conXhub EB Supplement

How to save 50% on your telecoms

Welcome

TIMES HAVE changed, however. According to Statista, there were 4.2 million self-employed workers in the UK in late 2022. Moreover, home working and hybrid working have become commonplace since the Covid-19 lockdowns.

This new normal is changing our whole relationship with the telecoms sector. We welcome the chance to communicate while we’re on the move, but we’re not always keen to give our personal mobile numbers to business contacts.

Meanwhile, cheap voice calls made via broadband – technically known as Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) calls – come with their own irritations, such as dropout when the signal fades.

The technological solution provided by conXhub covers all of these bases and more. As well as being reliable, cost-effective and simple to install, it can turn your humble smartphone into a communications powerhouse. You can add one or more mobile or landline numbers from dozens of countries. Or set up a professional switchboard with all the call-routing possibilities that implies.

In you’re phoning contacts in a particular foreign country, they’re much more likely to answer (or get back to you) if the number is local. In addition, when you use cellular mobile networks rather than broadband, your chances of a crystalclear connection rise sharply.

And the benefits don’t stop there. You can create virtual offices anywhere you want, save money with whichever allinclusive plan suits you best, and bolster your green credentials by ditching that wasteful business mobile.

Mark Trowbridge, the entrepreneur behind conXhub, previously founded Business Network International (BNI), the networking organisation that is a boon for small and medium enterprises.

As you read on, you’ll discover why conXhub is catching on among large organisations and SMEs alike. That interest is likely to intensify ahead of BT switching off its analogue network in 2025.

At Elite Business, we think you’ll be hearing a lot more about conXhub in the months and years to come. With thousands of satisfied customers, it’s firmly established in the global

Contents

04 The clearest signal

08 The next stage of telecoms

10 Get ready for the big switch-off

12 Infographic

13 Flowchart

14 Case Study: An unbeatable deal

15 Case Study: The blowfish effect

16 Making the right connections

communications space and is set on making 2023 a landmark year.

Whether it’s sophisticated analytics tools, call-forwarding or virtual switchboards, there’s a great deal to interest small business people. Whatever you’re looking for, we hope you’ll find the answers in the pages that follow.

Telephones used to be so simple. You had a desk phone at work, a mobile for personal calls and perhaps a company mobile as well

THE CLEAREST SIGNAL

YOU COULD say business is in Mark Trowbridge’s blood. “Even at school, I was kind of an entrepreneur, working through the holidays,” he recalls. “Not even to make money, really. It’s more because I’d get bored.”

His estate agent dad and accountant mum had a lot to do with that. “They worked really hard, were very sociable and were heavily involved in Round Table and Rotary. So, I was brought up around business people from a very young age and that rubbed off, I think.”

His ensuing career, full of startling achievements, also contains a devastating setback. At 17, he was running his first business, a four-office estate agency in Hertfordshire. Preinternet, a 200-office agency bought the related multi-terminal software solution he’d built. He then sold the underlying business to Hambro, who made him a director at the age of 21.

As the property sector boomed, so did his fortunes – first as Hambro’s resident troubleshooter, looking after struggling offices, then as founder of a multi-milliondollar land-finding agency, and finally as

a pioneer of the self-build industry. “Then we had the recession of 1989, when interest rates went from 3% to 17.5% overnight,” he says. “I had nine businesses at the time, all in property.”

His knowledge of software and talent for business consulting helped him to bounce back. His next step, after emigrating to Spain, came in 2003 when he launched Business Network International Spain (BNI), the world’s largest business referral organisation.

In all, he has worked for major corporations three times, at very senior levels. “Big business is great and the money’s really good, but I’ll be honest with you, it’s really boring,” he says. “Small business is a lot more fun, a lot more dangerous, a lot harder and very insecure. But that’s where I’ll always be.”

It’s the cut and thrust that attracts him: “Finding that product or business that can scale and grow, and you can have fun with.” BNI, he points out, is “geared towards supporting and helping small businesses grow. So yeah, I’ve always been there trying to fight for the smaller guy.”

