VoIP Services Better than Skype

While Skype is a very popular option among consumers for making VoIP and video calls, the service has not been able to compete with VoIP vendors in the enterprise market. Nevertheless the service has come a long way from its humble beginnings and added several cloud PBX features in a bid to take on the more established VoIP providers. Quite a few businesses may be tempted to use Skype over other available alternatives but there are many VoIP services that are considerably better than Skype in the market.

Even as Skype has gained many enterprise focused features over the years, it is still not the complete alternative that most organizations are looking for. There are quite a few areas where established providers like VoIPstudio perform better than Skype:

Proprietary and closed platform

SIP is the most popular VoIP protocol and is the de facto standard used by the vast majority of providers. Though Skype offers VoIP service, it is not compatible with most other SIP-based software. It is a proprietary and closed solution that is completely controlled by Microsoft. Organizations are pretty much forced to use the official Skype client with the service.

On the other hand, VoIPstudio is based on the SIP protocol and is compatible with any other SIP-based device, application or service. In fact, clients can use the service with any SIP client of their choice on mobile devices which means that users are not forced to utilize an app that may not meet their requirements.

Tight integration with Microsoft products

Skype for Business is tightly integrated with Microsoft products such as Office. While this is good news for organizations that are already part of the Microsoft ecosystem, it restricts choice for others. What if your business refers to use other online storage, email or document collaboration software? VoIPstudio offers interoperability with many other software services but does not restrict clients to any particular one. Additionally Microsoft lacks experience with VoIP, an area where VoIPstudio has years of expertise. This will make a crucial difference when it comes to customer and tech support, troubleshooting, quality control and other integration issues.

No emergency calling

VoIPstudio offers E911 service as long as users enter their location information and keep it updated. This means that the service works as a full-fledged, standalone enterprise communication system without the need for businesses to have a landline as a backup. This is not available through Skype and Microsoft explicitly states that the service is not a replacement for normal telephone service.

Convoluted pricing scheme and annual contracts

Just like other Microsoft products, Skype for Business has multiple pricing schemes and contracts for businesses. There are different prices depending on whether clients require standalone Skype or other office products. Deciding which plan to go with may itself take several hours!

In contrast, most VoIP services offer simple plans that come without any annual contracts. VoIPstudio goes a step further and even offers a free demo that does not require a credit card. Clients can either pay as they go or opt for the unlimited (domestic or international) calling option. A small businesses can get started with VoIPstudio in as quickly as a few minutes.

Advanced enterprise features

The earlier versions of Skype for Business were pretty bare-bones and lacked many of the essential VoIP features offered by practically every VoIP vendor. Though the service has added a few of the much needed features like number porting, there are many more still missing. For the most part, Skype for Business is still playing catch up with the competition. Some versions even lack the capability of integrating with on premise PBX systems.

When you compare Skype to VoIPstudio in terms of features, it quickly becomes apparent that the former will not suffice for modern business organizations. In addition to offering advanced online PBX functionality, VoIPstudio also provides free speech to text functionality, local numbers in as many as 4000 cities around the world, integration with Salesforce, auto provisioning and many other features in all the available plans.

Perhaps the biggest difference between Skype and other VoIP services like VoIP studio is that the latter does not block certain features under premium plans or tiers. It means that even the smallest of businesses can compete with large corporations on an equal footing. When it comes to enterprise VoIP, Skype still has a long way to go.