VoIP Insight exists because most business phone guides are written by people who have never had to run one.
I’m Mark Draper, and I’ve spent most of my career on the other side of that problem.
17 years inside business telecoms
From 2002 to 2019, I worked at Verastar — a Manchester-based business services company providing telecoms, broadband, and utilities to tens of thousands of UK small businesses. As Head of Product Operations, I wasn’t reviewing VoIP systems from the outside; I was building and managing the products that small business customers actually used for their communications.
During my time there, I led the development and launch of three virtual mobile networks operating on the EE network. That meant understanding how voice infrastructure works at a technical level — routing, network architecture, quality of service, regulatory requirements — and then translating that into products that business owners could actually use and afford.
I led a team of 50 people across multiple offices, oversaw full product lifecycles from concept to live service, and spent nearly two decades learning exactly where business communications go right — and where they go wrong.
Why I started VoIP Insight
When I left Verastar in 2019 and started running my own businesses, I discovered a frustrating gap.
The VoIP market had exploded. Dozens of providers, competing pricing models, feature sets that were genuinely hard to compare, and a sea of review sites that clearly hadn’t tested the products they were recommending.
I knew enough to see through the noise — but I also knew that most small business owners don’t have 17 years of telecoms experience to draw on. They just need a clear, honest answer to: which system is right for my business, and is it worth the switch?
VoIP Insight is my answer to that question. Every guide, comparison, and review on this site is written with one goal: give you the information you’d want if you had a telecoms expert sitting across the table from you.
What you’ll find here
- Provider comparisons that go beyond headline pricing to cover call quality, support, contract terms, and real-world reliability
- Practical how-to guides for setting up, troubleshooting, and getting the most out of your business phone system
- Honest recommendations — if a provider isn’t right for a particular use case, I’ll say so, regardless of affiliate arrangements
My other work
Outside VoIP Insight, I run Clixoni, an all-in-one digital marketing platform for business owners, and iindigo, a web design and SEO consultancy for small businesses in the Stockport area. I also hold a BSc (Hons) in Psychology from the University of Staffordshire — useful, it turns out, for understanding why business owners make the phone system decisions they do.
I’m based in Stockport, Greater Manchester.
Get in touch
Questions, corrections, or suggestions for topics I should cover: [email protected]