If you’re already thinking about turning your business over to an IP Telephony system then you are definitely thinking the right way. Uptake of VoIP telephony has really taken off in the past few years as businesses large and small have realized the cost saving benefits of a VoIP system not to mention some of the advantages that a large VoIP business system can have.
IP Telephony basically takes advantage of making cheap calls over the internet. Rather than the traditional PSTN analog landline systems VoIP is completely digital. Explained in the simplest way IP Telephony consists of all audio being converted into digital packets which are encrypted and sent through the internet to be unpackaged at the other end. To the end user everything feels pretty much the same as a regular telephone system.
Small and large businesses need to be aware that IP telephony does take up bandwidth, its important to be aware of your bandwidth usage in your company to ensure that you have sufficient resources to run an IP telephony system without seeing any degradation in performance.
It must be explained that when considering an IP Telephony system for a larger corporation that wishes to use a complex VoIP PBX system (private branch exchange) that you will be required to merge both regular analog voice and data networks into a single converged network. This will therefore mean there will be some changes to your existing IT operations and so it is important to plan properly. Entrepreneur.com has a nice article about large businesses switching to an IP Telephony system with details on the PDIO methodology (planning, design, implementation, operation and optimization) thoroughly explained.