Whether you have a small company or a large enterprise, don’t forget to consider these key elements when choosing your phone for work.
We all know that businesses are heavily reliant on technology, particularly telephone systems. Not only is it a critical resource, it is something that can assist you for years to come. For this reason, you should take a little extra time to ensure you’ve made the right choice for your business. The technology industry is a competitive market and it’s easy to get lost in all of the extra features and gadgets that are constantly advertised. Your first step is to cover your basic necessities. Once you’ve established what you really NEED in a business phone, you can start separating the rivals and look at what each system can offer you. Listed below are 10 key things to consider when purchasing your business phone:
How will you be using your phone system?
Before jumping right in, clearly, establish your needs within a phone system. Think of how your business “typically” performs, and then consider the highest point of success you could reach today, as well as in the future – and what you would need to get there. Consider all inbound calls that occur within your business, as well as all outbound calls.
Types of calls you will be making and receiving
Take a moment to think about the types of phone calls that occur within your business, such as:
- Individual, one-on-one phone calls, and how often these are being made by employees.
- Local, national long distance, as well as international calls.
- Conference calls or group calls, whether it is between your team and your client’s team, your entire division, attendees to webinars and seminars etc.
- Inbound calls during non-peak hours, such as customer service inquiries and sales requests.
- Both inbound and outbound faxes, credit card terminals, etc.
Who will need a phone and where will these systems be needed?
It may shock you to think about the various places in your office that you’ll need access to a telephone system and just how many people will be using one.
- Reception
- Public/common areas (lobby, waiting room, hallways, break room for staff etc.)
- Any temporary, contract, or part-time employees
- Guests, clients, partners
- Fax machines
- Credit card terminals, data ports, other operating systems
- Conference rooms
- Warehouses, storage rooms
Scalability
As well as the usage of your phone, you also need to remember how your phone requirements and needs may change over time. In order to prevent this from impacting your business, it is important to choose a system that will scale with your needs.
Assessing scalability of your system may be a time-consuming process, but it is undoubtedly one of the most significant decisions you will need to make within your business infrastructure. Make sure you allow time to pre-plan this decision in order to mitigate any negative impacts, ensuring you are making the best decision for your business needs.
Basic Phone System Features
Listed below are 10 basic phone features that most businesses regularly utilise.
- Automated Attendant
Enabling an automated attendant feature ensures that your inbound calls are always responded to in one manner or another, even if the phone is not able to physically be answered by a staff member. This is a fantastic feature to have during extremely busy periods, or when calls are made outside of business hours. These days, it is almost considered unprofessional for a business to NOT implement a type of automated phone attendant.Auto attendants act as “off-duty” receptionists and feature a variety of ways to customise their use, including the ability to offer touch-tone options to clients in order to route their query to the most appropriate sector/response. - Hunt Group
A hunt group is a valuable resource for critical outbound calls that you do not want to ring out and go to voicemail – such as sales and customer service inquiries. Hunt groups are able to be configured in a way that groups of local extensions can ring in unison for outbound calls, whilst incoming calls have the ability to be automatically redirected to the first available extension. This feature is particularly useful for inbound sales inquiries as we all know the importance of responding to customers in a timely manner. - Voice Mail
Voice mail is a feature included in just about every phone system available on the market, though there are some variations on what your voice mail system can provide. Consider these three aspects:
Remote access to messages
Whether you are in the office or off-site, you should always be able to access your messages. Whether you use a remote voice system or can access the message feature directly from your phone, it is a business necessity to have constant access to your voice mail. The ability for the caller to leave a long message. We know that substantial voicemail messages can be boring and exhausting, though, particularly within your business, it is vital to ensure your caller can complete their message without being restricted by your voice mail settings.Multiple greetings
Enabling a variety of pre-recorded greetings shows attention to detail, professionalism and an interest for customer service. Multiple greetings may include a short message to say you are out of the office or busy with another call. By implementing multiple greetings, you are less likely to need to constantly update your voicemail. - Conferencing
The feature of phone conferencing allows the connection of multiple extensions for discussions among numerous people. Some phones only allow for two additional callers to connect within their phone conferencing feature, so keep this in mind. Always consider the maximum number of lines that can be included when implementing a conference call.Note on sound quality: It’s important to test the sound quality on both your speaker and your microphone in order to establish that your conference calls are suitable for your needs. You can opt for an additional conference call “station” which incorporates additional speakers and microphones for calls involving large groups or multiple extensions.There are a number of affordable (and free!) conferencing services used by a multitude of businesses in today’s society, including FreeConferenceCall.com, AllConferencing.com and UnlimitedConferencing.com. - Hold Music or Hold MessageStudies show that hold music is a key element for businesses to incorporate within their phone systems. Telemarketing Magazine conducted a study in which the results presented that a staggering 60% of customers will end their call if they experience whilst being placed on hold. Of this group, 30% percent of participants stated that they would not call back. However, if a caller hears music, they are more likely to hold the line for approximately 30 seconds longer than those who hear silence. As well as this, between 85-88% of callers prefer to hear on-hold messages, as opposed to silence. In an ideal world, clients would not be placed on hold to begin with, but it’s important to consider the reality of these situations and how you can best implement quality service without direct contact.
- Caller ID
Realistically, most businesses are unable to answer every single inbound call or solicitation that they receive. Because of this, caller ID is an essential feature to have within a phone system. Caller ID allows for efficiency and productivity levels to increase, though some salespeople may slip through the cracks by blocking their phone numbers in a bid to supersede caller ID systems. - Microphone Muting
Incorporating the ability to mute your microphone within a phone system is a significant advantage for a multitude of reasons. These reasons include protecting privacy and sensitive content matter within a business, as well as being able to eliminate background noise and other distractions when people are not directly engaging. The mute button for your microphone should be clearly visible and easy to use. - Headset-Enabled
All business phones should (as a standard) be compatible with most hands-free headsets, allowing for further communication between stakeholders, customers and colleagues. - Speed Dial and Redial
Most businesses regularly use speed dial as a basic, essential feature. By inputting frequently called numbers into a speed dial system, employees increase their efficiency within tasks by eliminating the need to search for multiple phone numbers. Alongside speed dial, redial is also a helpful resource, particularly during conference calls or if a disconnection with a client occurs. - Call Forwarding
By enabling call forwarding, inbound calls can be easily redirected to another phone – whether it is a mobile, business phone, home phone or another staff member or colleague. Many call forwarding features implement a “hunt group” methodology in which calls are forwarded to a sequence of numbers until the call is either answered or the client is prompted to leave a voice message