An analog phone system: still useful for modern businesses?

Written by Steven Bryan

The digital revolution has changed the way that office workers perform their daily duties, including making phone calls to clients. As a business owner, you now have the option to maintain an analog phone system that has served you well for years, or trade it in for a more advanced digital model with many more intuitive features and far-reaching capabilities.

Just a plain old telephone system

Alexander Graham Bell gets the credit for inventing the first analog phone system, which still is widely used in homes and businesses. Affectionately referred to as a plain old telephone system (POTS), an analog system allows your staff to place and receive phone calls and transfer callers from one extension to another.

For a small business, a POTS is an inexpensive, effective way to keep in touch with customers. The phone line supplies the dial tone and the power, and can be hooked up to an interactive voice response (IVR) system, allowing you to handle more clients in a timely manner. Analog may not be fancy, but it still gets the job done.

Updating an analog phone system

As your business grows, however, you may find that updating to a digital phone system might be a wise move. Digital lines can carry more information than analog phone systems, allowing your staff to send and receive files and video images more quickly than on analog lines. Conversations over a digital line also tend to sound “cleaner” than those made using an analog phone.

Because digital technology is growing in popularity, you may be considering retiring your existing analog phone system. Before making the digital switch, keep a few things in mind:

• Equipment damage. Telephones, fax machines, and other analog equipment can’t be plugged directly into a digital phone connection. Analog phone lines govern the amount of electricity a device draws, but a digital line doesn’t. If you plug an analog phone directly into a digital jack, there's a good chance it will draw too much juice and malfunction.
• You can bridge the gap. If your office has a digital subscriber line (DSL), you can give your employees the benefits of digital phone service without the extra expense. Some telephone providers use what's called voice over Internet protocol (VOIP), which lets you use analog adapters to make phone calls over the Internet.
• Head count. If you manage a small staff, an analog phone system should easily handle all your communication needs. On the other hand, if you expect to increase the head count as your business grows, it may be time to switch to digital lines.

A (phone) call to action

Analog phone systems are proven technologies that keep the lines of communication open between you and your customers. As your needs change, though, it may make more business sense to make the leap to a digital phone system.

Interested in getting your company started? Submit a free request for phone system price quotes and let multiple dealers help you descide if an analog phone system can fit your business needs, or if you’re a better candidate to go digital.