As he prepares for the next stage of conXhub’s evolution, founder Mark Trowbridge tells us why he’ll always be on the side of small businesses

Mobile first

With conXhub, Mark is challenging the traditional telecommunications market. In essence, it’s a flexible successor technology to VoIP – to internet calls –that eschews broadband for the vastly more reliable mobile cellular networks that criss-cross the world. Annoyingly, the Skype call he’s answered from Spain for the sake of this interview is littered with split-second cut-outs, as if to prove his point that VoIP is inferior. Connectivity is just the start, however. Sign up to a conXhub package and you can add as many phone numbers – including overseas ones – to your smartphone as you like. As well as existing landline business numbers, that might include departmental numbers, personal direct dial numbers or connections to new virtual offices.

In a sense, the business started accidentally. “We’d launched an MVNO (mobile virtual network operator) in Spain and had the ability to push our

international calls from the mobile carrier across our network. This reduced costs dramatically and allowed us to give much cheaper pricing to our customers,” Mark explains.

“One day, I got a message from my secretary to call one of those clients that you really don’t want to talk to. I said, ‘Fine, I’ll give him a ring,’ and she said, ‘No, he wants to talk to you at eight o’clock tonight.’

“I’d either have to stay in the office and call him using the company’s phone number, or we’d have to give him my mobile number. That got me thinking: can we add additional phone numbers to our primary service? Three weeks later, I’d worked out how we could do it.”

Built as a standalone product, the system subsequently evolved into a standalone company. To understand why, it’s worth considering VoIP’s shortcomings. When telecoms professionals discuss the start and endpoint of a call, they refer to the first and last mile. At both of those points, strong broadband connections are crucial for VoIP to work well.

“All of the business clients that we had at the time were using VoIP solutions,” Mark adds. “We moved them over to our new conXhub solution, and calls to customer support stopped overnight because we were going over the mobile network.

“All of a sudden, the quality issues went away. What’s more, our clients could easily call from different phone numbers on the fly. If they were making international calls, they could use a number from where their customer was based, which was just a eureka moment for everybody.”

As soon as we walked into lockdown, there was a huge need for additional services and features

conXhub’s development roadmap took an even more unexpected turn during the pandemic. “As soon as we walked into lockdown, there was a huge need for additional services and features. For example, you’re monitoring people remotely – who’s on the phone, who are they calling and how long have they been on the phone for? A lot of our competitors had massive issues dealing with this, but in our case, people were just picking up their mobile phones and walking home with them.”

Clients in every sector

Take-up of conXhub’s services have been “literally across the board”, says Mark. “Accountants, solicitors, plumbers, engineers, call centres… We have clients in every sector.” To date, the company’s strategy has been to develop useful products and sell them on its website. This year, however, the emphasis will be on tailoring products to different audiences.

“A really good example we’ve come across is that a lot of females in particular are struggling with safety and security and communications. So, we’re taking our product, rebranding it and redelivering it for that market, calling it VIP Safety First. A lot of women want to evangelise this product because it’s a major issue, so

that’s going to have its own website, its own branding.

“Moving forward, what we’re effectively doing is building a lot of micro-product websites that are very specific to the audience. We can support the issues and the problems of the plumber right through to government call centres, and we’ve got a product for everyone. What we’re doing now is boiling that down to ‘who is the audience and what do they actually need?’ We’re finding the product that fits them to a tee.”

Certain products have soared in popularity, in ways the company didn’t expect. “Our verification service suddenly became number one in the world as far as Google were concerned,” says Mark. “A lot of clients just want a phone number to verify against a particular website for a day, and they want to what we call ‘burn’ the number. Not many companies like doing verification services, but that just took off. I mean, thousands and thousands of numbers for us.”

SMS2Email – again, developed to meet client demand – forwards texts to customers’ email accounts. “It was very surprising how quickly it became a number-one product in the world after launch, and we’re hoping to emulate that with our other products by being more tailored and more bespoke.”

Your lucky number

Adding extra phone numbers to your mobile is one of conXhub’s principal selling points, so we asked Mark to spell out the practical advantages.

Let’s say you were planning to make lengthy calls to the United States. Should you add an American number to your British phone? Financially, would it be worth your while?

The answer is a firm yes, he says.

“Firstly, we don’t charge for calls. There’s no additional cost. You’re also using your mobile phone, so you can wander out of your office and continue the call.

