subject: Increase Performance With An Integrated Small Business Phone Service [print this page] Today's small business phone service is as powerful as telephony services available for large-scale businesses. Not only are the phone systems powerful and able to handle a variety of features and customizations, they are also affordable for the average business owner. If you currently have a small business that uses a traditional phone line with a few extensions, it's time to put the newer systems to work for you. And you don't need to worry about making huge changes or training your employees to use the phone.
Virtual Phone Systems
A virtual phone system works with your current telephony service, it merely manages the toll free or local access numbers you set up with the system. This is great for people who work from a home office or run a small business that doesn't have an extensive business system in use. It makes your business appear professional and relays to customers that you're a serious professional skilled in your industry.
Investing in a small business phone service also helps you expand your business, since you can use a toll free number accessible from all over North America. Other features of a virtual system include:
- Call forwarding: Have your business calls forwarded to any number you like. You can have calls forwarded to your cell phone, an employee's cell phone, or another branch phone within the business.
- Voicemail options: Choose from a variety of voicemail options that let you conduct business on your schedule. A virtual phone system can send voicemails to your email, store a large amount of voice messages for future reference, and even allow you to leave an extended outbound message for clients to receive information while you're on vacation or out of the office.
- Auto attendant: To increase the professional aspect of your business, an auto attendant can answer the line. This will be an automated message instructing customers which numbers to push to reach certain employees or departments within your business. Even if you only have three employees, you can still use an auto attendant to make your company appear more impressive in size.
- On-hold music: A music selection will be played while customers are on hold, giving the impression of a large business.
Hosted VOIP
Voice Over Internet Protocol (VOIP) has expanded and improved in recent years. Small businesses can now take advantage of hosted VOIP to improve their small business phone service options. With a hosted VOIP phone system, your small business can have all of the features of a large telephone service without needing to make a large investment. You won't even need to stockpile equipment and tech support in order to utilize the system. The host will provide everything you need to efficiently run the phone lines, all you need to provide are IP compatible phones.
With a hosted VOIP phone service, you can easily expand your business into different areas without worrying about transferring phone numbers. All you need to do is provide the compatible telephones, and the host will make sure your system is up and running at all of your business branches. Most, if not all, of the features mentioned above are also available on a hosted system. The key is finding out which type of small business phone service best meets your business needs and budget.
