1. Auto-Attendant

Receptionists are becoming increasingly rare, especially in small businesses. Handling incoming calls that are meant for other employees is time consuming and means frequent interruptions. An auto attendant allows you to set up menu options to route calls based on the callers’ input. It gets callers to the right person more quickly, and reduces the number of calls that have to be handled by whoever is on receptionist duty. Not only will your calls be managed far more efficiently with a call menu, but it will also make your small business seem like a larger corporation. Additionally, with call queues, you can make one person look like five. VoIP phone systems can automatically route calls to “different” departments, even if all those departments are run by one person.

2. Music On-Hold

Not only does adding music or a promotional message to your hold program create a more pleasant experience for your callers, but it also makes your business appear well-established. Using the appropriate hold music enhances your corporate image and leaves a good impression on your customers.

3. Professional Voicemail

Voicemail makes customers feel that your business is always reachable and ready to take in their requests promptly. Even if an employee at a small business is away from the office phone, they can still receive the voicemail and give a speedy response. Fast response time increases customer service and improves the small business’s image.

4. Find Me/Follow Me

Follow me allows incoming calls to be received in multiple places. This feature usually provides a choice of multiple ringing (where all the lines ring at once) or sequential ringing (if the primary line isn’t answered in a given time other lines are tried in turn). This can be particularly useful for businesses with employees who work remotely. It’s also handy for people who work irregular hours, as they don’t need to keep changing their call diversion settings.

5. Staying Up When Phone Lines Are Down

VoIP also offers small businesses disaster management capabilities. In the event of a disaster, a traditional phone line might be down hours or days, making the company appear unstable and unreliable. But a VoIP solution allows the company to easily route calls to a new destination or your mobile device with just a few clicks. In a highly competitive environment, you could end up losing opportunities if you aren’t available all the time. 

CallHarbor’s VoIP system can help any small business seem bigger with all of these convenient features and more. 

Sources:

https://www.forbes.com/sites/centurylink/2016/09/16/how-a-new-phone-system-can-make-a-small-business-look-big/?sh=6d1d53607151

The post 5 Ways a VoIP Phone System Can Help Your Small Business Look Bigger appeared first on CallHarbor.

There are many benefits to remote work that companies are unaware of. Working from home is not only beneficial to employees but to businesses as well. Here’s why your business should be investing in work-from-home tech in 2022.

1. Demand for Remote Work Continues to Increase

According to recent studies, about 25% of professional jobs in America will be remote by the end of 2022, and opportunities will only continue to increase in the years ahead. The pandemic may have been the reason for our shift to remote work, but it doesn’t seem to be going away in this post-pandemic environment. There is an increasing need for flexible work opportunities, as remote work provides employees with the work/life balance they need to really excel in their careers. 

2. Remote Work Reduces Costs

For any business, budget will always be an important factor to consider when implementing new technology and working strategies. Investing in work from home technology might be costly at first, however, it’ll definitely pay off in the long term. Businesses will need to invest in things like cameras and flexible cloud-based UCaaS and CCaaS technology, but they’ll be saving money on a range of other expenses, like maintaining a physical office or work environment.

Providing equipment for an office full of employees can be costly. After all, computers, printers, copy machines, paper, work desks, and office chairs aren’t cheap. By having employees working remotely, many of these costs can be dramatically reduced, or eliminated altogether. For some businesses, the majority of the work is able to be carried out remotely, so it may be possible for a company to get rid of a centralized office space, and simply pay to rent meeting rooms or co-working space as and when they are actually needed.

3. Access to a Wider Range of Professionals

When employee attendance at a physical workplace is required, recruitment efforts are limited to the nearby area or people willing to relocate; however, work from home technology has made it easier to manage remote teams, thus widening your company’s talent pool, and allowing you to hire the best minds from across the globe. Companies are able to hire potential employees based on their qualifications and suitability for positions, regardless of where they live. This not only allows companies to more effectively pursue top talent, but can also help create a more diverse and inclusive workforce. 

