SMB Knowledge of Business Phone Tech Is Lagging

Small and midsize companies are interested in new phone systems, but often don't know how they work, according to a survey of 427 purchasers of capital equipment at SMBs that Hanover Research conducted on behalf of Allworx, a unit of Winstream that sells voice over IP (VOIP) phone systems. The good news from a solution provider's perspective is that almost half the respondents said they would consider a new phone system, largely because they were using outdated equipment. The bad news from a channel perspective is that the awareness of modern telecommunications technologies is fairly limited. "After 20 years of VOIP, most SMBs have not been keeping up with the innovations in business phone systems," the report indicates. "But voice communication remains critical to SMB operations. There's still a huge opportunity to educate SMBs about how they can optimize business phone systems to increase efficiency, boost productivity, and do more with less." In fact, 25 percent were not even aware of the type of technologies they were using for delivery of voice services, but, on the upside, 74 percent, recognized how important phone systems are to their businesses.