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Call Center Software vs PBX
- If you're looking for a solution to manage your business's communication, you may have come across the question: PBX vs. call center software - which one is better for your business? While there is no clear-cut answer to this question, the choice depends on your specific needs and goals.
- PBX systems typically have higher upfront costs and require ongoing maintenance and upgrades, whereas call center software has lower upfront costs and provides a more cost-effective solution over time, especially for businesses with high call volumes.
- In the following sections, we'll explore the benefits, features, and costs of each solution in more detail to help you make an informed decision. So, whether you're considering PBX or call center software, keep reading to learn more.
What is PBX?
- PBX, which stands for Private Branch Exchange, is a private telephone network used within an organization to communicate with each other as well as outside the organization.
- You can support more phones with a PBX phone system by splitting your company's phone line into multiple lines. PBX solutions allow agents to answer multiple calls at the same time, with their own extensions, by having multiple lines.
Features of PBX phone systems
Telephone extension directory for employees
On-hold music or custom messages (while callers wait)
Voicemail box of an employee or department
Call Transfer and Conference Calling
What is call center software?
- Call Center Software is a suite of tools that enables call centers to efficiently communicate with customers and agents. The main purpose of call center software is to route customer calls to the appropriate agent and help in making efficient outbound calls.
- Additionally, it helps in tracking the performance of those interactions, generating reports, and providing insights to improve call center operations.
Features of call center software
Automated call distribution (ACD)
Intelligent routing
Call recording and quality monitoring
Contact history database
Smart dialers
Real-time, historical & custom reporting
Text-to-speech & speech recognition
List management
Data import
- It is important to carefully evaluate the benefits of call center software and PBX solutions to determine the best fit for your business needs.
- With a better understanding of what the top call center software and PBX solutions can offer, you can make an informed decision by considering factors such as budget, features, and scalability.
- Although the choice between call center software and the top PBX solution can be challenging, taking the time to weigh these factors will ensure that you choose the solution that provides the most value for your business.
Top 6 Reasons Why Call Center Software Is Better Than a PBX Solution
1. Boost your productivity with smart features
- Compared to the traditional PBX system, call center software offers a wide range of modern features that enable businesses to provide an exceptional customer experience.
- For instance, multi-level IVR allows businesses to route calls based on the customer's inquiry and direct them to the appropriate department or agent. This ensures that customers receive accurate and timely assistance, which can enhance their overall satisfaction.
- Moreover, Virtual Call Center Services come with intelligent call routing, which allows businesses to prioritize calls based on factors such as customer value, agent availability, and urgency.
- This ensures that critical calls are attended to promptly, thereby reducing wait times and improving customer satisfaction. Conversational AI is another modern feature that enables businesses to engage with customers through natural language conversations.
- With conversational AI, businesses can handle a high volume of inquiries and provide 24/7 support, which is essential in today's fast-paced business environment.
2. Cost & Savings
- Maintaining a PBX system can be a daunting task. Not only do you need to hire a full-time employee to handle service and maintenance, but you also need to allocate a separate space at your facility to install the necessary hardware components.
- On top of that, you need to allocate a monthly fee specifically for the maintenance of the purchased hardware. This can result in significant expenses that can burden your business.
- Call center software, on the other hand, eliminates all of these issues.You don't need to worry about hiring a full-time employee or allocating space for hardware installation, as the software is entirely cloud-based.
- This means that the software is accessible from anywhere, and you can manage it remotely. Furthermore, with call center software, you only need to pay for the services you use without any additional maintenance fees.
- This can save you a lot of money in the long run, and you can invest your resources in other aspects of your business.
3. The ability to integrate with other customer service tools
- Integrating your CRM tool with your telephone system is crucial to efficiently managing your customers' information in one centralized dashboard. However, with a PBX system, this integration is not feasible.
- On the other hand, modern call center software can seamlessly integrate with your existing business tools, providing several benefits to your business operations.
- By integrating your Call Center Software with your CRM tool, you can automate customer logs and save them automatically.
- This can save your agents time and prevent any errors that may arise from manually entering data. Additionally, you can access customer data in one place, eliminating the need for your agents to switch between multiple tabs to gather customer information.
- This can result in a significant improvement in agent productivity and enable them to provide faster and more accurate responses to customer inquiries.