4. Improved Employee Wellbeing

Since the pandemic, in particular, companies have been increasingly focused on the importance of keeping employees happy and healthy. With work from home technology, companies can provide their employees more opportunities to work remotely for the benefit of their physical and mental health. Well-being is positively correlated with employee productivity, organizational profitability, customer satisfaction, employee loyalty, and employee retention. When your staff sees you’re willing to invest in their wellness, they’re more likely to stick with your business in the long-term.

5. Better Team Performance

Investing in work from home technology can empower your employees to work effectively from any environment. According to studies, around 90% of part-time or full-time remote workers say they’re more productive or just as productive when working remotely. Around 84% of employees also believe working remotely makes them happier, which can directly impact workplace outcomes. With the right technology, your employees can focus on tasks and accomplish what they need to from wherever they may be. 

Check out this blog to read about what you need to work from home: https://callharbor.com/2021/10/20/what-you-need-to-work-from-home/

Sources:

https://www.uctoday.com/unified-communications/top-6-reasons-to-buy-work-from-home-tech-2022/ https://blog.bit.ai/why-companies-need-to-invest-in-work-from-home-technology/

The post 5 Reasons for Businesses to Invest in Work from Home Technology appeared first on CallHarbor.

Features and Benefits of Call Monitoring

Listen

This feature allows you to passively listen to an agent’s conversations. The Listen mode allows the user to hear both the sales rep and the caller but doesn’t allow them to speak to either person. It’s typically used so supervisors can take notes and provide feedback, or even assess the company’s customer service quality when applied to multiple calls. Listening to live calls can help sales managers better understand the daily actions of agents and how they’re executing on your sales process.

Whisper

With Whisper mode, supervisors can join a live call and speak directly to the agent without the caller hearing them. This allows supervisors to coach their remote sales team in real-time and train them as they work on a call. This is a great feature to use during an agent’s training period, as it allows supervisors to give tips and guide the agent to success.

Barge

When agents are having a hard time during a call, call barging lets the supervisor drop in on a live call to speak with both the agent and the caller. This basically turns your call into a three-way conference call, allowing all participants to hear and speak to one another. When using call barging, make sure the agent introduces the third party that’s joining the call. Never barge an in-progress call without being introduced.

Who uses call monitoring?

Call center managers

Supervisors can monitor calls to ensure that call quality standards are being maintained and that agents are attending to customer queries as quickly as possible and in the right manner. 

Marketing departments

Knowing how well leads are converted once they are passed over to sales agents is key, and monitoring calls allows you to do just that. Join active calls or relisten to call recordings to assess how sales agents present a particular product or service and hear how customers respond. Use this data to tailor marketing campaigns and create popular content.

Sales and customer support

Properly train and coach employees from day one using live and recorded calls from the best agents. Revisit calls to find key details that may have been missed during the original call.

Conclusion

Call monitoring can be one of the best methods to ensure that your employees are providing effective, compliant, and excellent service. Through CallHarbor’s user portal, supervisors can easily access an active call from the dashboard in real time, listen to the conversation discreetly without the customer or agent being interrupted or disturbed during the call, and monitor their team regularly from one call to the next. Call centers that make effective use of call quality monitoring are likely to find a corresponding improvement in customer satisfaction levels.

Sources:

https://www.talkdesk.com/blog/call-monitoring-benefits-in-call-centers/
https://www.ringover.com/blog/call-monitoring-definition

The post 3 Ways to Monitor Calls: Listen, Whisper & Barge appeared first on CallHarbor.

Proper phone etiquette will help you maintain a strong connection with your customers and can help separate you from the rest of the market and encourage customers to call back again. 

Here are 5 business phone etiquette tips to help enhance your communication skills over the phone:

1. Answer the call within 3 rings.

There are so many communication alternatives available nowadays, such as email, chat, and online forms, so when a customer decides to pick up the phone and call your company, you know they’re looking for an immediate response. According to phone etiquette, three rings is the rule. Most people will hang up if they have to wait for more than three rings for you to pick up the phone, which is why three rings is the optimal wait-time.

Three rings is a universal number mainly for these two reasons:

1. You answer the call fast. Three rings mean you haven’t picked up the phone immediately, but at the same time, you didn’t let the customer wait. Basically, you answered the call just right!
2. You get enough time to prepare. Three rings give you enough time to notice the call, take a deep breath, and prepare, so when you take it, you can do your best.

