IP Telephony Unveiled

Product Description

Understand how IP telephony can change your business

This book explains four key points to help you successfully implement your IP telephony strategy:

• IP telephony works today. This is not new, unproven technology. Thousands of customers have implemented IP telephony successfully. So can you.
• Expect to save money. IP telephony may well cost your organization money-initially. But the business impact and post-installation process improvements give you a significant and rapid return on your investment.
• It's more than voice over IP. You'll understand the difference between voice over IP (VoIP) and IP telephony and what that means for your business. This is critical. They are not the same. It's more than a dial tone. There are potential business-impacting applications within your own organization. IP Telephony Unveiled helps you recognize these applications.

The emerging IP telephony market is fraught with misunderstandings and misinformation. IP telephony can impact a company's business model in tremendous ways. It can open new revenue streams, enhance profitability, drive new levels of customer and employee satisfaction, and be a key enabler in a company's strategy to differentiate itself competitively-but only if you're aware of these benefits.

IP Telephony Unveiled is written for all those responsible for corporate strategies for revenue generation, cost containment, and customer satisfaction. IP Telephony Unveiled uncovers the value behind this technology, which helps you see past what might appear to be only a new telephone system, to understand the strategic enabler laying dormant in many companies' networks. Through this book, you will understand the real benefits of an IP telephony strategy and get assistance in developing this strategy inside your organization.

This volume is in the Network Business Series offered by Cisco Press. Books in this series provide IT executives, decision makers, and networking professionals with pertinent information on today's most important technologies and business strategies.

Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful Good Context for Voice/Data Convergence, May 30, 2004 By  A. Sardella (Sunnyvale, CA United States) - See all my reviews    This review is from: IP Telephony Unveiled (Paperback) IP Telephony Unveiled by Kevin Brown (Cisco Press, 2004) provides some interesting history of the convergence of voice and data, and points out how early efforts in this area were focused on the PBX; it turned out this was not a good place to converge because the links were inadequate for ever-increasing data traffic. Eventually the tables were turned and now it's apparent that the data network is the place to converge the two traffic types. The book discusses new capabilities and applications: virus alerts, paging, etc. And it implies throughout that many more revolutionary ("killer") applications are still to be conceived. I kept asking myself if I was convinced of this, but there weren't enough true-ringing examples to sway me. Of course, the day has dawned for IP telephony (IPT). There's no question that toll bypass and unified messaging-with its undeniable cost savings and the means to increase employee productivity and hold staff accountable-will drive a very high growth... Read more Help other customers find the most helpful reviews  Was this review helpful to you?  Report abuse | Permalink  Comment 1 of 1 people found the following review helpful This is a must read for anyone interested in IP Telephony., February 10, 2004 By  "mshaw152" (Detroit, MI) - See all my reviews This review is from: IP Telephony Unveiled (Paperback) I have never written a book review before this one but feel that this book is so superior that I'd like to see it on a 'must read' list for IP Telephony. IP Telephony Unveiled should be required for any University's Information Technology Management curriculum. It departs from 'technology for technology's sake' and makes a quantifiable business case for IP Telephony. This is not a deep-dive technical book but the 20,000 foot view of how IP Telephony will be intelligently tied into a business ROI. If you are a CXO and are considering IP Telephony, this book will be an epiphany and you will use it as a roadmap. It will be the best money you ever spend. Kevin Brown correctly stresses the fact that a VRA (Voice Readiness Assessment) will save lots of money and make the difference between a clean implementation and something that you'll want to rip out and sell on EBay. If you are an engineer, this book is not technically challenging but it should be read because sometimes the... Read more Help other customers find the most helpful reviews  Was this review helpful to you?  Report abuse | Permalink  Comment A convincing case for adopting IPT, March 8, 2005 By  Charles Ashbacher (Marion, Iowa United States) - See all my reviews          This review is from: IP Telephony Unveiled (Paperback) The phone service in the United States is one of the most useful and reliable services ever invented. So reliable that we are astounded when we pick up a phone and there is no dial tone. Through all kinds of weather and heavy usage, we rely on the phone system to transmit our voices, fax our documents and be available for Internet connections. Therefore, when managers are told that there is a more efficient replacement, their "Why switch?" response is one that must be answered. The response must also be persuasive, demonstrating that the new way to do things is better than the old. The new wave in this case is IP telephony (IPT), or the placing of voice clients and voice applications on an IP network. Approximately ten years ago, I worked for a company with a programmed phone system and at the beginning it did not work well. Furthermore, moving to another cubical generally required changes in the phone system that didn't always work as expected. Therefore, the idea that... Read more Help other customers find the most helpful reviews  Was this review helpful to you?  Report abuse | Permalink  Comment

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Praise For IP Telephony Unveiled

Review by Todd Keller, CCNA
Review by Israel Lang, CCNP and Cisco Voice Specialist
Review by Alan Sardella, CCDP
Review by Brian Sprague, CCNA

Index

Download - 97 KB -- Index

Table of Contents

Introduction.


1. Haven't We Been Here Before?

Downloadable Sample Chapter

Download - 2.31 MB -- Chapter 1: Haven't We Been Here Before?