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Telecom Business Review | Monday, August 15, 2022
ERM may help organizations in many ways, from improved access to capital to decreased manual reporting time.
Fremont, CA: Many businesses are modernizing their communications with SIP trunking, a flexible technology that enables voice over IP (VoIP) communications for legacy phone systems and cloud-based PBX solutions.
By tapping the advantages of SIP trunking, your company can lay the foundation for improved collaboration and productivity.
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Businesses across industries feel the advantages of SIP trunking when they have the right requirements.
That said, there are a few needs every organization must have in place to guarantee a successful implementation. So here's an observation of how SIP trunking can support you achieve your business goals, along with some pointers on how to improve your company for SIP success.
The Benefits of SIP Trunking
SIP trunking can provide your business with an edge. You can employ SIP trunking to keep capital expenditures in check, adding internet-based communications capabilities to a legacy phone system without making a costly upfront investment.
In addition, if you upgrade older voice and data systems while implementing SIP trunking or even later down the road, you can further optimize your total cost of ownership while future-proofing your business communications.
By powering SIP trunking's cloud features, you can guarantee better day-to-day productivity and reliability and improved business continuity over the long term. SIP also provides you increased flexibility in your deployment, enabling you to cost-effectively scale your operations. For instance, you can pay only for the call paths you require with SIP instead of being forced to install (and pay for) an entire primary rate interface (PRI) permanently. This technological and financial agility can be especially valuable if you open a new branch location.
SIP trunking can support your business cost-effectively and update its communications, creating a strong foundation for future digital transformation enhancements.
4 Requirements for SIP Trunking Success
To assure your business is completely prepared for SIP trunking, you'll want to address these four requirements before implementation:
1. Robust network infrastructure
Once you execute SIP trunking, your voice and video communications will employ the same network as your data transmissions. As this dynamic will place raised demands on your network infrastructure, it's important to properly prioritize network support for these new communications services — particularly if you have multiple locations.
SD-WAN technology can support you in implementing quality of service (QoS) settings everywhere you operate, ensuring that mission-critical voice and video calls receive high-priority treatment. Moreover, SD-WAN empowers you to make more effective use of your existing data connections, even automatically shifting to a backup connection in the event the primary circuit goes down.
While assessing your network infrastructure to ensure it's SIP-ready, make sure your existing network hardware, from your router and switches to your wireless network infrastructure, allows you to configure QoS settings and supports your new SIP environment. It should also provide the necessary throughput, ideally gigabit connectivity, to enable SIP and voice data connections.
2. Adequate bandwidth
You'll also need adequate bandwidth to make the most of SIP trunking. So take a point to review your current data connection, whether that's fiber, T1, or something similar, and determine whether it will be able to support the extra requirements of voice and video calling in a SIP environment.
For instance, analyze your existing call volume to ensure you have enough bandwidth to enable that same call volume — or a bit more if you're planning to grow your operations — besides the services already traveling across your network. You may also need to ask your SIP trunk provider about the codec they use to allow voice transmissions and how much bandwidth it consumes per call. Based on the type, it can use anywhere from 8 to 64 Kbps of bandwidth alone, not comprising any additional bandwidth for IP overhead.
Reliability is important for your business communications, so analyze your internet service provider's service level agreement (SLA) and its performance guarantees. This step will be even more crucial to your success if you have multiple locations.
3. A SIP-compatible PBX
Although many legacy phone systems are consistent with SIP trunking, you'll be required to confirm that your PBX is compatible with SIP. Sometimes, you may need to upgrade your present PBX with a SIP card that allows the integration. Software updates may also be necessary to ensure compatibility with SIP trunks. In other conditions, you may decide that switching to a full cloud-based communications solution is the right path for your company.
4. VoIP-compatible phones
If you've used traditional phones up until now, you'll also need to upgrade or replace them with VoIP-compatible ones. Some legacy phones can be updated with VoIP adapters that transform voice communications into data packets for SIP trunking. If you plan on utilizing VoIP phones, you'll need to ensure that your data switches have the Power over Ethernet (PoE) capability required to provide power to the phones.
SIP trunking can help your business cost-effectively upgrade its communications, creating a robust foundation for future digital transformation enhancements. However, cautious planning is necessary, still to get the most value from your SIP solution. By addressing these four conditions before implementing SIP trunks, your business will be ideally positioned for SIP success.
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