Your Guide to UCaaS

What is UCaaS?

UCaaS enhances the way your employees communicate by moving away from traditional limiting phone services and moving to a single platform for all communications needs, such as Voice, Text, SMS, Fax, Video Calling, Video Conferencing, Team Broadcasting, Instant Message and Team Messaging.

Functions of UCaaS

• Enhanced Mobility - While organizations continue to do business remotely, employees need to be connected. UCaaS provides voice calling, text/SMS, video conferencing, instant messaging, team messaging and online presence in one application on your mobile phone or desktop. Communicate from any device, anywhere you have an Internet connection.
• Integration with Business Applications - Businesses rely on email applications, CRMs and more to complete daily activities. UCaaS gives you integration into the applications you need for click-to-call, directory integration, and more.
• Extended Support in the Cloud - No more waiting around for support tickets. Unified Communications provides support access via an online management portal. Subtract, add or modify users, locations, features, mobile apps and more all within the cloud.
• Business Continuity - If you experience a localized event, such as a power outage or Internet outage, traditional PBX would be rendered incapacitated. A Cloud UC solution is redundant in the cloud.
• Simple Employee Onboarding - Traditional systems require expert knowledge to make moves, adds or changes in the phone system. With a Cloud UC solution, you can assign devices, permissions and profiles all through an online portal.

Why Use UCaaS

UCaaS simplifies the user’s ability to communicate and collaborate with co-workers, vendors, and customers. Let’s take Vicki. Vicki works as a seamstress for a large design warehouse. She needs to be able to communicate with her co-workers as she collaborates with the designer of the dress being worn by a popular television sitcom actress. When designs are changed, they are communicated by design plan changes that are globally available through a file storage system and quickly understood using the UCaaS-provided SMS/texting service that everyone has access to and uses on a daily basis. Vicki needs to know that sequins are being added along the neckline and away from the hemline, so the client has exactly what she’s expecting. Without unified communications, Vicki’s job is in jeopardy and the design company may lose a long-time client.

Benefits of Unified Communications

Flexibility

The ability to communicate on any device, anywhere, and any time surely means a flexible work and home life. Let’s take Lisa for example. Lisa is a single mother who manages a warehouse. During the holidays, Lisa has to put in 6 to 7 days a week, and 8-10 hours each day. She needs to be available during work hours and she has to be there for her 11-year-old daughter. With UCaaS, she can manage her warehouse by SMS with her employees, file share to keep her boss updated on order fulfillment and a softphone on her laptop. Communication between work and home is vital as Lisa juggles her work/life balance.

Affordability

With UCaaS comes automatic updates to features and unlimited benefits that don’t cost an arm and a leg. On-premises systems become particularly expensive to maintain and upgrade every time there is a change in locations, users, and hardware installation. UCaaS is a cloud-based solution that is managed and maintained by the UCaaS provider so total cost of ownership is reduced significantly. Let’s take Norman, the VP of Finance for a well-known hotel chain. Having to manage expenses with an on-premises based service was becoming extremely expensive. Norman researched cloud-based UCaaS solutions and discovered that he could save well over $100,000 each quarter simply by switching to a solution that offered phone service, fax service, SMS, softphone, extension-to-extension dialing, file storage and sharing, and web conferencing all at a significant savings to his company’s bottom line.

Provide a Better Customer Experience

Communication between hotels, employees and between rooms has improved customer and staff experience. UCaaS gives everyone a sense of community where you are never left hanging or waiting for answers. When communication is connected to all of your devices, all of your locations and available all of the time, the customer experience increases exponentially.

Scalability/Opportunity for Growth

Because UCaaS is cloud-based, the opportunity for growth and scalability become less daunting. Let’s take Norman, the VP of Finance we referred to previously. Norman can open new locations without worrying whether the rest of the organization is connected. When UCaaS is implemented, the only thing Norman has to wonder about is his core business competencies. His communication issues are a thing of the past. He doesn’t have to worry whether his new locations are up-to-date on communication features. He just has to turn on the faucet and let the UCaaS flow each time his organization expands. With UCaaS, all of your communication dreams become reality.

Learn About a Phone System for Your Business

If you’re ready to explore more of what VoIP can do for your organization, don’t miss our powerful Cloud PBX offering and PanTerra Streams. What’s even better is that you can try it for FREE today!