Whether you’re running a non-profit that’s looking to connect with potential donors, or you’re a small business owner who wants to let your customers know about a promotion, phone calls are still some of the best ways to get in touch with people. Emails and texts are easy to ignore and talking over the phone makes it easier to build a personal rapport. However, that can only happen if your potential connection picks up the phone in the first place. Since the dawn of mass-market telecommunications, people have been trying to avoid spam calls. The situation has gotten worse over the past few years, and some phone providers are trying to help customers by flagging potential spam calls. Unfortunately, many innocent businesses get caught up in the spam warning system. How can you avoid landing your calls in the dreaded “spam likely” box and actually ensure that your customers will …
How to Use Your Existing Phones with a Virtual Phone System
Entrepreneurs have a lot of questions on their minds, especially when starting out or scaling up. How will I make payroll? How do I advertise my business? Is my product properly positioned in the market? Even, what’s the best phone system for my business? We’ve been entrepreneurs a long time, and we’d like to help answer some of those. Check out our blog for some great tips for new business owners to help solve the first three questions and others about getting started in business. And as far as phone systems go, well, that’s our business, so we can certainly get you started off on the right foot there, too. We think simple, fast, and easy solutions are the best solutions for entrepreneurs. So we believe that the best business phone system is not a particular make, model, or brand. The best one is the one that works consistently. On …
5 Reasons Why You Should Get Rid of Your Business Landline
In the old days, one of the first steps to opening a business was having a telephone installed. Now, the traditional landline phone may be on its way out, replaced by cell phones and PSTN technology. In fact, many companies began phasing out their landlines at least a decade ago. It may be time for you to eliminate your landline, too. If you’re wondering whether you’ll be able to keep a professional business running without a landline, the answer is yes. You can set up a virtual phone system which provides everything that your old landline used to—a call menu, a welcome greeting, professional voicemail, and much more. Of course, if you’d like to keep your landline, that’s perfectly fine! You can incorporate it into a virtual phone system as well. Keep on reading for some of the best reasons to cut the cord on your business landline. Five …
Reasons Why Your Customers Want to Text You
Did you know that over 6 billion texts are sent every day?! Like most new technology, texting did take time to take hold with the public. In 1995, the average American sent just 0.4 text messages per month, according to Mobivity, and by 2000, the number still stood at just 35 a month– or about one text a day. The average American sends about 94 of them per day. Of course, many of these texts come from businesses or bots, not real people. Still, Americans are defaulting to text as their preferred communication medium more & more often. Texting is not a uniquely American habit, either. About five billion people, or 65% of the world’s population, enjoy access to texting. Why do people everywhere love to communicate by text message? And why would a customer want to text your small business instead of calling, emailing, or contacting you through social …
3 Ways to Forward Your Landline to a Cell Phone
As a business owner, you take important phone calls at the office. But you’re not always in the office. You’re meeting clients, attending events, and ducking out for lunch at school with the kids. So what do you do when an important call comes in on your business phone system but you’re not there to take it? Believe it or not, there are lots of options for business owners who face this predicament. Most offices have a landline, and most business owners & managers have a smartphone. These two can easily work together to create a seamless system that reaches you wherever you are. Having a landline at home might seem dated now. More than half of Americans have gone to wireless only in their homes, and the trend toward landline-free residences shows no signs of abating. As you probably expected, most people who still use landlines at home come …
How Your Business Can Benefit from a Virtual Phone Number
As virtual phone numbers were basically created for businesses, it’s a given that they carry with them a lot of benefits for businesses. Those benefits are not always spelled out for businesses by the virtual service providers, though, so we thought it fitting to show exactly what you can do with a virtual phone number as a small business owner. In their function, they function pretty much the same exact way as a normal number, but in addition to the standard service that you would get with any other number that you’re used to, virtual numbers are actually quite a bit more versatile. It’s kind of like when you switch from using CDs for your music to using mp3s. You’ll be able to do a lot more with mp3s than CDs, and you’ll be able to do it quicker, more cheaply, and more easily. Your business has more options …
Toll Free or Local Number: Which One Does Your Business Need?
Something as simple as a phone number isn’t often on the minds of entrepreneurs starting a business for the first time. With most business tools found in the cloud or on your computer, you probably won’t need to worry about your phones until you have at least a few customers. As your company grows and evolves, the number of phone calls you have to handle will increase, and having a professional phone number will prove to be invaluable. This leaves you with an important choice to make; should you go with a local or toll-free phone number? These different types of phone numbers provide a similar user experience, but offer a diverse range of opportunities along the way, making it critical that you consider them carefully. Before diving into the differences between these number options, it’s a good idea to take a look at what they are. What …
Text Messaging & Small Business: Why Text is So Important
We live in a much different world today, and small business can be said to be at the forefront of changing times because commerce usually leads the push into the future. That’s a much larger conversation, of course, but one of the things that serves as a perfect example of this change is text messaging in business. Not only do you probably communicate a great deal with your colleagues and employees through text, but the need for text with your customers has most likely been developing for a few years now. If you’re like most small businesses, customers are increasingly contacting you with a text message, rather than a phone call. As is always the case with advancing technology in business, you are forced to either get on board or be left behind. This is why text messaging is so important. We All Prefer Text, and Customers are No Exception …