Enterprises all over the world are modernising their workplace, but often telephony remains a pain point in terms of ease of use, cost and manageability for IT departments. With Google Voice by G Suite, Google Cloud is introducing a Cloud-native way for companies of every size to stay connected with a phone solution that is easy to use and to manage.
As a premier Google Cloud partner we have been implementing G Suite for over 7 years. Companies that think about adopting G Suite as their productivity suite want to reimagine the way they collaborate and communicate internally and externally.
G Suite is born in the cloud and has a major competitive advantage when it comes down to collaborating in a different way. It also has a very strong video conferencing offering, which is Hangouts Meet. Still, we lost multiple deals to the competition because G Suite didn’t have a telephony offering.
That’s why we are extremely happy that Google announced at Google Next ’19 that Google Voice is now generally available.
Reimagining Voice
At this moment there are more than 8 billion phone numbers in the world, which makes voice still the most universal way to connect. Voice solutions in the enterprise space are extremely difficult and hard to maintain. The on-premise PBX systems require deep expertise in the telephony space and is a nightmare to every IT department.
Google wouldn’t be Google if they wouldn’t completely rethink the way voice works. Like all G Suite products, Google Voice is born in the cloud. No need for an on-premise PBX system anymore.
Google Voice for G Suite is built to be simple, smart and scalable – which makes it an attractive telephony solution for companies of all sizes. Let’s take a closer look at the different capabilities and functionalities of the solution.
Simple
Google Voice is very easy to administer. Administrators can easily attach a new phone number to a user, port existing numbers, create workflows and see analytics on the usage.
Smart
- With Google Voice, your user phone number works from anywhere and on any device, so you can place and receive calls wherever you’re doing work. You can also easily determine which device should be active at a given moment in time.
- Use intelligent capabilities to transcribe voicemails and block spam calls to help minimise unwanted distractions.
- Manage your work-life balance by determining your office hours and by blocking calls whenever you’re done working.
- Increase efficiency through integrations with other G Suite products like Calendar, Contacts, Hangouts Chat and Hangouts Meet.
Scalable
- Migrate smoothly with integrated number porting to help prevent interruption of key business processes.
- Leverage Google’s text-to-speech technology to automatically create call menus in nine languages to manage and route callers without worrying about recordings or translations.
- Give users permission to choose a number and set up their service independently without admin involvement.
Google Voice regions
It takes time for Google to get Google Voice activated in all countries. Below is a list of the current status of availability. Your country isn’t there? Contact us and we can keep you updated.
Google Voice is already available in the underneath countries
- Denmark
- France
- Portugal
- Spain
- Sweden
- Switzerland
- United Kingdom
- United States
- Canada
- Ireland
- Netherlands
Without committing to any ETA, the next wave on Google’s list is:
- Belgium
- Australia
- Italy
- Japan
Google Voice pricing structure
Google Voice has several pricing plans with a fixed cost per user per month, so you can choose which one fits your company best. See below for a comparison of these pricing plans as they are priced right now (for an updated chart you can check the Google Voice page at the Google Cloud website).
Not sure which one to choose? Our G Suite experts can help you with an assessment of your specific business needs. Just contact us to start the conversation.
In short, we think Google Voice is a real game changer for companies willing to rethink the way they work. Telephony is yet another aspect of G Suite and of the digital workplace that you can make easier to use for your workforce and easier to manage for your IT department. Resulting in a more efficient and more collaborative way of working.
Interested in Google Voice, but still have questions?
Wondering how you can get Google Voice for your organisation if you’re already on G Suite or not?
Just drop us a line and we’ll make it happen!
