How Our ‘Find Me/Follow Me’ Service Can Help You Never Miss Another Call

Business never sleeps. As the sun goes down on one market it rises over another—and even on the same street, people seem to be ticking to a completely different set of biological clocks.

To stay competitive in this modern world, businessmen have long realized that the traditional idea of ‘regular operating hours’ no longer applies. So the challenge, especially to smaller players who cannot afford after-hours staff, has become that of coping with ‘irregular operating hours’.

This is still more challenging if your line of work requires frequent travel.

For instance, let’s say that you’re an electrician in business with another partner. You don’t want to miss any calls—but neither of you can become a permanent fixture in the office.

You could hire a receptionist—but that’s an extra salary to pay, and it’s not like the phone is constantly going off the hook...you simply want to be there when it does.

Another option would be to include your mobile phone numbers in all your ads—but consider that you may not want to make your personal phone numbers public, and getting another set of business phones is again running a significant expense. Then, you also want to avoid giving the impression of a disjointed operation (a first impression is only made once) and a single contact number just looks so more professional.

Find Me/Follow Me is a service offered in conjuncture with a virtual phone system and a powerful tool in this kind of situation.

Basically, it lets you keep all your phone numbers—office, mobile, home, etc—under your profile. Then, whenever a call is destined for you, the system would automatically start dialing every number in succession until you are reached (or route it to your voicemail if you chose not to answer).

So whether you’re out on a site, at home, or in the office, you’ll always be able to take the call. Moreover, since the call is placed to the company’s main line and the subsequent rerouting is performed within the system, none of your personal contact numbers will be revealed in the process, and the public will always be dealing with a single number.

This protects your privacy and promotes your company's brand-recognition!

A virtual IVR has many additional features to let you fully control the way calls are handled by the automated system, thereby helping you find that elusive balance between work and personal life.

The Find Me Follow Me service, as part of our virtual phone system, provides a reliable, cost effective call handling solution that will ensure you'll never miss another call—keeping both you and your customers happy!

To learn more about the features of a virtual phone system, check out: ‘Anatomy of a Virtual Phone System: What’s in it, and Why You Need It?’

Labels: asterisk, business, call routing, cloud computing, cost saving, customer service, find me follow me service, IT, phone system, technology, virtual IVR, virtual PBX, virtual phone, voicemail

Tired of Playing Phone-Tag with your Customers? A Virtual Phone System is a Whole New Game!

We all know how it goes. They call you. You call back. They leave a message. You record a voicemail. And round and round you go. This may have been fun as kids, but by now the whole thing must start feeling a bit juvenile...

If you’re ready to leave the kiddie table and come sit with the grownups, we’ve got a whole new game for you.

It’s called A Virtual Phone System.

Chances are, just hearing the words ‘Phone System’ conjures hellish visions of mega-expensive hardware and extortionistic setup fees threatening to leave both you and your spouse without an undergarment. But before you start sweating off your Calvin-Kleins, let it be said that technological advances over the past decade have taken the entire field to a whole a new level, and that today’s virtual systems are a far-cry from those old clunkers that got you all worried about her Victoria's Secrets.

(You may want to check the article ‘A Fortune 500 Customer Calling Experience that Won’t Cost your Company a Fortune’ for some background on what makes virtual PBX phone systems so cost-effective.)

But even though decidedly cheaper, a virtual PBX packs all the features you’ve grown to expect from their physical granddaddies—and more. Now let’s see how these can help you do away with that old phone-tag routine.

For starters, a virtual IVR (Interactive Voice Response) ensures that your customers get an answer 24/7 and immediately transferred to the right department. This beats getting that perpetual ringing tone or coming to a heads-on collision with some general voicemail.

The ability to review detailed call-logs by department ensures that no caller goes unchecked, making sticky-pads and tear-out sheets a thing of the past.

Going virtual also means that your system travels with you no matter where you are, so customers can always reach you. You won’t ever worry about letting a sale slip by unnoticed or desperate cries for help go unanswered.

Most providers offer unlimited extensions, so you can use the one landline you already own to outfit your entire team. Some, like Synclio, even offer a Live Answering service for a small additional fee, so when you're feeling a bit overwhelmed or worried that you might not be available to take calls, you can always trust them to give your customers that extra human touch.

These are just a few of the ways a virtual PBX phone system can make child-play a thing of the past, giving you the confidence to join the grownups for a hairy game like Monopoly.

Now let Synclio make you a winner!

