In this issue: 
    Two Innovative, Cost-Saving Voice & Data Technologies  

Hello, and welcome to the July 2009 edition of ListenUp!, your source for the latest news and expert advice about the world of business communications and data solutions. 

In our feature article, we share how two recent innovations in voice and data technology can help save your business money and supercharge your productivity.

More articles to check out:
ETA earns top honors from our Technology Partners
Are you a Twitterati or Facebook Fanatic?  Follow ETA and you could win $100!
ETA Brings a "Taste of Home" to our Troops
Employee Spotlight: Heather Christopher


Two Innovative, Cost-Saving Voice & Data Technologies

At ETA, we're always looking for new and innovative ways to help our customers save money, enhance productivity, and protect their business-critical assets.  In fact, we spend thousands of hours every year researching, evaluating and testing the latest innovations in voice and data technology. 

It's all part of ETA's mission to help "cut through the hype" of technology and help our customers implement best-in-class solutions that deliver value. That's why we're excited to highlight two recent technological advancements that can help your business cut costs, become more efficient, and safeguard your ability to stay up and running: SIP Trunking and Data Recovery.

SIP Trunking:
  How the "New VoIP" Can Reduce Costs and Enhance Collaboration

SIP Trunking, a new communications technology solution, is gaining popularity at breakneck speed.  In fact, Infonetics Research, a leading industry analyst firm, predicts that SIP Trunking will hit an annual 89% compound growth rate by 2013.*

So you may be wondering... What is SIP Trunking, and why is it gaining popularity so quickly?  Simply put, SIP (Session Initiation Protocol) trunking allows businesses to send voice and data communications, both internally and externally, over the Internet instead of the regular telephone network.  This is a departure from traditional Voice over IP (VoIP) applications, which have to translate internal IP communications before they can travel - as voice communications - over phone lines.

This "direct connection" to the Internet can deliver several key cost-saving benefits, including:

»  Substantially lower toll charges for long distance, International, and local
    access calls.
»  Reduces or eliminates many hardware-related costs associated with
    traditional Voice over IP solutions, such as managed gateway devices and
    T1 circuit cards
»  Reduces recurring monthly costs for separate voice and data circuits,
    since SIP carries voice and data over one connection
»  Eliminates over-subscribing for voice - Traditional VoIP connections are
    often sold in standard packages that contain large numbers of "channels"
    that provide more bandwidth than a small business needs. SIP architecture
    allows companies to pay only for the bandwidth they use.
»  Simplified, cost-effective access to Unified Communications (UC) - SIP
    Trunking's streamlined architecture provides more efficient and affordable
    access to powerful collaboration tools such as chat services, audio/video
    conferencing, application sharing, "find me follow me" technology and more. 

However, like all communications technology solutions, one size doesn't fit all.  To truly maximize the potential for cost savings with SIP Trunking, it's critical to work with a partner who can thoroughly analyze your existing communications infrastructure, understand your business' workflow and goals, and design a customized SIP Trunking plan using the technology and service providers that fit the best.  

At ETA, that's exactly what we do. We work with you to thoroughly understand your technology needs and business objectives to design customized SIP Trunking solutions that help reduce costs while enhancing collaboration.  Want to learn more about how SIP Trunking can help your business?  Click here to schedule a free, no-obligation SIP evaluation with one of ETA's team of experts.

Data Recovery:
  Enterprise-Class Continuity at SMB Costs - With No Capital Purchase!

Even with the economy on the rebound, it can still be challenging to keep sales up when things are running smoothly - So what happens if the business-critical data resources on your key servers become unavailable?   Whether it's due to a power or network outage, equipment failure or natural disaster, every hour you lose getting back up and running cuts into your productivity and profits.  In fact, industry studies show that 40% of companies that suffer a significant, unrecoverable data loss for 3 days go out of business within 36 months.** 

Although small and mid-size businesses understand the negative impacts downtime can cause, they have historically not had effective and efficient options to get servers up and running when outages happen.  While most companies have some sort of tape, hard drive, or USB backup system in place, these systems are made for storage - Not recovery.  It typically takes 1-3 days to fully restore a server from long-term storage media, between locating the tape or drive with the latest data, loading the Operating System onto a new server, installing all the necessary patches, configuring user settings and loading the backed up data.  However, sophisticated data recovery options such as clustering, high availability, replication and co-location, while providing almost instantaneous uptime during an outage, are typically way too expensive for smaller businesses. 

To bridge this gap, ETA introduced a solution that delivers Enterprise-class data recovery at prices designed for the smaller business.  Server Data Recovery PoweredUp!™ is designed to get you back up and running in the shortest possible timeframe and with extremely little exposure to data loss. In fact, our Recovery Time Objective (RTO) - Or the time it takes to restore full connectivity to your critical files and applications, - can be as little as an hour. And our Recovery Point Objective (RPO), or the amount of time and data lost, can be as low as 15 minutes. Here’s how we do it: An initial image, or “snapshot” of your servers is taken and stored on the PoweredUp!™ Network Appliance (installed and managed by ETA). Every 15 minutes, all changes since the last image are recorded and stored as well.  Server backups are then transferred via an online connection to a secure, remote data center to ensure redundancy and reduce risk in the event your office or technology infrastructure becomes compromised or unavailable.

There are two options available to restore your server data, depending on your business needs.  Either way, getting you back up and running couldn't be easier.
1.  Your server cam be "virtualized" so it's available online, usually within an
     hour.  This option is best in temporary outage situations where only a
     single production server has been damaged or compromised.

2.  A fully functional copy of your server can be shipped to you, typically arriving
     in as little as one day. This option is best for situations where your server or
     building has been physically damaged or made inaccessible.