2. Be calm and cheerful & smile when you talk.

You should always remain calm and cheerful on the phone, even when dealing with the most difficult customer. You have to remember that the person is calling for a reason. If they’re calling for customer support, they may have questions, concerns, or frustrations that need to be addressed. By remaining calm and cheerful, you can diffuse the situation and even end up brightening your customer’s day. It is also important to smile while you speak. You may think that smiling while speaking on the phone isn’t going to make a difference, since the person on the other end of the line can’t see you, but you’d be wrong. The tone of the human voice changes when smiling. It is readily perceivable to the caller and it sets the tone for the rest of the call. It’s been proven that a smile puts the caller at ease. 

3. Actively listen, and take notes.

It’s important that you actively listen to your customers throughout a conversation. Actively listening means hearing everything they have to say and basing your answers off of their comments, rather than giving a generic response. This shows customers that you’re present and are empathetic to their inconveniences. Being a good listener makes customers feel cared about and respected, which makes them loyal to your brand. If you take the time to actively listen to each individual customer, you’ll build real personal connections and make a true difference. It’s also essential to take notes during calls. Keeping a record of the conversation by taking notes can ensure that you remember and respond to all the customer’s concerns effectively. Being proactive during the call ensures that you won’t miss any important information, and will help you understand customers’ issues, allowing you to provide a better service.

4. Don’t interrupt.

Don’t ever interrupt your customer at any period of the conversation. It’s not only rude, but also a quick way to lose a customer. No matter how angry, annoying or even provoking a customer is, you should stay calm and let them finish talking, since listening to the customer’s story is also beneficial from a psychological point of view as the customer feels taken care of when you listen carefully and let them speak. Listen carefully to complaints and show the customer that you find their concerns important.

5. Ask permission to put a caller on hold.

No matter how you try to avoid it, there will be times when you’ll need to place a caller on hold; however, it’s important that you ask the caller first. For example, you can say, “will you please hold while I verify that information for you?” A simple request will make the caller more willing to wait. If the hold takes longer than anticipated, check back with the caller periodically so they don’t feel like they’ve been abandoned. Upon returning, thank your caller again for their patience.

Proper telephone etiquette in the workplace is crucial and can be the ultimate key to gain a positive impression from customers and individuals you are talking with. Answering calls promptly and politely is an absolute must if you want your business to succeed, so make that call the best it can be, and it may create a loyal, lifetime customer.

Sources:

https://blog.hubspot.com/service/phone-etiquette

https://www.ringcentral.com/us/en/blog/business-phone-etiquette/

The post 5 Ways to Improve Business Phone Etiquette appeared first on CallHarbor.

• Happy employees stay in their job four times longer than unhappy employees;
• Happy employees are 12% more productive;
• Happy employees commit twice as much time to their tasks;
• Happy employees have 65% more energy than unhappy employees.

Creating a positive work environment and keeping employees happy has many benefits. Here are 5 benefits of happy employees:

1. They’re more productive

Creating a culture that encourages employee satisfaction and happiness will no doubt boost employee productivity and performance. Employee happiness can improve a company’s bottom line, as well as increase creativity, productivity, and service quality. Happy employees are more present and engaged. They pay more attention to the customers’ needs and are more alert of the company’s systems and processes. All these factors come together to bring organizations increased productivity and profitability. 

2. They contribute to the happiness of customers and coworkers

When an employee is happy, it is apparent in the interactions they have with customers. The more engaged an employee is with the customer, the more interested the customer will be in the company’s products and/or services. The customer will likely return and tell others about their pleasant experience.

Another thing to consider when examining the effect of happiness is that it can have a multiplying effect. A positive demeanor and good mood is contagious and can influence other employees without them even realizing. Employees who give off negative vibes aren’t much fun to work with and typically aren’t as engaged.  Employee happiness inspires teamwork, and such comradery helps projects run smoothly and get completed on time. Since effective team collaboration depends on having solid working relationships with your colleagues, you can lose a lot by not engaging and satisfying your team, as unhappiness breeds instability. Just one unhappy employee can affect the entire team, and in turn affect the success of the company.

