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Sean Rivers

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Director of Product Marketing, Bandwidth.com

110 points

As an industry insider for over 15 years, I've been talking about, installing and developing VoIP for 10 years. I spent the past 5 years at Bandwidth.com, helping businesses across America by developing new VoIP products and services to meet their growing and changing telephony needs.

WEB: Phonebooth Community

Sean Rivers and 8 other people answered this question

July 5, 2011

Google+: Do you think Google+ will grow quickly and disrupt Facebook, Twitter, and Linkedin?

I'll take them one at a time:
Facebook:
It is going to be very hard to unseat Facebook, but people are getting fatigued and Facebook still has done little to handle over notifying. People can be real fickle, lets not forget how fast mySpace fell.
Twitter:
Twitter is always ... more

Information Technology

Sean Rivers and 8 other people answered this question

June 16, 2011

How does Sharepoint compare to Google Apps?

Sorry but if you are a paid GApps for business customer there are no adds either and the ability to work on documents and ideas together are far superior in GApps than Office 365. I have used both. Office 365 was behind the curve and ... more

Information Technology

Sean Rivers and 5 other people answered this question

June 10, 2011

If I need 5 9's uptime do I have to use a premise solution or can I go with hosted/managed solution?

I agree with Mike. Building to a mathematical need as opposed to a business need is folly. There are a lot of variables that go into the equation. You can take the approach of controlling everything, as prem-based providers will say, but you can't control ... more

Information Technology

Sean Rivers and 4 other people answered this question

June 10, 2011

How can you avoid disrupting your business operations when migrating to VoIP?

Take it, Tony. No attribution required. :)

Information Technology

Sean Rivers and 1 other person answered this question

June 10, 2011

Do VoIP vendors differ in their network security offerings? What should buyers know?

Do not rely on VoIP vendors to secure your network. Most VoIP attacks are to the local network not to the carrier. Here are some common attacks:
1. Toll-fraud - Hackers are trying to make money one way to do this is to take ownership of ... more

Information Technology

Sean Rivers and 1 other person answered this question

June 10, 2011

How can communications developers and IT keep in front of trends?

I do not, this is just my opinion, think that you need to keep ahead of trends. Just follow blogs, trade rags and talk to your vendors and customers and that will mostly keep you informed. The main thing to keep ahead of is the ... more

Information Technology

Communication Developers

Sean Rivers is now following Joel Maloff

June 6, 2011

Sean Rivers and 6 other people answered this question

June 6, 2011

Poll: Do you still feel the need for a wireline/home office phone?

I agree, I am not a big fan of VoIP for home-business or SOHO use. Unless you are a tech person who sets up the network accordingly and pony up money for a business grade Internet connection, there will be issues. Most home-based businesses try ... more

General Management

Information Technology

Sean Rivers and 7 other people answered this question

June 6, 2011

Is the "most powerful smartphone ever" a compelling marketing message for you?

Not compelling since it is only the most powerful until a new smart phone comes out in a few months. People are pretty jaded on this. See Best Buys new campaign, they play on this.
I agree with Jamie Wallace, make people feel something and you ... more

Information Technology

Sean Rivers and 6 other people answered this question

May 24, 2011

What is best IP phone to buy?

Our Lab has tested quite a few phones and the question of "Best" has a lot qualifiers:
Brands:
Best Budget Phones - Yealink (good build, lots of features pretty stable and cheap)
Best Mid-range Phone - Linksys/Cisco SPA (excellent quality full line and Cisco name)
Best High-end IP-phones - ... more

Sean Rivers and 11 other people answered this question

Aug. 19, 2009

When is the best time to cold call?

It depends on who you are cold calling. If you are calling on the main business decision maker, I have always found them to be easier to reach either very early or after normal work hours. The benefit to this is that the gatekeeper is ... more

Sean Rivers and 1 other person commented on a brief

Aug. 17, 2009

Quick Guide to Purchasing VoIP Phones

I think this is a very good starters guide to VoIP phones. Most small business consumers need to consider a few details before buying previously used IP-phones. The first issue is that they need to make sure they get the exact models and brands sold ... more

Sean Rivers asked a question

Aug. 17, 2009

How has the user experience been with voice-to-text applications?

Information Technology

Sean Rivers recommends this comment by William Bumbernick

Aug. 7, 2009

Why wouldn't a small to mid-size business always go with a hosted phone solution?

Interesting question... "Why WOULDN'T a business ALWAYS go with a hosted phone system?"
A properly run business will certainly look at all options when making decisions about the future of the company... Communications decisions (inclusive of not only PBX but also email, Unified Communication, Fax, ... more

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