Why You Should Update to a Virtual Answering Service
Many companies in the quest for savings on call centers and receptionist staff elected to switch to automated systems, “Press 1 for another long wait”, “Press 78 for another list of options”. Customers get frustrated, they feel like the personalized touch has gone, and they get fed up of wondering whether they’re being dropped lower down the priority list based on which button they pressed. There is a much better solution which is a virtual answering service.
Unlike the outsourced call centers that again frustrate your customers, because they’re speaking to a person on another continent who doesn’t understand their accent and vice versa, a virtual answering service appears to your customer like they’ve got through to your office, and they’re speaking to one of your very own employees, which is rare nowadays!
photo/ AllClear55
How Does a Virtual Answering Service Work?
Your customer rings a toll free number, which they’ll love, or they will ring the same number they’re always rang to get in contact with your business. A human will answer the phone stating your company name and great them professionally and politely. The customer will make their enquiry and the advisor will deal with their request or forward them to the appropriate person in the company to deal with it correctly. The customer won’t know the person answering the phone isn’t your employee, and won’t suspect that they’re not sat in your office.
Companies who run professional virtual answering services have a well-trained team of customer service experts who will field calls from several clients. These advisors may work from home or be sat in a large call center. When the phone rings software diverts the call to an advisor who is trained on how to answer a call dependent on who the client is, and they have a resource file available to them so they can answer the majority of queries or divert the call to the relevant member of staff at the client.
What Improvements Should You See When You Start Using a Virtual Answering Service?
One of the mains changes you will find as soon as you switch to a virtual answering service is that your current staff will be freed up to get on with activities which make you money, rather than constantly answering the phone to deal with enquiries. Nuisance phone calls and sales calls will be eliminated, and only calls which you deem important will be dealt with by your staff such as sales enquiries and customer issues.
Your customers should be happier because when they call you, someone will answer quickly and be able to deal with the enquiry efficiently. They can call out of hours and they’ll still get an answer. Your customer reviews will be more positive and you should expect customer loyalty to improve.
As you refine the process and provide more direction to the company managing the virtual answering service you will find the process becomes more and more efficient so they can handle more of your calls.
Author: James Daniel