3. They’re more engaged

When employees are engaged, their main objective is to contribute to the company’s success. It’s important to create an environment where your employees feel engaged and motivated in their roles. When an employee is satisfied in their role, they naturally perform better. Engaged employees are motivated to complete their tasks on time and successfully and will go the extra mile to reach their goals and objectives. They genuinely care about their responsibilities and want to make the company and their superiors proud of their work. Additionally, they’re better at meeting customers’ needs, which leads to more sales and higher revenues. 

4. They’re more likely to stay with your company

It’s a given that an unhappy employee is more likely to quit, so if retention is something you care about, you should start paying attention to employee happiness. Many companies are finding it difficult to retain top talent. According to recent research of more than 600 US businesses with 50-500 employees, 63.3% of companies say retaining employees is actually harder than hiring them.
Happiness and employee retention are the results of a highly engaged workplace culture. Feeling valued and appreciated are critical components to employee happiness and retention. Consistent recognition and appreciation of your employees and their performance will increase employee morale, retention, and collaboration.

5. They’re more likely to attract other good employees

How to improve employee happiness

Employers should encourage meaningful two-way relationships with their employees, reward their hard work and dedication, and make their wellness a priority. To improve employee happiness, employers should consider the following:

• Learning what happiness means to them
• Asking how you can improve and support them better
• Ensuring they have a balanced and interesting workload
• Encouraging and investing in their skills
• Involving them in decisions
• Creating opportunities for them to get involved
• Showing you value them
• Celebrating their successes
• Always acting on their feedback

Having happy employees is a necessity for every successful workplace. Productivity, motivation, dedication and retention all depend on it. Ultimately, a positive company culture will positively affect your employees’ happiness. 

Sources:

https://www.bizjournals.com/triangle/news/2019/08/29/attracting-and-retaining-top-talent-5-ways-to-make.html
https://www.indeed.com/career-advice/career-development/happy-employees
https://www.lorman.com/blog/post/36-statistics-on-the-importance-of-employee-engagement
https://www.ringcentral.com/us/en/blog/employee-happiness/ 

The post 5 Benefits of Happy Employees appeared first on CallHarbor.

Communicate with your customer

Communication is key. One way to make hold time feel more tolerable is to tell callers how much of it they can expect. A caller is much more likely to lose patience and abandon the call if they don’t know approximately how long they’ll be waiting, which is why it’s important to be upfront about the Estimated Wait Time (EWT). It also limits the chance of a customer abandoning the call just as they were about to be put through. Giving callers an EWT helps increase customer satisfaction as it allows them to manage their time and determine whether or not they want to stay on hold. 

Virtual queuing and callback options

There’s only so much you can do to reduce hold time. At some point, you have to start thinking about the customer experience and help make it more enjoyable, or at least not as frustrating. A virtual queuing system is an effective way to empower your customers to feel more in control of their call center experience. A virtual queuing system also allows your customers to hang up without losing their place in the queue. Your agent can then call them back when they become available. This simple tactic keeps customers in the queue, reducing call abandonment rates, all while easing their frustrations of having to wait on hold. Rather than having to suffer through long wait times when your call center is experiencing high call volumes, your customer can choose to schedule a callback at a convenient time. This improves the customer’s perception of their support experience, and your company, as callers will feel like your company respects their time.

Keep customers engaged

There’s only so many times you can hear, “Your call is very important to us. Please stay on the line and an agent will be with you momentarily,” before you lose it and hang up the phone. Incorporating new media and content can enhance the experience for callers. Good hold music and messaging – such as product updates, account information, changes in business hours, promotional advertisements, short informational announcements, or self-service options, are common approaches and a nice change of pace. Good hold music may not keep customers on hold longer, but a bad choice of hold music or a bad recording will surely make customers want to hang up sooner. Select music for the emotional effect you want to project – music that has qualities associated with your brand.