4. A cost-effective way to scale-up
- As your business grows and you handle more customers, you may need to expand your communication infrastructure to accommodate the increasing number of employees.
- However, scaling up a traditional PBX system can be a daunting and expensive task. PBX systems are physical systems that are designed to provide a limited number of lines at the time of purchase.
- If you wish to scale up your traditional PBX system, you would need to buy an upgraded version with more lines or add more physical lines, both of which can be time-consuming and costly.
- Fortunately, scaling up your communication infrastructure is simple with cloud-based call center software. You can simply change or upgrade your plan to add more lines to your phone system in minutes.
- This flexibility allows you to adjust your communication infrastructure based on your business's changing needs without any significant downtime or disruption.
5. It's Easy to Deploy
- When implementing a communication system, such as a traditional PBX system, in your business, there are several factors to consider before proceeding.
- In contrast, Virtual Call Center Software provides a much more cost-effective and flexible solution. All that is required is a laptop, mobile device, or tablet with a headset, and your employees can get started almost immediately.
- The service can be activated in just a few minutes by signing up on the website. Moreover, with advanced cloud technology, virtual call centers enable agents to work from anywhere, as their telephone systems are not restricted to a single location.
Firstly, you must ensure that you have a dedicated space for the hardware system to be installed.
Secondly, you will need to purchase consoles or switchboards to manage incoming calls.
Thirdly, you will need to acquire a telephone set for every user, which can add up to a considerable cost and may take several days or even a month to complete, depending on your provider.
6. 24/7 Customer support
- Providing reliable customer support is undoubtedly a critical aspect of running a successful business.
- However, it's essential to acknowledge that even with a dependable phone system, such as a PBX or call center software, technical issues may arise unexpectedly.
- In the case of traditional PBX systems, hardware malfunctions or damaged parts require you to schedule an appointment with your provider.
- Then, a technician will visit your site to diagnose and fix the issue, which can take a considerable amount of time. Meanwhile, your employees may be unproductive, causing significant disruptions to your business operations.
- On the other hand, with cloud-based call center software, you can avoid such time-consuming and costly inconveniences. Your service provider will take care of any issues virtually, ensuring uninterrupted customer service.
- This eliminates the need for on-site visits from technicians, allowing your business to continue operating at full capacity.
Conclusion
- When it comes to choosing between call center software and PBX systems, your decision should ultimately depend on your unique requirements and financial limitations.
- Both solutions have their strengths and can help you achieve your communication and sales objectives. However, it's essential to consider the significant differences between the two.
- PBX systems require higher upfront costs, and you may need to replace your hardware system if your team expands.
- Additionally, they can limit your employees' ability to work remotely, which can be a significant disadvantage in today's rapidly evolving business landscape.
- On the other hand, call center software provides a more flexible, scalable, and cost-effective solution that empowers your team to work from anywhere.
- With advanced features such as intelligent routing, advanced analytics, and integrations, it provides businesses with the tools they need to deliver exceptional customer support and streamline their operations.
- Considering these factors, we recommend that businesses opt for call center software as their preferred communication system.
- If you are still unsure about which option is best for you, we invite you to try the best call center software for free for 10 days. This will give you a chance to test out its features and see if it meets your specific needs and budget requirements.
FAQ
Call center software is a better solution than a PBX system for several reasons, such as that it operates in the cloud and eliminates the need for bulky hardware, resulting in cost savings. Call center software enables businesses to operate virtually and work from anywhere. Leveraging the software's advanced features to achieve a wider range of metrics than a PBX solution results in improved productivity and exceptional customer support.
Traditionally, PBX was a hardware-based solution that had to be installed and maintained on-premises, which incurred a significant upfront cost and required constant upkeep. However, with the advent of technology, communication tools have evolved to offer more advanced solutions such as hosted or cloud-based PBX solutions.
A traditional PBX system generally handles and directs inbound calls within an organization, while a contact center is an omnichannel communication system that manages customer interactions across various channels like phone, email, chat, and social media. The primary distinction between the two is that PBX deals with internal communication, whereas a contact center caters to external communication and customer service.
Currently, many businesses are transitioning from traditional PBX to cloud-based PBX solutions due to outdated technology, limited features, and the high upfront costs associated with the former. However, some businesses may still opt to use traditional PBX systems, either because they have invested a considerable amount of money in the hardware or, in rare cases, because their business model necessitates the use of such systems.