Best of all, ETA manages the service for you - All for one low monthly fee.  That means there's no expensive equipment to buy or maintain, software patches to worry about, or staff needed for administration.  Want to learn more? Click here to schedule a free evaluation to see how ETA can help keep your business-critical data and applications PoweredUp!™

How To Get ETA News & Offers In Real Time:
In 140 Characters Or Less!

As ETAs Mktg Prgms Mnger its my job to sprd the wrd abt how we lvrg busns commctns 2 help cmpns lwr costs, enhnce efficncy & bst productvty.

Translation (for those of you not accustomed to TweetSpeak): As ETA's Marketing Programs Manager, it's my job to "spread the word" about how we help companies leverage business communications to reduce costs, improve efficiency, and boost productivity. 

That's why you're reading our quarterly newsletter right now.  It's also why we send out monthly eBulletins to help keep you up to date on the latest news and innovations in business communications. 

And the good news is - Our customers love them!  We receive a deluge of phone calls and emails every month asking us about topics we've covered and thanking us for the information.  However, there's always been one thing that bothered me.  How can we help update people who want to know about ETA events, industry news, and special offers as they happen? 

The answer hit me over the head one night, right after I became a "fan" of one of my favorite shows (Anthony Bourdain's "No Reservations", if you're wondering) on Facebook - Because I have a terrible memory and don't want to miss the new episodes.  The answer, of course, is Social Media!

Now, all you have to do to get up-to-the-minute news, updates, and exclusive "social media" offers is follow us on Twitter or become a fan of ETA on Facebook!  

If all those real-time updates aren't reason enough to join us, here's a little extra motivation to sweeten the pot.  Every new Facebook Fan and Twitter Follower we receive between now and August 30th will be entered to win a $100 Amex gift card!  We'll announce the winner live on Facebook and Twitter on Friday, September 4th and will re-print the winner's information in our September eBulletin the following week.  

Hope to "c u on FB and twtr soon!"  

 - Chris Aldred (@caldred), Marketing Programs Manager



* http://ip-pbx.tmcnet.com/topics/ip-pbx/articles/57478-growth-ip-lines-pbxs-decline-2009-report.htm
** http://www.ironmountain.com/resources/tape/cost.pdf

Knock one out
of the park...

 

With these cost-saving voice and data innovations.

ETA Earns Top Honors From Our Technology Partners
ETA was recently recognized by several of our technology partners as being among their most elite performers throughout the country.  We're honored to have received several prestigious distinctions, including:

1. Mitel Platinum Plus - Top 15 US Business Partner:   ETA ranked 13out of approximately 750 Mitel authorized partners throughout the United States during a 16 month period from 2008 to 2009.  ETA also earned Mitel's "Platinum Plus" designation, which represents the most prestigious level of recognition attainable among Mitel Partners. Mitel, a leading multinational communications solutions provider, designs and manufactures the technology (e.g. VoIP and Digital phone systems, Unified Communications applications, and Mobility and Collaboration tools) that fuel ETA's solutions.
2.  Top 5 Paetec Partner: ETA ranked among Paetec's top 5 partners out of approximately 600 throughout the United States.  Paetec is a leading, national business to business carrier services provider serving thousands of customers across the country.
3.  Netcarrier - #1 Overall Partner: ETA was ranked Netcarrier's #1 overall partner in 2008!  Netcarrier is a regional, premier Integrated Communications Provider, offering low-cost, high-value communications services to businesses throughout the Delaware Valley.

ETA Provides "Creature Comforts" To Marines Overseas

Sadly, there are tens of thousands of marines in Iraq and Afghanistan that never receive any mail from home.  That's why MarineParents.com, a non-profit charity whose mission is to provide education and support for Marine Corps families, created the "Care Package Project" initiative. 

The program's goal is to send care packages to marines in Iraq and Afghanistan who do not normally receive mail from family or friends.  They ship over 1,000 care packages six times a year - That means over 6,000 marines are able to enjoy "creature comforts" they otherwise would not receive.

To help this worthy cause, ETA employees raised enough money to send care packages to 8 Marines - with weekly donations over a 2 month period. 

We're proud to have helped Marine Parents provide moral support to our troops.

To learn more about The Care Package Project, visit http://www.thecarepackageproject.com/.


Employee Spotlight: 
Heather Christopher 

"Nobody puts Baby in a corner."  If you don't recognize that quote, it's the line spoken by "Johnny" (Patrick Swayze), the male star of the movie "Dirty Dancing" -Right before he calls "Baby", the heroine of the movie, out from her corner chair to stun a room of conservative onlookers with an unexpected and dramatic dance routine.

It's also a line that we hear here at ETA, just before we start product demonstrations - From our Sales Engineer, Heather Christopher.

 

Heather Christopher, ETA Sales Engineer

Of course, when Heather utters this famous line, it's meant as a joke. You see, Heather sits in the corner of our presentation room, since it's the closest to the monitor jack for our projection screen.

However, it's actually a bit ironic that Heather chose Johnny's famous line to open these meetings - Because once she starts presenting, she usually steals the show!

That's because Heather's unique combination of in-depth real-world experience (she spent many years as a project leader managing new phone system installations), exhaustive technical expertise(Heather spends hundreds of hours every year earning certifications in our business communication platforms and applications), and passion for what she does always means that when she presents, our guests are treated to an impressive, informative - and always enthusiastic - demonstration.  

So, the next time you visit ETA to learn about a new product or service, be prepared - You're in for one heck of a show!

 - Chris Aldred, Marketing Programs Manager