Make sure your staff are well-trained

Having adequate staffing is important. Every contact center should have enough agents to handle the ongoing workload. Well trained and well-equipped staff are much more productive, as they can deal with customer queries quicker and increase positive customer experiences through their knowledge. Fast, efficient computers, up-to-date systems, and the use of VoIP phone systems mean your agents are always connected and calls can be conducted seamlessly. Streamlining the entire call process by training and equipping your staff allows them to get through calls and move onto the next customer more efficiently.

Ultimately, a high rate of abandoned calls is a sign that your customers aren’t receiving the level of service they expect. Bad customer service can lead to dissatisfied customers and a loss of business. By integrating some of the tips above, more customers can be connected with your agents and enjoy an efficient and effective experience.

Sources:

https://tollfreeforwarding.com/blog/how-to-reduce-abandoned-calls-in-call-centers/ 
https://www.avoxi.com/blog/6-tricks-for-reducing-abandoned-calls-in-your-call-center/

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How Can Financial Institutions Benefit from Using VoIP?

More Flexibility

CallHarbor’s VoIP phone systems are flexible and secure. Financial institutions receive a lot of calls involving sensitive financial information, which is why using a secure phone service like VoIP makes perfect business sense. With VoIP, you can access your company phone line from any device, giving you the flexibility to attend to multiple customers and not miss any important calls. It also allows you to check messages while on the move.

Most financial industries have multiple locations across the globe. VoIP phone systems help the internal teams and management stay easily connected with the teams of other branches using advanced features like video conferencing, audio calls, texting, and more that are highly flexible for scheduling meetings, sharing the data, and recording the meetings. These, and other VoIP features, allow you to get in touch, stay in touch, and keep current with customer demands, whether you’re working from home, on the road, or in the office.

Improved Customer Service

With VoIP, you and your team can connect and collaborate more easily and effectively. Hosted VoIP systems enhance client interactions by allowing your team to be more accessible and responsive. When customers call needing financial help, they don’t have time to be passed around from department to department until they reach the right person. A great VoIP feature is customizable auto-attendants that ensure customers are automatically routed to the right department. CallHarbor includes unlimited auto-attendants for free, so you can build out auto-attendants for business hours, afterhours, holidays, and more!

CallHarbor also includes unlimited call queues to distribute calls to all available team members. This reduces hold time and improves overall customer service satisfaction. Our onboarding team will assist you in creating call queues, and give you suggestions on call routing to better your financial institution’s phone system.

Data Integration

CallHarbor’s VoIP phone systems can also help you save time and facilitate daily activities. Integration with systems like CRM will give your employees the ability to collect information and deliver even more personal services to each of your clients – all thanks to the online system that automatically pulls up the customer’s information on your screen when a customer calls, allowing you to solve customer issues much quicker. Agents can also take notes for the next time the customer calls, creating a more personalized customer experience.

Thanks to API integration, VoIP allows you joint access with your partners to certain data. This will enable you to make exchanges, sales, and share business information securely with your partners. You can also inform your partners about upcoming products and their charges, policy changes, and regulations.

Cut Costs

Most finance companies and banks operate globally. VoIP softphone systems help offices in different parts of the world stay connected at minimal costs. Financial service workers know better than anyone else that every penny counts. Telephony systems are a major cost for financial services that frequently make long-distance calls. VoIP systems actually eliminate traditional telecom charges like costly long-distance fees and hardware maintenance contracts.

In conclusion, customers want support that is fast, easy, and accurate, which is why it has become even more important for financial institutions to have the best unified communications services. CallHarbor’s VoIP service system can provide a seamless omnichannel experience for both customers and employees. 

Sources: 

1. https://www.vitelglobal.in/blog/tag/voip-for-financial-services-industry/
2. https://www.velantro.com/blogs/voip/voip-for-financial-services-stay-100-compliant 
3. https://blog.votacall.com/voip-for-financial-institutions 

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A satisfied customer becomes a repeat customer, and will most likely recommend your business to others; while an unhappy customer will not. In fact, they may share their unpleasant experience with potential customers, tarnishing your company’s reputation and brand image. Improving customer response time can improve customer service efficiency, close more sales opportunities, and boost customer loyalty. 

