Modern businesses can no longer afford sluggish, outdated phone technology that stifles growth. Luckily, SIP trunking has emerged as an innovative solution, offering the flexibility and scalability to meet modern communication needs.
Experts predict the SIP trunking market will reach $43.74 billion globally by 2031,1 showcasing its immense popularity for businesses of all sizes. Read on to learn about the importance of SIP trunking, how it works, and what it can do for your business.
SIP trunking refers to using Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) to make phone calls over an internet connection instead of traditional copper phone lines. It’s a digital method for delivering voice, video, messaging, and other communications services, enabling businesses to replace their analog and ISDN phone lines with a modern, flexible, and cost-effective alternative.
With SIP trunking, calls are transmitted digitally over a data network. This eliminates the need for physical phone lines and hardware associated with legacy phone systems, instead working with an organization’s existing private branch exchange (PBX) system to provide voice services through their internet connection.
Here's an overview of how it works:
SIP channels are the virtual phone lines that replace analog phone lines. Each SIP channel allows for one incoming and one outgoing call at the same time. Businesses can scale the number of SIP channels up or down as needed through the SIP provider's online portal without having to install new physical phone lines.
SIP trunks bundle multiple SIP channels together, usually anywhere from 10 to 100+ channels. The SIP trunk connects the business's PBX phone system and the SIP provider over the internet. Most businesses only need one to three SIP trunks depending on their call volume and number of users, but additional SIP trunks can be added as needed to increase capacity.
SIP, or Session Initiation Protocol, is the signaling protocol used to initiate, manage, and end communication sessions like voice and video calls, conferencing, and instant messaging. SIP handles the setup and teardown of sessions between endpoints over an IP network and enables all multimedia communications transmitted via SIP trunking. It works with other protocols like RTP to transmit voice and video data.
A SIP provider offers the SIP trunking service that connects businesses to their telephony network. The SIP provider manages the platform and technology that enables the SIP trunks to work over the internet, playing a critical role in the reliability and uptime of the SIP trunking service.
There are many reasons SIP trunking has become a top choice for businesses upgrading their communications:
In many cases, switching to SIP trunking helps companies lower the total cost of ownership (TCO) of their phone system by up to 60%.2 With SIP trunking, you only pay for the number of SIP channels your company needs rather than overpaying for unused phone lines. SIP trunking also eliminates the need for expensive hardware as it uses existing infrastructure – and removes ongoing maintenance and repairs required for analog phone lines and equipment since it’s delivered digitally.
As your organization grows and requires more capacity for concurrent calls, you can simply request additional SIP channels or trunks from your provider. Adding new SIP channels takes minutes rather than waiting days or weeks for new analog lines to be installed, so you no longer have to worry about an inflexible phone system limiting your business growth.
SIP trunking offers more reliability compared to legacy phone lines. SIP providers implement redundant systems to minimize downtime, so even if your business loses power, your SIP phone system maintains connectivity. And while calls over analog lines are restricted to one path, SIP trunks dynamically route calls over optimal network paths for added reliability.
Since SIP trunks are location agnostic, your business can implement local phone numbers from different area codes to establish a local presence in different geographic areas. If you need to move your organization's headquarters, your SIP trunking phone numbers can move with you. SIP trunking also supports flexible working models by letting employees make and receive calls on desktop phones or softphones via laptops and mobile devices.
Nearly 80% of customers still rank phone calls as their preferred customer service channel.3 The bandwidth available with SIP trunking ensures consistently high-quality calls. These solutions minimize latency and jitter for clear voice quality without static or echoes. And because SIP trunks provide QoS and prioritization of voice traffic, you can rest easy knowing call quality issues will no longer degrade the customer experience or frustrate your teams.
With SIP trunking, your business can manage voice, video, conferencing, instant messaging, and other communication channels from a single interface. IT staff no longer have to manage separate tools and platforms for telephony, video, and messaging – instead, SIP trunking bundles everything into one place for simplified management and administration.
With more businesses operating globally or enabling remote work, they need a flexible alternative to the rigid analog phone systems that have been the standard for decades. SIP trunking provides agility, cost savings, reliability, and scalability, so it's easy to see why this technology is quickly replacing legacy phone solutions.
However, providing SIP trunking services can be a struggle for service providers serving many customers. Managing SIP trunking and voice services at scale requires robust platforms like Alpaca by ECG. Alpaca’s bulk provisioning feature makes it easy to build customers and configure accounts in minutes rather than hours, ensuring your SIP trunking services are deployed smoothly and can continue to scale as your customers’ needs grow.
Contact the ECG team today to learn more about how Alpaca can help streamline service activation and SIP trunking management.
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