Software Advice spoke with hundreds of buyers from businesses looking for VoIP solutions that are designed for their needs. The result: some interesting insight into the needs of today’s VoIP buyers. Much of which reflects what we at ATC see and hear daily.
Interactions with business buyers (from companies with annual revenues of $100 million or less) uncovered their most common pain points and reasons for purchasing a new business phone system. Here’s some of the key findings:
- 77% indicated a preference for a web-based/hosted PBX solution
- 58% were considering VoIP services for the first time, of which 31% are still using a traditional landline
- Only 6% were in IT positions, placing a premium on technical assistance and reliability
- 32% cited reliability and scalability as their top reasons for wanting to purchase a new VoIP system
Read the full report here.
ATC also requested some additional insight on those requiring 20 or more seats/handsets:
Businesses that currently use 20 or more phones tend to request software with features such as CTI (Computer Telephony Integration) and ACD (Automatic Call Distributor) at a much higher rate than smaller businesses. Call centers made up a significant portion of the buyers in this demographic, which is one reason why these features were so in demand. This demographic also tended to put a premium on CRM integration.
Pain points specific to businesses with 20 or more phones included the age of their current system and the need to scale with growth. In particular, a number of buyers noted that their aging systems were not as well supported as they’d like and that the systems lacked features such as remote accessibility. A number of the buyers in this category were also experiencing technical issues such as dropped calls and crashes, perhaps because they were operating at the limits of their systems’ capacities and because they weren’t using easily scalable solutions like SIP trunks.
Buyers for companies that were currently using 20 or more phones tended to employ VoIP solutions much more frequently than smaller businesses, though a number still relied on landlines and legacy PBXs.
Buyers for companies that were currently using 20 or more phones were more likely to work in IT than smaller businesses. 16 percent of buyers in this demographic had IT job titles, whereas only 6 percent of our overall sample worked in IT. The more informed buyers in this demographic also tended to request a higher level of functionality than smaller businesses.
-Daniel Harris, VoIP and telecom researcher at Software Advice.
Read the full report here.