Customer satisfaction is now the biggest differentiator of brands, replacing price and product quality. CMO council found that the most important attribute of a good customer experience, according to the customers’ themselves, is a fast response time.

For this reason, businesses should really consider how they can deliver a superior level of customer service and stand out from their competitors. Here are 5 ways you can reduce customer service response times and better serve your clients: 

1. Implement customer service software

Customer service software, also known as help desk software, dominated the market and accounted for a revenue share of over 20% in 2021. Customer service software is one of the best investments you can make to improve your customer service. Support software helps you streamline your team’s workflows and organize incoming customer requests by assigning them to designated customer service agents.

There are various helpdesk solutions available that allow you to put all your customer queries, whether they be via phone, email, social media, or messaging, into one easy-to-use dashboard. This can help your business’s customer service team resolve customers’ issues efficiently and effectively. With every inquiry organized, your team will be able to process a greater volume of customer queries in a shorter amount of time. Support software also lets you track the status of customer requests and customize different kinds of reports to monitor your team members’ performance and support quality.

2. Use email autoresponders

No matter what business or industry you’re in, your customers just want to be heard and get a simple, fast response. Less than 10% of companies use autoresponders, but this simple technology can be used to let a customer know you have received their email and what they should expect to happen next. 

Automated responses can be used in three main ways:

• An immediate automated email for every inquiry received
• Certain types of common inquiries receive an automated response
• An automated email is used for messages received out of business hours

Automated responses may seem impersonal, but that prompt acknowledgement will let customers know that they and their questions and/or concerns matter and that they’re being taken seriously. Automatic response is a excellent way to: 

• Thank them for their message 
• Remind the sender of the opening hours of your customer service department and that it may take several hours until their email is seen by someone
• Set expectations up front and Inform the customer of your average response times
• Provide links to FAQs and other self service tools that they might not have been able to find on your company website

3. Use time-based email alerts  

Every business focused on its customer service understands the importance of optimizing their response time. As much as a company would love to respond to every email as quickly as possible, there are times when the lag in resolution time is out of their control. For example, an agent may be waiting on information they need from the customer to be able to resolve their inquiry. In this situation, it’s important to flag your customer emails for a timed follow-up so that they aren’t left behind and forgotten.

Using time-based alerts is best because your team will always be notified within a set period to either work through the query (if the customer has provided the requested information) or they’ll be notified to follow up with the customer to obtain the necessary information. Either way, time-based alerts make sure that nothing is dropped. Although team members can create manual alerts, it’s much more effective to automate this using customer service software, most of which have handy features that can automatically tag new inquiries with a timer.

4. Use templates and text shortcuts

There are some common questions that are repeatedly asked by many customers. Sometimes, these questions are rather simple and don’t require a lot of hands-on responses. Such frequently asked questions can be handled quickly and efficiently by making use of templates that contain prepared answers. Rather than drafting a new email for each and every customer inquiry, your support team should have access to a number of email templates or how-to guides covering the most commonly asked questions.

Email templates that provide the right information can be used by agents to respond to customers quickly, without having to individually type out the same answer over and over again. This allows them to handle more inquiries in the same amount of time, reducing the average response time.

5. Categorize and prioritize emails you receive 

Categorizing and prioritizing emails is one of the best ways for a business to reduce customer support response time. Categorizing emails can help you keep track of your customers’ needs. Customer support agents should handle an email based on its subject and then assign it to a specific category. Different categories represent different levels of priority. Categorizing the emails you receive based on subject matter and complexity helps your support team be more productive. They’ll know which ones to prioritize and will be able to work within an organized framework. Some email categories include: 

• Technical issues
• General questions
• Invoices
• Refunding
• Payments
• Spam

You can also categorize emails according to the type of customer: 

• Lead
• Customer
• Old customer

Improving customer response times will not only improve your customers’ overall experience, but it can also enhance your brand’s reputation, and improve efficiencies throughout your entire company. Better customer response time means better business. 

SOURCES:

https://emailtree.ai/blog/7-ways-to-reduce-customer-service-response-times-in-2021/
https://www.edesk.com/blog/reduce-customer-response-times/
https://www.simplr.ai/blog/how-to-drastically-improve-customer-service-response-times 

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