“If you’re calling people you don’t know, they’re more likely to pick up if they see a USA number. They’re definitely not going to pick up a UK number,” he adds.

“Another benefit is that the people in the USA will be calling you less expensively. It will cost them whatever the local call rate is. Sometimes it’s free.

“There are lots of advantages. But basically, we charge an all-inclusive monthly fee for those services.”

Accountants, solicitors, plumbers, engineers, call centres… We have clients in every sector

The next stage of telecoms

conXhub has superseded traditional VoIP telephony. So, what does that mean for customers?

JUST AS tractors replaced horse-drawn ploughs, conXhub is making traditional VoIP telephony look like yesterday’s technology.

Perhaps it’s inevitable that making phone calls via broadband will fall out of favour. Issues such as lag, echo and dropped calls show no sign of being resolved soon.

Besides which, the internet was designed to transfer data, not phone calls. To VoIP’s detractors, it’s a bit like fitting a car with outriggers to run down a railway track.

The mobile cellular network, on the other hand, is a dedicated communications platform, built from the ground up to handle calls in the fastest, safest, most convenient manner.

This network is the backbone of conXhub’s technology.

The result is a scalable, agile system that reinvents communications architecture and replicates the most

useful features of the traditional private branch exchange (PBX) switchboard. So, how does this benefit you?

Increased efficiency

Leaving behind VoIP puts an end to stressful, low-quality conversations. On the cellular network, calls are much more likely to be crystal clear.

There’s no need to call in engineers or mess around with cables and equipment. All your staff members need are their smartphones – a development that suits the new norm of working remotely.

Numbers galore

With conXhub, your mobile contains all the numbers you’ll need to make and receive calls. You can keep your personal contact number private, but add work numbers, switchboard lines, department numbers, direct dial numbers and more.

People are 78% more likely to answer

an unknown number if it’s local to them. For its part, conXhub supplies more than 10,000 city-based phone numbers across all major global destinations.

Convenience

Using a honeycomb system of antennas, the mobile network offers practically 100% coverage, particularly in the Western world. With VoIP, any loss of signal will result in a dropped call. With the cell network, you’re simply handed over to the next antenna.

Most people keep a mobile phone with them constantly. It’s certainly more convenient that setting up a workstyle VoIP desk at home. What’s more, when the children play online games or stream movies, you can carry on making calls without fretting about the sound quality.

Mobility

conXhub’s patented technology means that no matter where you are –commuting, at a coffee shop or even lying on the beach – you can make and receive calls from your work numbers.

In addition to this, conXhub can pass calls on to your smartphone. Before picking up, you can find out which number you are being called on, and whether the caller has selected any ‘virtual reception’ (press 1 for, press 2 for) options.

Calls can be passed to several people in a group and you’ll know if a colleague answers before you. You can be confident

too that even if the signal on your mobile is just one bar, the sound quality will be outstanding.

Privacy and security

Staff don’t need a separate company mobile when their employer subscribes to conXhub’s services. As a result, they don’t have to carry two phones around with them.

Since conXhub doesn’t use any data, it also doesn’t eat into a user’s personal data plan. Indeed, all personal communications are ring-fenced and private – the company won’t know anything about them.

Some firms allow staff to use their personal phone and number for work, reimbursing them for any charges. This short-sighted policy can cost businesses a fortune in lost revenue.

The mobile number makes the company look smaller than it is, and the lack of stats from calls made between staff and their customers deprives the business of key performance indicators.

Worse still, the company might lose the customer altogether when the employee quits. One firm that conXhub knows of lost £47,000 of business this way.

A finger on the pulse

With the aid of detailed statistical monitoring, you can analyse all aspects of your communications. conXhub utilises sophisticated reporting tools that sales directors, customer service managers and call centre supervisors couldn’t imagine five years ago. Uniquely, it captures 16 points of data per call to deliver some of the most accurate and comprehensive reporting available.

What’s more, you can:

• Capture recordings and metadata from every call to measure and improve your campaigns. Details include who called the dialled number, call duration, held time, etc.

• Glean insights about your campaigns by generating reports either from conXhub’s dashboard or your own application, using its management APIs.

• Monitor the real-time status of every agent via conXhub’s dashboard.

• Check who is taking calls and keep an eye on call durations, time between calls and who is logged off or on a break.

