Selecting Phone Services for Small Business

​When you have a small business, you need phone solutions for small business—phone services that meet your unique needs, not a system that forces a square peg into a round hole. You want a business telephone service that gives you great call quality at an affordable rate, and you don't want to pay for more than you need.

How to Choose the Right Phone System for Small Business

There are many options when it comes to phone solutions for small business, and you'll have to determine which one is the best fit for your company—after all, your business telephone service is the lifeline to your customers. Understanding how you and your employees communicate should be high on the list of factors to consider when shopping for phone services for small business; for example: do you need a fax or credit card line, is price the most important factor or do you need a variety of features?

The two most popular choices are the landline and Small Business VoIP (Voice over IP). Let's take a look at the pros and cons of each.

Small Business Landline

Traditional landlines, also known at plain old telephone service (POTS) have been in use since the invention of the telephone. Modern landlines are either connected by metal wire, coax, or in some cases a fiber-optic telephone line for transmission. A reliable and dependable phone system for small business, a landline can be a good choice for phone services. However, landline services can be costlier than managed voice options or VoIP solutions that leverage the Internet instead of a dedicated telephony network, have a reduced feature set and may be expensive if you need to add more than eight (8) lines as your small business grows.

Landlines provide access to common features such as:

• Call Reporting: Provides phone logs for each line
• Voicemail to Email: Sends an email to the recipient notifying them of the message along with the voicemail message attached as a sound file that can be played on a computer or mobile device
• Simultaneous and Sequential Ring: The ability to ring two phones at the same time (simultaneous), or ring one number after the other (sequential)
• Selective Call Forwarding, Rejection and Acceptance: A configuration that determines which numbers can ring through, go straight to voice mail or are forwarded to another number

Landlines typically operate during a power outage providing subscribers have the knowledge and information available regarding battery backup options.

Small Business VoIP

A relatively new option in phone solutions is small business VoIP. Small business VoIP phone systems work by sending phone calls over the Internet or a privately managed IP network rather than traditional landlines. A small business VoIP phone system requires an internet connection with enough bandwidth to deliver high quality phone calls. Small business VoIP phone systems make it simple to expand service, can be extremely affordable and offer a wide variety of features not available with a landline. Managed voice solutions, delivered by VoIP technologies, general leveraged dedicated networks but some may leverage a public internet connection.

Decide the Features You Need in a Phone System for Small Business

Both landlines and small business VoIP come with calling features you're probably familiar with like caller ID, voice mail, speed dial, long distance options and conference calling. You can also set up a dedicated fax or credit card processing line with both these types of business telephone service.

While price is an important factor, there are other considerations. If your small business doesn't need many bells and whistles, has existing equipment you don't want to replace, a landline may be right for you.

Cable ONE Business Phone Solutions for Small Business

Cable ONE Business offers phone solutions for small business customers of all types. Our business phone service includes free local calling and features plans that include bundled long distance. Cable ONE Business can match you with the right phone solution for your small business. You'll never miss another call with our reliable and affordable small business phone services.