How to use Microsoft Teams Direct Routing to communicate better internally AND externally

Address: Boosh Barns Aincroft, Cove Road, Fleet, Hampshire, GU51 2RT, GB
Telephone: 01252 916 888

John Baker
November 27, 2020
Business Telecoms, Modern Workplace

Did you know you can use Microsoft Teams to communicate better internally and externally?

Here’s how you do it with Direct Routing.

Working from home was getting popular before the pandemic. Fast-forward 10 months and it’s a necessity – and who knows what the state of the working world will be in another year’s time?

Perhaps you’ve already migrated to Microsoft Teams to facilitate a remote workforce and create more agile processes within your business. But are you using it to its full capability? (And if you haven’t made the move towards cloud-based communication for work, why not?!)

But now, with a modern communication strategy like Direct Routing for Microsoft Teams, you can make all your outbound calls directly from the Teams platform. So Teams needn’t just revolutionise your internal communication, but your external too.

With call termination, business continuity and improved security features, Direct Routing is a fantastic alternative to Microsoft’s Calling Plans (MCP) or your current telephony solution. Flexible, accessible and cost-effective too, Direct Routing lets you connect with the world outside your business – from within Teams.

How does Direct Routing work? Let’s take a closer look.

Direct Routing provides a Public Switched Telephone Network connection to Microsoft Teams users (let’s just call it a PSTN, shall we?). It means they can make and receive external phone calls though Teams on any device.

Historically, businesses have made internal and external telephone calls using a Private Branch Exchange (PBX) phone system, which you’d usually have installed on your premises.

But now, Microsoft Teams can perform the role of your PBX and replace it with a new cloud-based telephony solution – and that’s where Direct Routing comes in.

Why should that make a difference to you? Plenty of reasons! Not only do you get to cut costs, enjoy increased functionality and stop maintaining your PBX, you can do it with all the full PBX voice capabilities you’re used to – inside and outside of your organisation. Here are some other great benefits:

More flexibility

With Direct Routing you get to choose your own provider, meaning you’re not subject to any of the carrier or location limitations of Microsoft’s Calling Plans. And rather than having to stick to the off-the-shelf bundles offered by MCP, you can get a tailored solution to meet the exact needs of your organisation, whatever they are.

Centralisation

Direct Routing is great news for multinational businesses too. Most providers offer global networks and worldwide coverage so you can keep communication totally cohesive across the entire business. Your new single telephony solution will allow you to streamline compliance, IT support and employee training with a replicable experience across the organisation.

Lower rates

Generally, you’ll enjoy lower rates from a third-party provider than you would have with Microsoft directly. When you’re only dipping into a centralised pool of minutes from one worldwide provider, you’ll cut out wasted minutes and never have to top up single accounts that have already reached their limit.

Lower costs

Without expensive, time-sucking on-site hardware to look after, you’ll only pay for the resources you actually use. Nine times out of ten, migrating fully to Teams will lower your costs and save you a heck of a lot of time.

Better remote working

When your telephony solution is cloud-based with Direct Routing, you won’t ever need to manage any on-site PBX gear and can modify Microsoft Teams users wherever they are. It’s great news for helping you facilitate working from home and mobile working (and maybe hot-desking in the post-pandemic future too).

Happy, productive staff

When you use the same interface for all internal and external communication, you get a consistent experience. Pretty much every tool is accessible from the same platform; external phone calls, video conferencing, even file sharing too. When they can do everything from the same place, your staff will become more productive and enjoy the ride a whole lot more.

So what do you need to enable Direct Routing in your business?

There are four components you’ll need to have if you want to take advantage of Direct Routing and reap the benefits it offers to Microsoft Teams users:

An Office 365 or Business Voice subscription (we can help you there)
A Microsoft Phone System Add-on (we can help you there as well)
A calling plan (unsurprisingly, we can help you there!)
And, of course, an internet connection (actually, we can help you there as well!)

And we’ll provide all the cloud infrastructure you need to route your incoming and outgoing external calls to Microsoft Teams.

The simplest way you can implement Direct Routing within your business is to first roll out Teams internally, obtain your licences and choose a provider (again, hi!). We’d then help you configure your PSTN gateways, port your existing numbers and provide training so you can get your employees up to speed.

Want to talk about this in more detail?

If you like the sound of creating a more agile, more cohesive and, ultimately, more cost-efficient way for your entire organisation to communicate – internally and externally – let’s talk about Direct Routing.

Not only can we help you make the migration and install the software that’ll help your business communicate better, but we’ll help you strategise to make the very best of Direct Routing too. And we’ll provide you with all the training your organisation needs, to maximise value from your Microsoft Teams environment.

Ready to have that chat? Give Boosh 365 a call on 01252 916 888 or say hi to [email protected].

John Baker

John has been a key part of the Boosh 365 Senior Team since joining as a Director and co-owner in 2019. With over 20 years spent working in telecoms, John brings a wealth of experience (and a whole lot of geekery) to our already amazing team.

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How to use Microsoft Teams Direct Routing to communicate better internally AND externally

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