• Use conXhub’s Google Chrome widget to see which calls are in your queue and enable prioritisation for certain calls where necessary.

A business empire on your mobile

For SMEs, the benefits of signing up to conXhub are manifold. These might include appearing much bigger than you are; running multiple businesses through one mobile phone; and letting staff use their personal mobile while giving the impression that they’re calling from the office.

Features such as call recording, voicemail to email, and background music when the caller is put on hold simply add to the overriding sense of professionalism.

Can you afford not to find out more?

For more details, visit: conXhub.com

Get ready for the big switch-off

The end of Britain’s old analogue network in 2025 puts ‘mobilepreneurs’ in a strong position

IN 2025 , BT will switch off the Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN) – the old analogue service, which relies on copper wires and has been in use since 1876.

Nearly 30 million PSTN lines, along with ISDN lines, will become inert. So, businesses need to start thinking about alternatives right away.

Broadly, the two options are VoIP systems and mobile networks – and as we’ve established, conXhub has shrewdly built its services around the latter.

It’s thought that the number of ‘mobilepreneurs’ – small businesses that work purely on mobile devices – has risen by tens of thousands in the past few years.

The flexibility and cost benefits have made this way of working increasingly mainstream, as have the changes wrought by the Covid-19 pandemic.

In addition to saving money in cashstrapped times, conXhub’s clients can operate on the move with ease. The ‘new normal’ of remote working is second nature to them.

What’s more, packing a reliable and sophisticated telephony system into one mobile phone is much better for the environment than VoIP hardware and separate work mobiles.

Value

conXhub’s technology is a highly valuable piece of kit. At the same time, its prices are competitive, with multiple benefits wrapped up in one neat bundle.

Buying a VoIP system involves additional expenses such as broadband, cabling and routers. You’ll also need to know about structural insulated panel (SIP) extensions.

Zero carbon

A mobile phone and SIM card are all you need to use conXhub’s extraordinary software. Effectively, its carbon footprint is zero. In the UK alone, 17.2 million mobile phone users have a second handset, and millions of desk phones are used every day. That’s a huge issue that conXhub is helping to tackle.

One of conXhub’s strengths is its simplicity. In fact, all you have to do is install it on your mobile.

Fresh thinking

VoIP suppliers compete on price but offer the same features and functions regardless, say their critics. The downside is that you, the client, can be locked into long-term contracts, receive feature sets you don’t need and be charged extra for those you do.

During the pandemic, when companies were forced into lockdown and had to forward switchboard numbers to employees’ mobiles, some telecoms firms were charging more than £120 per number to set up call-forwarding. conXhub provides this service free of charge.

Its technology has been designed to put even the most complex tools into the hands of every business, from neighbourhood tradesmen to multinational organisations.

The set-up includes all the traditional features of a private branch exchange (PBX) switchboard, such as welcome greetings, time-of-day routing, queues, music on hold, busy announcements and voicemail to email.

No contract, no tie-in, no risk conXhub is so confident in its products, it doesn’t use contracts or tie-ins. Customers simply pay from month to month and can cancel at any time.

You can port in phone numbers – that is, transfer them from another provider –and if you want to leave conXhub at any point, it won’t stop you porting them out.

Prior to porting your phone numbers, conXhub will configure your system and even supply interim numbers for you to use.

And if you’re dissatisfied for any reason, you can just pick up your old system where you left off. There’s nothing to install and no equipment to buy, so trying the service is risk-free.

For more details, visit: conXhub.com

Problems...meet the solution!

conXhub combines the best of VOIP and Carrier technology. Businesses can add functionality to their existing handset contracts –including your current business landline or an extra number with any area code that suits you. All from your current mobile phone. We guarantee the best quality and reliability - with the lowest cost.

Do you feel prepared for the 'PSTN Switch Off' in 2025?

Given missed calls are a loss in potential opportunity/ business, how important to you is a solution to this problem?

Yes - Already switched

No - But no urgency as it's not until 2025

I don't know? I have not heard of the 'PSTN Switch Off'

When I use VoIP it is often great but sometimes dire, suffering from poor connections, lag or interference.

Given your mobile phone is constantly with you, how would you feel if all your business communications were on that phone too?

