If you are an Internet Telephony Service Provider (ITSP), you need to handpick the right Internet Protocol Private Branch Exchange (IP PBX) software to manage your operations.
From traditional phone lines to over the internet, PBX telephony systems have come a long way. Over the years, the rapid technology evolution has played a huge role in enhancing the functionalities and capabilities of contemporary IP PBX systems.
Even though capabilities and features play a huge role in making products what they are, the way they work together and the use cases they provide makes all the difference.
This blog post not only details some important capabilities of sophisticated IP PBX systems but also explains their use cases for ITSPs.
If you happen to own an ITSP or you work in one as a senior professional, this blog post can be extremely insightful for you. Without further ado, let’s dive right into it and learn about the key functionalities. Stay tuned, it’s worth the read!
1. SIP Trunking
SIP trunking is ideal for all types of ITSPs—whether they are small or mid-sized organizations to growing or large concerns. SIP trunking enables ITSPs to connect their PBX system to external networks.
2. Multi-Tenant Support
IP PBX comes in two types—single tenant and multi-tenant. The latter is extremely beneficial for ITSPs as well as for Internet Service Providers and Managed Service Providers. Multi-Tenant IP PBX is engineered to support multiple tenants on one platform. It enables customization of features for different tenants. It is beneficial for ITSPs with branches in multiple locations.
3. Auto Provisioning
The auto provisioning feature in IP PBX software enables remote configuration of IP phones by system admin. To give an example, just imagine an ITSP needs to deploy 500 IP phones across 50 branches. Manual provisioning would take a lot of time. But auto provisioning would eliminate the need for manual configuration of IP phones and saves time as well as minimizes errors. But with auto provisioning, ITSPs can configure ringtones, wallpapers for IP phones, and more remotely.
4. CRM Integration
IP PBX software solutions come equipped with in-built CRM systems that enable ITSPs to store, access, and manage clients’ data quite effortlessly. The use case of CRM integration is extremely important, whenever a client calls an ITSP, then the CRM integration displays all vital customer information such as name, address, contact details, transaction history, etc.
5. SMS and MMS Integration
Sophisticated IP PBX systems offer SMS and MMS integration of third-party platforms such as Telnyx and Twilio. By using this, ITSPs and their clients (tenants) can send SMS and MMS to their customers.
6. Voice Transcription
Advanced IP PBX systems provide voice transcription via third-party application that converts speech into text and mails the transcription to the relevant person. By automatically transcribing voice calls, this feature enables ITSPs to analyze sentiment, patterns, and interactions for more clarity.
7. Payment Gateway Integration
Sophisticated IP PBX systems are fitted with in-built automatic billing and payment gateway integration, which record transactions in detailed reports and share that with third-party systems via API. It supports multiple payment gateways such as CCAvenue, PayPal, Paystacks, and Stripe.
8. Multi-Currency Billing
This is one of the most important capabilities in IP PBX systems ITSPs need to look for. As ITSPs serve clients in different countries, it would be prudent to bill them in clients’ own currencies for better ease and convenience. Say for instance, an ITSP has clients in the US, the UK, Italy, the UAE, and India, it must have multiple currency options such as USD, GBP, Lira, Dirham, and INR in its billing portal.
9. Prepaid and Postpaid Billing
By using cutting-edge IP PBX systems, ITSPs can offer two billing options to their tenants. Prepaid billing and postpaid billing. In the former, clients pay an upfront fee and use the services till they exhaust their balance. In the latter, clients avail the services first and get the invoice based on their usage.
10. Least Cost Routing (LCR)
IP PBX systems employ Least Cost Routing (LCR) feature that chooses the least expensive path to handle calls. To give an example, let’s suppose an ITSP has five SIP trunks. While directing a phone call, the LCR will choose a SIP trunk that offers the lowest cost during that point of time.
11. Audio Conference
IP PBX systems have the audio conference feature that enables a tenant admin to create an extension and initiate the audio conference call. This feature helps remote teams to stay connected with each other. Some IP PBX software solutions allow tenant admins to add 1000 audio conference calls.
12. Intelligent Call Routing
IP PBX systems have a wide range of call routing features such as skill-based routing, time-based routing, geography-based routing, AI-assisted routing, IVR routing, direct routing, least occupied routing, and more. These routing strategies ensure that all incoming calls reach the right agents and help ITSPs improve their first call resolution rate.
13. 100% Voice Logging
100% voice logging records, stores, tracks, and automates all the inbound and outbound calls across all geo-locations. This feature enables monitoring of agent’s live performance such as total call duration, total hold time, idle time, and more stats on the agent’s daily performance.
14. Reseller Module
This feature is an extremely important capability for ITSPs! Some IP PBX systems come with this feature that enables ITSPs to add resellers (create reseller accounts within the IP PBX system) and expand the reach of their services without directly managing all end-users.
15. Platform Features
The platform features of sophisticated IP PBX systems provide a wide array of configuration options for both resellers and tenants. This allows them to configure platform features as per their diverse needs.
16. White Labeling
This feature enables ITSPs to add their brand name, logo, color, and style in sync with their brand across all IP PBX applications including desktop application, softphone application, chrome extension, and more. When ITSPs use white labeling features, they can highlight their brand to their clients.
17. Busy Lamp Field and Presence
This is an indicator in IP PBX phone systems that signify if an extension is busy or not. A color such as red can signify if an extension is indeed busy whereas another color such as green can indicate the opposite. In case an extension is busy, then the receptionist would avoid transferring a call to it.
18. Real Time Analytics
This is quite self explanatory. This functionality enables an ITSP as well as its tenants to generate a wide range of analytics and reports in real-time. Some IP PBX systems can generate more than 80 real-time analytics and reports. It can help ITSPs and their clients to rectify errors, enhance performance, as well as make data-driven decisions.
Taking Everything Into Consideration,
In the present age, we all know how important IP PBX software solutions are for ITSPs. Providing seamless internet telephony services is not possible without using a sophisticated IP-enabled PBX system.
That’s why all sizes of ITSPs must handpick the right IP PBX software. And one of the first steps to choose the right software is to define the objectives and list out the must-have functionalities and capabilities in IP PBX solutions.
There are many functionalities to choose from but the eighteen key capabilities listed here are extremely important and their presence can make a huge difference to an ITSP’s success.
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