also important to note that these speeds may not be symmetrical, so this needs to be taken into account when determining the bandwidth needs of the customer.  The final consideration is whether the customer is going to have wifi access, and if that wifi is going to be public, private or both.    

What kind of switches are needed?  

Switches are a bit of a mystery to a lot of SMB customers, especially those closer to the “S” than the “M” side.  Many have heard of a switch before, but they aren’t really sure what they do, if they need one or even if they already have one.  It’s very likely that some sort of switch is going to be needed. Only the smallest customers with the simplest of setups do not need a switch.  We typically recommend a managed, PoE, VLAN capable switch for our standard deployments.  The PoE capability allows the switch to provide power to the phones so no separate power supplies are required.  VLANs allow the phone and data traffic to be separated, which is generally cleaner and makes it easier to troubleshoot issues.  The switch being managed simply means it can be configured with a variety of options such as VLANs and typically has remote administration and event logging.  By contrast, unmanaged switches will at most be able to provide PoE, but are unable to be configured or administered otherwise.  

Does there need to be any special routing or firewalling at the site?  

Firewalling and routing are likely the most foreign subjects to SMB customers, especially those on the smaller side.  The good news is that if a customer is big enough to need more advanced routing, firewalling or circuit failover then SD-WAN is probably an easy choice.  SD WAN is quickly gaining ground as the most deployed routing/firewalling solution due to the ease of setup and scalability.  It encompasses everything from simple circuit failover using physical and/or wireless connections to complicated multi-site routing, traffic filtering and inspection, VPN configuration and much more.  Most of these services and configurations can simply be added on at a later date as well, so these easily scale up to meet growing customer needs.  In the past, this type of setup would require costly hardware, a dedicated server room and expensive specialized IT staff to configure and maintain.

Still confused or need more info? Reach out to the Sales Engineering team with your questions! salesengineering@corp.netcarrier.com

As someone who has worked in telecom for almost ten years, you start to hear the same reoccurring fears when it comes to telecom and technology. Businesses often refrain from researching and analyzing new technologies because of their underlying fears. 

At NetCarrier, we try to make sure our customers understand the solution that we are providing them. We also make sure to explain the benefits as well as outline the differences.

90% of people said that dealing with a company that uses outdated technology would cause them to consider taking their business elsewhere. By Zech Crook  – Chief Operating Officer, Sunstate Technology Group https://www.bizjournals.com/phoenix/news

What it comes down to is that having outdated technology can greatly impact your business, but we understand it isn’t as simple as jumping into new technology. It’s important to complete a thorough network assessment to examine a company’s needs from top to bottom, and ensure all your fears are being addressed before making the change. Having a provider and partner who is willing and able to assist in this process is vital to making the correct technology decision. 

Top 6 Fears and how a hosted phone system can help your business.

• Fear of losing control & accessibility: Whether you want control over your phone service or not, a cloud phone system is flexible and can offer both options.  Our nCloud Connect PBX solutions offers a user friendly administrative portal for your team to manage and make changes as needed without needing a degree in technology. Access your entire phone system with any web enabled device from anywhere. NetCarrier provides you with the tools to become your own expert. 
• Fear of Flexibility: Users can access the system remotely or in the office without the need for large infrastructure costs. A cloud phone system merges your desk phone, computer and mobile device for seamless communication no matter where you are. Having the flexibility to operate remotely as well as the ability to easily scale and grow with your business are important factors when choosing a communications platform. 
• Fear of relying on Internet: Cloud communications inherently offers redundancy when it comes to local power or internet outages. Since your phone system is in your providers’ network that has multiple generators for power and several internet and voice providers as backup, you no longer have to worry about losing your phone service when you lose local power. Having the option to utilize multiple internet connections, SD WAN, and failover solutions adds even another level of redundancy. 
• Fear of having outdated system in 2 years and being stuck: Think of your cloud phone system software, just like your mobile device. You have updates available that increase features, functionality and correct bugs and they get applied to your device automatically. A Cloud phone systems works the same way, as new features are developed they are rolled out to your phone system, ensuring you have the latest technology. We own the technology behind the platform we offer, so as the industry expands we are able to implement the newest features with a simple update.
• Fear of support: Making a change to a new phone system is daunting, but knowing that your phone provider has support 24/7 is important. You don’t want a provider that has ticket takers and lack the ability to troubleshoot and provide proper support. You also want to be able to speak to a live person right away instead of going through multiple options and waiting on hold forever. NetCarrier offers support when it comes to transitioning to to our services. Your dedicated project manager walks you through the process along with the option to have an onsite technician install all of your equipment.
• Fear of cost: Cloud phone systems eliminate the need for capital expense (CAPEX) and allow you to pay as you go. You can easily add and remove users from the system as needed. NetCarrier offers invoice analysis and free consultations to see how we can possibly save you money while upgrading your system. 

Now is the time to try it out. NetCarrier is offering 3 months of free seats and a 30 day trial!