Very - My business depends on incoming calls, we need a solution

Mildly - However it would be beneficial to improve

None - We have a solution already

In order to compete with bigger businesses and their bigger profiles, do you see the benefit of having designated landline numbers for various departments, virtual offices or staff direct dial?

I agree - We would like something more efficient

I agree - But accept that this can happen

I disagree - Our VoIP service is always perfect

Bad - I don't want to mix together my personal and business life

Good - If I could separate me Personal/ Business communications

Not Sure - I am feeling butterflies in my stomach, and I don't know why!

Yes - I understand the benefit of appearing larger then we current are to compete with larger competitors

No - I don't believe in misleading people

I don't know - I need to understand this more

An unbeatable deal

For currency exchange broker RedFX, signing up to conXhub was a game-changer

TALKING TO clients is a major part of Kevin Tullett’s business. As founder of RedFX, an independent consultancy based in London and the south of France, he’s in constant communication with CEOs, CFO and COOs, as are his colleagues.

The business deals with currency and payments solutions for corporates and private individuals. “So, the two elements are to protect against currency moves, and also to optimise when currency moves in their favour,” he says.

“Because the currency markets move so much, there needs to be an ongoing channel of communication and to be quite frank with you, there is no substitute for the telephone in order to keep relationships going.

“We prospect for new businesses, I’d

say 60% on the phone, 40% by email, and then we are in contact with existing clients 100% on the phone. These are big, important decisions.”

Until about seven years ago, Red FX used only mobile phone numbers. Then a client in Spain, thinking the business would benefit from British and French landline numbers, suggested conXhub. “It was a very glowing recommendation, so I trusted it,” says Kevin. “And I think within two weeks of contact, we were set up and ready to go.

“It’s not easy to get a landline number in France, but these guys managed to find it. We also have a 04 number, which is very important. It’s important regionally for people to know that we are in the southeast of France, because it shows we have a footprint here.”

Reputationally, signing up to conXhub was a smart move. “The system means that we as a team can travel between France and London – literally travelling on the road, which we have to do all the time to see clients – and we still have that professional-looking point of contact.

“People want to see that you have that facility, and from my perspective, it’s important to know who’s calling on which numbers. We immediately know which one of the teams should take it, whether it’s French or English-speaking. “Also, and this is probably the overriding factor, every call we make has to be recorded. That is a regulatory obligation. The Financial Conduct Authority requires all our calls to be recorded and stored.

“To have that regulatory requirement being met is fabulous. For me, that was a game-changer. Without it, we would be struggling to find a solution for that.”

From a cost perspective, he adds, conXhub’s service is unbeatable. “I have partnerships with a couple of companies in France. They use a different system, and I don’t know why, because the quality of service they get for the amount they’re paying isn’t close.”

The blowfish effect

AS ONE of its first clients, Nigel Fitzpatrick has reaped the benefits of conXhub’s technology in a big way. When the British expat co-founded Business Broker Spain, the benefits of adding landline numbers to mobiles soon made themselves plain.

“We were selling businesses –anything from bars to hotels – in different territories throughout Spain. We set that up 15 or 16 years ago and I think at one time we had about seven offices,” he explains.

“Obviously we were making a lot of calls, so we needed an office number, we needed a UK number, and at one time we had a French number as well, if I remember rightly.

“It was a very cost-effective way of making calls – and even though we were using our office number, we weren’t tied to the desk.

“We didn’t have to be in the office, simple as that. We could be at home or wherever, and it came directly through to our mobile.

“Equally, when we were making calls, we didn’t have to be in the office to make those calls from our landline number.”

Nigel based the business in the picturesque town of Javea on the Costa Blanca. As he recalls, he was probably one of the first people that conXhub founder Mark Trowbridge introduced to the service.

“It’s just incredible – really, really good,” he adds.

“From a business point of view, it’s all about the blowfish effect. Having multiple offices with those numbers makes you look very big, so that’s what we did when we first started out.

“We wanted to look as though we were big, and we ended up being the biggest, but it took a while to get there. So, I was very thankful for that.”

Family and friends

Nigel sold his share of Business Broker Spain to his partners in 2021, but that hasn’t ended his connection with conXhub. Far from it.

