If you've recently sealed the deal on a business phone system upgrade, the Central Telephone Sales and Service team would like to congratulate you!
As a Twin Cities business phone service provider, we understand that you're taking your business into a brighter age with an improved communications system ready to handle the growth it will bring you.
It's something to get excited about and also something to celebrate! Are you prepared to get the most out of this new telephone system?
Just like every company we serve, every system is different. While any small business phone system tailored to your needs will bring you the benefits above, knowing what to do before this new system is hooked up can help you reap those benefits quickly and minimize any unavoidable stress.
Let us explain how to prepare for a new phone system correctly!
Prep Work for a New Telephone System Isn't Complicated
Especially when your phone service provider is here to help! Establishing an open line of communication with your provider and asking directly about what you should be doing is a great place to begin.
No phone company or tech help site knows your logistics and layout like your phone provider, and with their knowledge of communication systems, they can make your transition practically stress-free.
Of course, there are actions you can take outside of that, too, that help to accomplish the same goal.
Notify Employees
Inform your employees of the switch as soon as it's finalized. This gives them time to mentally prepare for learning something new, as well as clear time in their schedules to do so and to store any critical files away if needed.
Schedule Training
Plan training sessions, if applicable. If the upgrade is particularly radical or changes how your business does things on a fundamental level, it could be helpful to host tech training sessions to onboard your entire team at once or in groups.
While setting aside time to train might make you hesitate, it will definitely pay quick dividends, as your team will be able to help one another out with the tech more efficiently and ask burning questions up-front. At the same time, provide comprehensive manuals to ensure your team members have a solid reference point to stay up to speed on the system.
Get Comfy With the Idea of Change
Change can be scary for some, especially small businesses with volatile bottom lines, but reminding yourself that you can bounce back after change-related troubles can decrease any anxieties about the impending upgrade.
Ask for Feedback
If you don't typically answer calls, you can encourage your staff to give you feedback on how the new system functions. Take time to speak with employees about areas that can be improved, common sticking points, or if additional support is required to help customize the training so current and future employees have the resources and education needed to optimize the system.
How an Improved Telephone System Improves Business
Your phone system shouldn't just work for your business; it can synergize with it. It can actively function to improve the way your company operates, and if you aren't taking advantage of updated phone systems, you're missing out.
An improved business phone system offers these benefits and more!
Cut Down Communication Bills
Innovative solutions from Central Telephone Sales and Service make communicating cheaper than ever before.
With a personalized installation and a customer-focused approach, we help you shave down your expenses so that your business can put more money toward what matters.
Boost Productivity
Cut down on redundant buttons and features and watch your employees' productivity soar.
Easy-to-use systems from Central Telephone Sales and Service mean onboarding these new, more efficient systems is easy.
Ensure Fewer Outages
With the remote maintenance offered with some of our systems, problems can be solved completely digitally.
Not only does this help minimize service interruptions, but it also saves you money and time in the long run, as there's no need to call a handyman onto the premises to fix things.
Simplicity Made Easier
Upgrading your system can simplify your communications. Instead of using separate collaboration and calling options, you can manage them from anywhere. Streamlined functions can help create enhanced features like custom answering services, advanced call analytics and screening, and team collaboration tools for improved performance.
Stay Connected No Matter Where You Are
You always want to have a connection to your business phone system regardless of whether your team is using tablets, mobile phones, or laptops.
Enhancing your system can streamline communication regardless of whether your employees are in an office or working remotely. Upgrades can also give you access to the phone system features, even if you're not on-site, to ensure you stay connected at all times.
Stay Ahead of the Game
Keeping track of all the outgoing and incoming calls can feel overwhelming, but enhancing your business phone can help simplify things.
Upgraded systems can offer you a range of reporting tools and analysis features that can help you determine how much time teams or employees spend on calls, how many calls have been abandoned, and other useful metrics to improve the system and keep stakeholders and customers happier.
Selecting the Right Business Phone System for Your Needs
Selecting the right business phone system can be fairly confusing, considering how many systems are on the market. However, a few important characteristics stand out phenomenally when purchasing certain phone systems.
With this being said, we will cover some of the more critical issues that should be considered when purchasing a business phone system.
Why Are You Upgrading Your Phone System?
Answering this question is a great place to begin, even if you're still on the fence about upgrading your small business phone system.
What does your current phone system lack that has made you consider getting a new one? What frustrations does it give you? What negative feedback have you received from your employees about it?
It helps to list what you don't like about your current phone system. Or, if you're more of a visual person, you can make a t-chart. One side will list the flaws of your present phone system, and the other will list features you'd like to keep around.
The chart approach can provide insight into what type of wiring solution you would need and how much money you'd need to spend to get there. If you're on the fence about upgrading, it can also help you weigh the pros and cons and finalize your decision.
While there are a myriad of choices, some popular features are:
Voice Transcription
The system feature puts any voicemails received into text and converts them to an e-mail directly to the worker's inbox. This feature cuts down on how much time individuals are on the phone and allows them to focus on other activities.
Call Forwarding
Long on or the days of missing calls and missing potential opportunities from clients. Fortunately, with advanced phone features, business phone systems have call-forwarding capabilities to ensure no calls are missed.
They offer flexibility and don't require human intervention or costly hardware, and your customers never have to play phone tag, which means streamlined experiences and happier clients.
Call Masking
With online thieves and hackers, keeping personal information private is critical. Call masking is a system that hides customers' and businesses' information by decrypting the contact number they're using.
The system displays a temporary number while they're communicating to help add extra protective steps to keep the customer's and employee's data safer and more secure. It also allows employees to receive and make business calls no matter where they're located without worry.
Do You Need Physical Phones?
