VoIP phone technology has become the rage among businesses. Service providers are continually competing against each other, which make it ideal for companies to shop for their next business communication system. Once you decide to upgrade to VoIP, you have to make some decisions like what method would you prefer, hosted services or deploying your own trunks, which hardware to buy etc.
However, for some businesses, particularly small companies, it’s rather a straightforward process. Pick a reliable VoIP phone system from a reputable provider and purchase the required hardware. The great thing about Voice over IP is that it is affordable, and the whole process takes only a few days. But, there is a lot more to VoIP than the cost-effectiveness.
With VoIP’s potential, you can improve employees’ efficiency and productivity. So, we are going to enlist some great tips to help you use the VoIP system efficiently.
Tips and Tricks for VoIP phone system:
As a small business owner with just three or four employees, installing VoIP business is an easy task. However, what to do if you have a team of thirty or a hundred employees? You wouldn’t want to waste your time installing phones for every desk. To resolve such an issue, the majority of reputable VoIP systems have auto-provisioning.
Auto-provisioning means that phones automatically get their setting configured from a server that is already set up. These phones are ‘plug and play’. You do not need experts to install the settings. All you need to do is plug in the phones with the right cables, and you are good to go.
This tip is for quality voice calls. Most businesses think its useless investing inexpensive and quality IP phones. While you don’t necessarily have to use them if you cannot afford them, but these IP phones do offer a lot of value for their price. With mobile phones, your calls depend on the network bandwidth and speed. If your carrier experiences congestion on the network, then your calls might drop or may not even go through.
You wouldn’t have to be concerned about such issues when using quality desk phones. With such phones, you get better audio quality and very few problems. Also, they come equipped with additional features such as bigger screens, programmable function button, conferencing capabilities and much more. All of these features help you increase productivity in different ways. Your employees can save a lot of time when they don’t have to deal with call drops or poor audio quality.
Instead of giving out a separate phone number for each person in your sales department, you can give out a general sales department phone number that will ring to employees in the order you set them or to everyone simultaneously. By using call groups, your employees can take better care of callers because if one member of the group isn’t available, the call goes to the other available members of the group. This way, you have reduces missed calls, and your callers don’t have to become frustrated while waiting.
A tremendous and time-saving feature of VoIP business that can make your company appear larger than its actual size is virtual receptionist or auto-attendant. You can set up specific greetings which can help callers choose the department or the person they need, and the call gets automatically routed. This whole process makes call handling more efficient for callers and for you.
As you know, the efficiency enhancements start from the beginning. VoIP phone systems give you the flexibility of answering incoming calls on different devices. You must take advantage of this capability. Ask your employees to download the right VoIP app on their mobile devices, including laptops, tablets or phones. This way, they can stay in touch with customers and each other.
Some service providers offer their own VoIP apps for multiple platforms while others allow you to use their phone services with any app of your choice. The latter option provides individual employees with more choices for apps. Don’t treat the VoIP phone system as just a cost upgrade to your traditional phones. Use all the latest tools and features VoIP offers for streamlining your task flows.
Another great VoIP feature that helps you have better control over incoming calls is call screening. With this feature, you can screen out the spam calls. You can set your phone system up to reject specific phone calls like robocalls, so your team doesn’t have to waste their time. Your virtual receptionist can be configured to ask for a caller’s name to get identified before getting connected. Call screening feature also include caller ID which includes telemarketers’ hidden phone numbers, so you can easily add them to the block list.
Bonus feature: if you are unable to pick the call, then you can also type a quick response, or you can use text to speech that your auto-receptionist can give to the caller.
One of the best things about VoIP is that you don’t have to learn anything beforehand. Regardless your experience will remain the same as it was before. However, you can boost efficiency by giving everybody training in using the latest VoIP features. You can’t gain much if everybody uses the new phone system in the same way as the old one.
It can be beneficial to conduct a few training sessions where your employees can learn about the advanced VoIP features. Once they learn to configure the phones to their preference, each employee can set up their phones to suit their working style. This way, you don’t waste any time while your employees go through the manual or website trying to learn how a work a feature. You can also break up sessions into small groups that are tailored to specific departments such as sales or customer support services etc.
Switching to VoIP phone system is easier than you may think. So, don’t hesitate and upgrade your phone system to boost your business productivity.