“We still use it as a family,” he says. “We have a Manchester number, so our friends or family can call.

“My father-in-law is elderly and can’t quite get his head around the fact that he’s making a local call on a Manchester number and it’s coming through direct to my wife’s mobile when she’s down on the beach, walking the dog. And it doesn’t cost him anything.”

When Nigel Fitzpatrick was establishing Business Broker Spain, conXhub’s services added much-needed weight to the company’s public image

Making the right connections

A handy guide to conXhub’s products and services

THE ADVANTAGES SMEs can gain from conXhub’s mobile-first technology are considerable. That’s one reason it’s among the world’s leading communications hubs.

With the minimum of fuss, you can transfer all your existing company communications to your existing smartphones, enabling you to bin the old desk phone, company mobiles and costly, unreliable VoIP systems. You can halve your costs, keep your personal phone number private and create virtual offices anywhere you wish.

There’s no limit to the mobile, landline, national and international numbers you can add to a single smartphone. And compared to VoIP, the connectivity and call quality are remarkable.

All the features you’d expect of a company switchboard are part of the package. Best of all, you can try conXhub risk-free – there’s no contract and no equipment required –and be up and running in minutes.

Premier plans

You’ll find full details of conXhub’s products and services on its website –but here’s a taste of what’s on offer:

Landline Cellular – never miss a call again

Any landline user can add their landline number/s to their existing mobile phone, and make and receive

calls from these numbers – in exactly the same way as their carrier-provided mobile number. Calls are carried via the mobile operator, over the mobile cellular network, just like normal mobile calls.

Any phone number can be added and the user simply selects which number to use when making calls.

The service allows for a very simple means of continuing to communicate using existing PSTN/ISDN lines and numbers. It requires no additional equipment or technical installation and works from any IOS or Android smartphone.

your personal mobile number. Your personal mobile number becomes completely private.

Our VIP safety first service can also record calls and locations to help call out threats to your safety.

Overseas calling

Arguably the simplest expression of conXhub technology!

Subscribe online, download the App and call anywhere (almost!) toll-free. The subscription is less than 50% of the equivalent carrier package and retains carrier call quality and security. The service is primarily cellular, but it will, like other conXhub products, back-up to VoIP if the network fails. The service is simple to use and your friends / relatives / business colleagues can also call you for free using our ‘Reversible’ subscription add-on.

Overseas calling

Superphone and Small Business Suite

VIP – safety first Reduce harassment, spam, bullying and unwanted attention. It is unpleasant & uncomfortable when you feel harassed, insecure or even trapped. Having shared their private information, this is something most women (and quite a few men) experience at least once. When you use a VIP number for website authentication, online activity or even dating, you add an extra layer of security with your personal information (such as your location, address, and personal phone number) remaining private.

Simply add our VIP service to your mobile phone – we give you a new number that works to protect

Superphone is our entry-level B2B product, allowing users multiple phone numbers on one SIM card – national / international, mobile or landline. The solution is data-light (as mostly cellular) and like everything else we do, compatible with your current network provider. No minimum contract, as usual.

Business Suite adds functionality in the shape of mobile PBX interface, automated call distribution, monitoring systems and more. All proprietary systems, not bought in from outside.

‘We’re streets ahead’

How is conXhub better than its rivals? “Our technology is way, way superior in terms of the quality of service,” says founder Mark Trowbridge, citing its uptime of 99.99%.

Its principal selling point is that it’s mobile first. “Every business person has a mobile phone. We’ve put all the features and functions that they would normally expect to get from a desk phone solution, and we’ve put those into their mobiles. We’re the only company that’s done that.

“We’re running over the cellular network, so we’re non-void. What do I mean by that? If you’ve got one bar on your phone, you’re going to get a high-quality call.

“The third point – and very few companies can do this – is that we can give you multiple phone numbers. So, if you’re wanting to departmentalise your business, or have a remote office elsewhere in the country or abroad, we can give you that with ease.

“It’s a very, very simple product to set up and install, and adding numbers is just a piece of cake. That’s not what the others can offer you. We believe we’re streets ahead.

“I heard of one small business person who ordered a number from one of the bigger companies and it took three weeks. We’re talking about three minutes from saying he wants a number to having it on his phone and working.”