Traditional copper-based phone systems come with huge international costs and are also a pain to maintain and install. With voice-over-internet-protocol (VoIP) systems, you make all calls over the internet, and prices tend to be much more manageable. Thus, VoIP is the best business communications alternative for small businesses. In this article, we’re going to show you 14 VoIP stats that will drive home why it’s the best option for your business.
1. Businesses save an average of 32 call minutes a day using VoIP
When a business moves to a VoIP system from a landline service, they save about 32 call minutes each day. Often, this results in individuals being able to reach the party they are contacting on the first try. This may not seem like a critical amount of minutes, but these little savings add up, and in a month or a year, they take a lot off of the business’ budget.
2. Using VoIP web conferencing tools can result in a 30% cost reduction
When a company uses integrated voice and web conferencing tools through a VoIP provider, it will find that conferencing expenses are reduced by as much as 30%. In fact, with the additional 40% cost reduction of local calls, most businesses see an overall savings of 50% to 75% when they switch to a VoIP service for all communication needs.
3. Small businesses experience a 90% reduction in startup costs
Starting a business is costly, especially when you have communication needs around the world. When a small business uses VoIP for their communication needs, they experience a 90% reduction in startup costs. This makes getting the business off the ground much more manageable because communication costs are reduced.
4. Companies save up to 50% on phone costs with VoIP
Based on research performed by Telzio, companies are saving as much as 50% by switching to VoIP. This is primarily because VoIP requires very little dedicated hardware.
While your business can use IP phones and intercoms, much of your business communications is easily done using softphones or smartphone apps. This also ensures that there’s no need for dedicated work smartphones. Your employees easily communicate with colleagues using their own devices without using their personal numbers.
Additionally, since VoIP is internet-based, your business won’t need to have traditional landline copper wire installed or maintained to communicate with customers and partners worldwide. Simply having a fast internet connection is enough with a hosted private branch exchange (PBX) provider.
Thinking of switching to a VoIP system? Before you make a decision, take our free VoIP speed test to measure your internet’s speed and performance.
5. VoIP is consistently growing at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 15%
Market growth is a sure sign that a technology is becoming widely implemented—and this kind of growth is clearly happening with VoIP. Based on data gleaned by Global Market Insights, the VoIP market was valued at over 30 billion and is expected to experience a CAGR of 15% in the next six years.
With wider implementation, thanks to its popularity, it’s going to be pretty hard to avoid VoIP as a technology going forward. Hosted VoIP providers like RingCentral and Nextiva provide powerful business communications solutions augmented by emergent technologies like 5G.
We have identified the six best VoIP systems for small businesses. Read our guide and learn how these platforms work to enhance business communications at a more affordable cost.
These services also help businesses skip expensive PBX server hardware, making it easier for them to add on and remove calling features when needed. As a result, businesses are simply finding VoIP to be too enticing to avoid.
6. Mobile VoIP is becoming popular for small business
About 74% of small business employees are using mobile VoIP apps to make their business calls. This means that calls can be made when the employee is not at their desk, so they can easily be reached at any time of the day.
Some providers even have a call flip in place, allowing you to transfer calls from your desk to your cell phone without the other party noticing that the call changed lines. With many adopting and using smartphones for calls and meetings, the mobile VoIP market is expected to grow 13% by 2025.
7. 61% of businesses switch to VoIP when their old contracts expire
Business leaders tend to be the first adopters of new technologies, and when that happens, most other businesses follow the trend. Based on a report by Blueface, 61% of businesses switch to VoIP-based systems when their contracts expire with their landline carriers. This is partly because VoIP services tend to cost less—with most providers offering free calls to several international locations and the relatively standard U.S. and Canada.
This trend isn’t limited to users of landline phone systems. IT leaders who use their own session-initiated protocol (SIP) trunking solutions to deliver business communications on-premise are also considering hosted providers. In fact, 90% of IT leaders say they will switch their communications to the cloud using hosted PBX. Not only does this provide geo-redundancy, but it also makes server maintenance and patching the responsibility of the provider.
8. VoIP & video conferencing are up as much as 212% since the pandemic began
Based on Alianza, customers are starting to use voice services at a far more significant rate than previous years. In fact, with VoIP and video conferencing experiencing an uptick of as much as 212%, it shouldn’t be surprising that more businesses are jumping on the VoIP bandwagon.
9. Several providers have uptime guarantees of over 99.99%
Business continuity is critical, and having service outages will hurt your bottom line. With traditional landline services, businesses relied on stability, and the same can be said for VoIP.
Today, most providers have a service level agreement (SLA) that guarantees uptime for their service. One of the most common numbers for this is 99.99%, but many providers have 99.999% uptime SLAs for their customers. To put it into perspective, a 99.9% uptime guarantee means that you’ll have up to eight hours of downtime in a year, but when this scales up to 99.999%, it means only five minutes.
Providers deliver this downtime by geo-redundancy. Instead of a single PBX server hosted in a territory, there will be multiple server locations. This means that when a server goes down, there will be backups around the world that will pick up the slack so that you won’t lose service.
10. Providers like RingCentral have seen subscription growth of at least 37%
With the pandemic making remote work a necessity, VoIP providers like RingCentral have been reaping the rewards more than they ever have during the entire history of VoIP. VoIP makes it easy for coworkers to stay in touch, which has resulted in many businesses adopting new business communication systems.
Based on recent research, RingCentral has seen Annualized Exit Monthly Recurring Subscriptions (ARR) to their RingCentral MVP solution increase by a full 40%.
Curious about this VoIP platform? Check out our comprehensive RingCentral review to learn more about its services.
11. VoIP-based call centers experienced a 15% reduction in IT personnel costs
With its cloud-based nature, VoIP easily saves on IT expenditures. In fact, when call centers shifted their communication tech to contact center as a service (CCaaS) solutions, they experienced a 15% reduction in IT costs. Combine this with the fact that 62% of call center respondents cite that reducing reliance on IT for PBX management helps IT teams focus on other technical aspects of their call center systems, such as analytics.
12. Softphones save businesses both time & money
When it comes to VoIP, communication is powered by IP phones, softphones, and smartphones on both Android and iOS. According to Cisco, softphones produce savings of $1,727 per month. This is primarily because these applications help businesses avoid expensive long-distance fees and data charges. Additionally, these same applications also save traveling employees 40 minutes daily.
13. AI will power 95% of customer interactions on VoIP
It is expected that artificial intelligence (AI) will power 95% of customer interactions with businesses in less than 10 years. This means that businesses that use VoIP will have less of a need for agents to answer customer calls and address their needs. This reduces the business’ overall bottom line.
With the need for agents reduced, fewer salaries need to be paid. Using an AI also allows you to personalize the customer experience so that each person who calls receives an ideal interaction with your brand.
14. VoIP is powerful for both local & international calling
Based on Tech.co, small businesses that switch to VoIP will save as much as 40% on local calls. This will increase significantly with international calling. When calling overseas, several providers will help you save as much as 90%. While prices are gradually increasing, the cost of communications via VoIP is far more economical than other options.
Bottom Line
At this stage, VoIP is unavoidable because of its efficiency, inexpensiveness, and convenience. With both on-premise and hosted solutions delivering a bevy of useful calling features for businesses like yours, it’s easy to ensure crystal-clear calling and service reliability.
If you’re looking to find out what kinds of features are available via this technology, check out our VoIP business phone features guide. It’ll walk you through features like call recording, call flip, and auto-attendants so that you can understand how each would affect your business.
