We’ve talked before about the concept of a Virtual Call Center and its many advantages over a traditional call center. Today we will look at how you could actually implement a virtual call center. This will be the first in a series on virtual call center requirements.
The first requirement to consider for your virtual call center implementation is high-speed Internet service. This will be required for both your voice calls and your computer data (such as e-mail, communicating with colleagues, web browsing, etc.). There are many different types of high-speed Internet connections, and we will list several below.
- DSL
- Cable
- Fibre Optic
- T1
Any or all of the above may suit the needs of your virtual call center, depending on how many staff you have and how many simultaneous calls you expect at any given time. For larger deployments, with a higher number of simultaneous calls, consider a more robust Internet connection. To determine which type of Internet connection might be suitable, first work out your approximate voice and data bandwidth requirements. We do not recommend satellite or wireless Internet connections for a call center application.
For voice requirements, take the maximum expected number of simultaneous calls at a given location. For example, assume that the main call center location will have seven employees, and that each employee may have up to two calls active at any given time. This gives us 14 active calls at a time. Next, multiply this number by the bandwidth required for each call. Using Easy Office Phone’s Hosted PBX service, the required bandwidth is either 87 kbps (maximum-fidelity) or 35 kbps (standard fidelity) per call, upstream and downstream.
In the above example, the requirement for voice calls would be 1.2 Mbps or 490 kbps, depending on desired fidelity.
Next, work out an approximate figure for data bandwidth. Consult with your staff to get a good picture of how they will use the Internet on their computers. E-mail and browsing typically do not use a great deal of bandwidth whereas sending and/or receiving large files may require more. Work out an approximate total for data usage.
For the best results, you should consider having two separate Internet connections for your virtual call center – one dedicated to your voice traffic, and one to your computer data traffic. This helps ensure the highest level of performance for each application.
We next recommend consulting your IT/networking firm and prospective Internet provider to obtain precise details, once you have generated approximate requirements for your virtual call center. You will need to ask the Internet provider for the approximate speed of the connection they are able to provide you to ensure that it will fit your expected requirements. Again, look for a provider able to supply you with separate connections (one for voice and one for data).
In addition, we recommend a business-class VoIP-compatible router. You can see some recommended models at our Router Compatibility page.
In our next entry, we will look at the type of virtual call center software you should consider for your deployment.