Similar to how “Google” became a verb meaning “to search online,” in 2020 “Zoom” became a verb meaning “to meet online.” But what many don’t realize is that Zoom (the company) offers more than just video conferencing. One of those additional offerings is cloud-hosted phone systems, a now-critical component of doing business in today’s world. With the sudden need to work remotely during the pandemic, UCaaS (Unified Communication as a Service) grew exponentially as many companies that still relied on legacy PBX systems found themselves needing to move to a more flexible solution. Microsoft Teams usage sky-rocketed, challenging other UCaaS providers to grow and add more features at a faster pace. Zoom was no exception, and given their success in leading the pack in online video conferencing, it is no surprise that they quickly moved into the “Leader” quadrant in the 2020 UCaaS Magic Quadrant report as well.

Source: Zoom

Let’s take a look at some of the factors influencing that rise.

Ease of Use, a Simplified Interface, and Features That Keep Coming

Zoom Phone has launched over 300+ features in the last 12 months, and they have a standard monthly release cycle across their entire platform.  Zoom’s singular focus is communications, which is a clear advantage when it comes to enhancements and responsiveness to user feedback/requests.  Whereas Microsoft Teams Phone is a small part of a large suite of products and, as such, does not necessarily get the same level of attention. Here are a few standout features of the Zoom phone service offering:

• Native PSTN services in 47 countries while Teams is only in 26 countries
• Architected for global scale, using a diverse mesh of public and private data centers while Teams uses a single private series of data centers
• More robust prebuilt CCaaS (Contact Center as a Service) integrations:
  • Five9
  • Nice inContact
  • Genesys
  • Talkdesk
  • Twilio
• Works with a variety of hardware providers

Reliability, Performance, and Call Quality of Zoom Phone Service

As most phone systems are used primarily for external communication, poor call quality or dropped calls can harm a customer or prospect’s overall impression of your company.

In a study conducted by Wainhouse Research to evaluate VOIP call quality under poor network conditions, Zoom outperformed the others. The other solutions begin to degrade in quality at 40% packet loss, whereas Zoom Phone maintains better audio quality even at 70% packet loss. (This study measured quality using the latest codec from Microsoft, called SATIN, which is designed to perform in low-quality network conditions.)

As the Executive Director of Technology Infrastructure for Quinnipiac University shares in this video, their Polling Institute can make 20-30k calls in a 3-4 day period, and Zoom is the enterprise phone system they rely on to make it happen.

Ability To Integrate Zoom Phone With Microsoft Teams/Microsoft 365

At the end of the day, it doesn’t have to be all or nothing.  Many companies choose a hybrid approach and use Microsoft Teams for internal collaboration and rely on Zoom voice for their external calling. Zoom built an integration with Microsoft to cross-launch from the Teams application and utilize the Zoom backbone and architecture to place and receive calls. At this time, there are a few convenience-type features that do not push from Zoom to Teams, such as presence and BLF (busy lamp fields).

And speaking of integrations, Zoom has hundreds in their marketplace, including software solutions like Salesforce and Slack.

Simple Cost Structure and Low Operational Costs for Zoom Phone

Zoom Phone works off a simplified pricing structure for all users. Discount tiers are based on company size and percentage of user adoption, making it a viable cloud phone system for companies from SMB to Enterprise.

Microsoft Teams Phone pricing is a bit more complicated as Microsoft 365 licensing comes into play. Teams is included in many of the licenses; however, that only provides the ability to chat, share files, and host video meetings internally. When it comes to making external calls or having an audio conference that includes people outside your company, there are additional features that must be added.  

Another important consideration is the cost to manage/administer the system. Zoom offers a single administration app, whereas Microsoft Teams requires access/command of several different programs, including Powershell. A 2020 study by Nermetes found that Zoom costs $962 less per user per year to operate than Microsoft Teams, which can translate to an operational cost savings of 64%.

All of the above has contributed to the rise of Zoom Phone, which just hit 1.5M seats this month, and elicits praise from companies both big and small:

“Zoom Phone has been incredibly valuable when it comes to keeping our teams connected. The one-click option to elevate calls to meetings allowed our users ease, and reduced time spent, alleviating the need to juggle multiple platforms. Zoom’s pricing plans made it easy to roll out a single solution across our offices around the world.” -Susan Delaney, Director, Global Network Services at eBay

If you are thinking about your current or future VOIP / UCaaS deployment and have questions, Opkalla can help.