Telephone Systems Global

Telephone Systems For The Small Business

Every small business has a list of basic needs in order to function status quo day in and day out. Often, those services are simple; they may include dial tone, voice mail, long distance, fax, email and broadband Internet services. To varying degrees you have down time with one of these and your breathing may become irregular. For instance no dial tone will surely cause you more heartache than a down fax system. Fax services have become less and less important as companies look to sign PDF documents, scan and email. But have a client wanting to fax you an order and your service is down that moves fax services front and center for your concern.

Reliability of these services is the lifeblood of any organization, service providers understand this and have made great strides in creating cost effective services that have ultra high levels of quality of service and up time. That is not to say that all services or companies are created equal, make sure you understand clearly any service level agreement (SLA) you sign. Many companies in this field are great on the sales side, but once you are a client under an SLA it’s like a game of where’s Waldo. However, there are many reputable companies out there that provide quality customer service throughout the SLA.

Do not be overly enamored with price, because that may ultimately be the best part of the service. Quality, customer service or even the livelihood of your service company may be limited. Learn your needs, evaluate how important these services are to your organization and then make an educated decision.

Try and think of the decision in the context of a business decision that will affect your clients should a problem occur, which in turn may drive them directly into your competitions doors. Consider the value that may have versus the cost savings.

All small businesses need reliability and quality, a little preparation and education will provide you with the knowledge to make the correct choice. When looking beyond the basic needs of your organization (listed in the first paragraph) consider whether they actually are needed and provide value. Bundling by service companies may seem like a great deal, but if you do not require the services it is actually money flushed.

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Telephone Systems-Hosted PBX

Hosted PBX phone systems provide small businesses with unique opportunities for flexibility and customer service for their clients, much more so than has previously been recognized by anything other than enterprise phone system users. Now small businesses can have a large amount of local and toll numbers sans additional investment.

In addition you can have a presence virtually from any location called what else than a virtual business presence. So you can have employees scattered throughout the country, some in remote offices or telecommuters all sounding like they are under one roof for both clients and employees alike. This helps add flexibility to employees looking to communicate, transfer calls, etc. all from unique locations. An additional benefit is the reduction in cost to set up physical systems in each location. The flexibility you experience for growth or downsizing of your business based on your unique needs helps keep you agile. This virtual system really allows you to keep you focus on client needs, as well as your business needs and not the technical aspect.

Features of a hosted PBX phone system can be functional and usable in a very short time. The ease of set up and understanding for the user is greatly reduced over time normally spent on learning of traditional phone systems. There is also no need to house expensive equipment locally, since all equipment and maintenance happens on the service provide site. Because the service is hosted, it’s shared by many users which make the business expenses reduced because you are only paying for a small portion. Likewise, the reliability of the hosted PBX phone system is very good, usually your PBX host provider will offer redundant (mirrored) services at different locations, so if one went down the other would stay up. This provides you with a level of comfort knowing your system should experience 99.99999% up time.

Making the choice to go with a host PBX phone system grants you flexibly, both economically and in use and provides peace of mind. As a business you have many options available to choose from, a simple Internet search will yield countless choices. As always, do a little research and know your needs. This will give you greater leverage in speaking with the host company.

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Telephone Systems, Virtual Auto Attendant

A virtual auto attendant is exactly what it sounds like, service that guides you through a phone system with the end goal of speaking to a real live human being. Going virtual can allow the smallest of companies to puff up their chest and act like the big boys, those Fortune 500 behemoths. But is that what you really want, an impersonal service guiding your clients through a maze of button pushing or saying yes or no to a voice prompt? That is exactly what you will need to decide while considering this option. There is something to be said from both sides of the platform, it sure is nice speaking to a person who is personable and not cold. However, there is also something to be said about the efficiency, standardization and cost savings by going virtual.

You have a few different options when choosing a virtual auto attendant, you can go with the PBX system which can efficiently handle any task like a real person, such as dial by name and extension, prove a company directory for individual guidance and much more. You can easily create custom voice prompts unique to your business needs and automatically set it up for non-business hours too. You can use software functionality to manage it on an individual user basis, so they can have it ring to their cell phone, deliver voice messages as emails, screen calls, do not disturb, fax services and a host of other functions.

As an alternative, hosted PBX phone systems can be relatively inexpensive and can be set up quickly. Some are as little as $10 a month for a few users and offer good functionality with options to upgrade should you find the need to add more.

Some of the features available to you at a very low cost to enter point are:

• Day and Night Greetings and Menus
• Dial-by-Name Directory
• Unlimited Extensions
• Follow-Me
• Custom On-Hold Messages
• Call Routing
• Automatic Call Distribution
• Call Screening
• Live Call Transfer
• Voice Mail
• Zero-out to Operator or Attendant
• Message waiting notification by email, phone or pager
• Sends your messages to your e-mail
• Receives your Faxes
• Delivers faxes to your e-mail
• Announcement-Only options
• Question and Answer message taking format
• Send Talking E-mails
• Tickler Reminder Service

So consider a few things, do you have more value in a real person taking on these tasks? It may be part of your business and something longstanding customers enjoy. You may find that automation has a place, if so consider a low cost hosted PBX solution.

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