Want to learn more? Try our tween articles: '4 Ways a Professional Phone System Can Improve Customer Experience in Your Business' and '4 Ways a Professional Phone System Can Boost Productivity in your Business' for a well rounded view.

Labels: business, call routing, customer service, technology, virtual IVR, virtual PBX, virtual phone

4 Ways a Virtual Phone System Can Improve Customer Experience in Your Business

A great product or service is sure to attract new customers—but do you have what it takes to keep them with you for the long haul?

With increased interest comes increased need for support. And guess what, if you can’t handle them, your new clients will soon move on to find someone who can—just like in a relationship.

Since you don’t want your business to end up like the cute kid who gets dumped in the end of the movie and spends the rest of his life building model airplanes in his parents’ basement, below are four simple ways a professional phone system will help make sure that those hard-earned clients remain with you through good and bad, sickness and health (etc, etc.)

1. Never miss another call.

When a customer calls support, nothing is more frustrating than that perpetual ringing tone ringing on, and on, and on... (See?) Perhaps because it reminds us of just how lonely we really are. Or perhaps we simply don’t like to feel our youth wasting away. Either way, we want to be answered—now.

With a virtual PBX, your customers get answered instantly, 24/7, and can easily follow a simple phone tree to reach the person they wish to speak to.

Sure, it may just be a friendly voicemail that will greet them at the end of the line—but hey, how much more connected will they feel hearing a human voice, even if only a recording? And besides, leaving a message for the right person feels so much more satisfying than just hanging up.

2. No more broken phone.

Perhaps the one thing more annoying than not getting through at all is getting through only to be bounced around from one line to the other, as if caught in some mega pinball machine. A virtual PBX takes human error out of the switchboard by letting you easily set your own phone tree and call rules, so that each call is automatically routed to the right person, every time. Simple. Quick. Reliable. If only human beings were this consistent.

What’s more, with our convenient ‘Find Me/Follow Me’ feature, you can take the call no matter where you are. And we mean anywhere

So if your car broke down and you got stranded alongside the highway, you can keep on offering support even as you’re helplessly waiting for the CAA truck to show up—good for your business AND for your morale!

Just make sure you don’t end up flipping with an “I’ve been waiting here for three f&@# hours!” at your client, then switching back to ask the CAA dude if he’d care to rate your service...

3. Never leave a customer hanging.

Another common scenario—and a major source of customer dissatisfaction—can be termed ‘the call-back that never comes’. It goes something like this: Johnny has a problem. Johnny calls ‘Support’. Rep tells Johnny that he’ll call him back in half an hour. Johnny sits waiting by the phone. An hour later, Johnny is still waiting by the phone. By the third hour Johnny picks up the phone and dials back, this time speaking to ‘Retention’.

Now, we may never know what made the rep neglect poor Johnny: perhaps he was relying on one of those knock-off sticky notes that just aren't sticky enough; perhaps he got caught up with another caller and asked one of his colleagues to follow up on his behalf--who regrettably was using that same wad of stickies...

Synclio helps make such mishaps a thing of the past by keeping all your client info in a single place, accessible by the entire team, and letting each department review their own call records. Johnny is happy. Rep is happy. And the girl at ‘Retention’ gets to finish her Sudoku—job satisfaction all around!

4. We’re all about the first impression!

Sure, we like to think of ourselves as highly evolved little monkeys: civilized, sophisticated, supremely un-superficial. But let’s face it—we’re still as moved by the primordial effect of appearances as a peacock looking to mate. And both he and we know that no birdie is getting lucky if it can’t make a first impression.

So this one’s a no-brainer. When a customer calls for the first time you want them to get a sense of dealing with a professional organization, not some outfit out of Jimmy’s basement. You might be running a perfect solo act—but with your own 1-800 number and a full set of extensions, who’ll ever know you from the big guys?

Go ahead, razzle-dazzle them!

Besides, nothing says ‘professional’ louder and clearer than an elegant phone system. Civilized, sophisticated, perfectly alluring to a species of highly evolved monkeys.

In many ways, running a business is like building a relationship. It’s not enough to lure a mate in. Getting lucky is a start—but without the ability to keep them satisfied for the long haul you’ll soon find yourself strapped for cash and heart-broken, looking back on a string of short-lived affairs.

The foundation of any strong relationship starts with proper communication.

Now let Synclio set you up!

Labels: business, call routing, call stats, cloud computing, cost saving, customer service, efficiency, IT, technology, virtual IVR, virtual PBX