Whether or not a business needs physical phones can be a fairly big issue. Some businesses can operate with digital phone services alone or cell phones (without the need for physical phones through the company).
However, traditional business phones can be confusing for new employees, and cell phones can sometimes feel too personal for business.
When outweighing the options, businesses often lean towards digital phones as they are a much easier approach to operating a business professionally.
If You Want Traditional Phones, What Would Benefit Your Business?
If you've made the decision to stick with traditional phones, selecting which method suits your business can be a bit difficult.
Many decide that sticking with a traditional landline service (provided through a regional or local phone service) works perfectly when it comes to business running effectively. This is especially true in instances of troubleshooting the hardware or technical difficulty.
These circumstances usually lead businesses to VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) systems/services. These services can easily streamline services and work great for high-traffic businesses working with lots of data/clients.
If Selecting VoIP, How Would You Like It Housed?
VoIP service is very popular for many businesses because it allows businesses to operate. However, it's up to the business to decide whether or not they would like to have their service housed at the company or if the service is cloud-based through the provider.
Although both have their own perks when it comes to service, much of this relies on how reliable the IT staff is on hand (when housing information at the business) or if having company information cloud-based (through the service provider) is an issue.
Considering the information above, choosing a reliable phone system isn't as difficult as it may seem. Since much of the issues rely on the business's traffic and the employees' comfort, your gut feeling may be in your best interest when selecting phone systems or providers.
What to Look for in Small Business Phone Systems
When it comes to finding the ideal phone system for your small business, many factors come up when deciding what to consider for small business phone systems.
Before you research phone systems, however, it is important to understand what you are looking for in a phone system.
Price & Value
As with any business-related purchase, it is important to understand a new phone system's value and price point. How many phones are necessary for your office(s), and are you anticipating an expansion in the future? Create a preliminary budget that includes anything that may come up.
Functionality
How do you use the phones in your office? Once you've created a budget, you can better understand the necessary and affordable features. Common business phone system features include caller ID, express conferencing, custom greetings, central office line ringing, and distinct ringtones.
Your Network & Equipment
As you look into a new phone system, ask yourself if you need new equipment. While your current phones may be fine for specific networks or features, the features outlined in your new budget may not be compatible.
Research Small Business Phone Systems
No, this step cannot be avoided. Though you by no means need to become an expert in the industry, knowing a cursory amount about various phone types, such as cloud-based phone systems, will help you keep up when you talk to a business phone installation service.
Cloud-Based Phone Systems
Cloud-based phone systems are a type of VoIP, or Voice over Internet Protocol, phone system. You can use standard VoIP equipment or combine service with app-based features and services.
Cloud-based phone systems are reliable, scalable, and easily integrated into your current system.
Premise-Based Phone Systems
One of the primary advantages of premise-based phone systems is that they can be configured as VoIP, digital, or analog systems. Premise-based phone systems are also reliable and provide a more unified means of communication for small businesses.
Indoor Cellular Solutions
DAS, or distributed antenna system, is an indoor cellular phone solution that offers a uniform cellular signal throughout your office building. This all-digital solution is best for those small businesses with frequently spotty cell service, whether in the area or the building itself.
When you begin to research types of small business phone systems, never underestimate the helpfulness of your peers. Speak with other business owners and ask what types of phones work best for them.
Can a Cloud-Based VoIP System Save You Money?
Voice over IP (VoIP) is a computer-integrated telephone technology used for the delivery of voice communications and multimedia content over the Internet. It may be cloud-based, semi-cloud-based, or more internally based using a local network.
Cloud communications are internet-based voice and data communications where telecommunications applications, switching, and storage are hosted by a third party outside the organization using them and accessed over the public Internet.
Landline telephone systems refer to a system that uses metal wire or fiber optic cables to transmit voice communications. There is an associated billing for such service, often on a per-line basis, and the capabilities of the technology are nearly always limited to simple communication.
In recent years, the landline telephone has seen a major decline due to the development of mobile network technology, the obsolescence of old copper wire infrastructure, and the rise of VoIP and other Internet-based methods of data exchange. With nearly 92% of the North American population being Internet-capable, VoIP has become a natural extension of a service most people already have.
Significant savings are enabled by receiving calls and voicemails regardless of your location, as long as you have access to high-speed Internet. Within the US and Canada, you can stay connected to your business and clients without any long-distance charges typically inherent to landline systems.
Your internet connection speed, or bandwidth, is crucial in properly operating your VoIP system. Our Central Telephone Sales and Service technicians always run a full test of your network to ensure VoIP is the right solution for you.
Unlike many other tests, our evaluation lasts anywhere from 24 to 72 hours to obtain an accurate, real-world snapshot of your network's capability. Give us a call for details on how you can save money using this reliable and robust communications platform!
Access Start-to-Finish Business Phone System Upgrades
Your small business phone system is your company's primary link to the outside world. Without it, how would you get anything done?
Sure, e-mail and chat apps are convenient; They're nice when someone just needs a simple question answered. But certain items can only be accomplished over the phone – take in-depth planning, problem-solving, and personal customer interactions.
Without a working telephone system, commerce could never get done!
It's this line of thinking that, ironically enough, could stop some businesses from investing in business phone system upgrades. If the current system works just fine, why change something that isn't broken?
Your business works relatively efficiently. You don't want to risk making a radical change if it won't guarantee improved productivity and communication.
Central Telephone Sales and Service is here to refute that line of thinking as a provider of business phone system additions. When you have a versatile and talented technical team on your side, you have no need to fret that you'll have your communications systems ruined.
Instead, you'll only deal with the benefits of an improved one, of which there are many.
We'll be with you every step of the way and pride ourselves on truly taking the time to get to know your communication needs. Contact us online or give us a call today at 763-550-2000.