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Software Solutions For Integrated Phone And Email
Starting your business journey with a personal smartphone is a move some people make due to its accessibility. After all, there might be no harm in doing so. However, as your operations progress, you realize the need to have a dedicated line for your business after receiving several calls at odd times of the night and weekends, when you should be relaxing with your family.
What About Dual Sim Phone?
To solve the problem, you resort to a dual sim phone and purchase another line. It sounds easy at first, but a few months down the road, you start thinking about the image you’re portraying to your customers when they find your business line switched off all evenings and weekends.
While you may think it’s outside your business hours so you could switch off the business line, your customers might not interpret it the same way since they want their needs to be met immediately.
What About Having Several Business Lines?
Your next move might be to purchase two additional business lines for your assistants together with two business phones, so customers can try contacting others when the first line is off. However, it would entail another responsibility for your staffs as they always carry around their business mobiles on top of their personal phones, and it would be a burden for them.
Opening Other Businesses
Your business might be booming now, and by adding your online platform, you decide to diversify your investment portfolio by opening another shop. The problem is you’ll need another business line dedicated to your business, and it means buying another phone in addition to the ones you already have.
It’s Bothersome
The chain can go on and on if you’re not wise in your operation. After a year or so, you may find yourself in a situation where you have to operate five or more different phones with various lines. It’d be inconvenient not only to you but also to your assistants who help you run your businesses.
The Solution
To get free from such a situation, it’s advisable to be more efficient in using your personal phone for work by having reliable software to add one or more business lines without the need for extra SIM cards. And the way to do it is by integrating software for your text messages and e-mails. Doing so would prevent you from overspending and wasting efforts.
Top Considerations For Software Solutions
Several software companies are designing and selling phone software to help make your communication operations smoother. Before settling on one, it’s good to have an idea of what features to look for. Here are some you should consider:
1. Multiple Contacts
You may be running one or two businesses now. However, you don’t know what the future holds for your organization’s direction. If all goes well, you can expand to several branches, each with its dedicated products and services.
As such, go for software allowing you to generate as many phone numbers as you want. In this way, you can expand your business reach as much as your finances would allow you to and operate all of them using your smartphone.
2. Dedicated Inboxes
Remember, you’re operating several lines from a single phone. It’d breed confusion if all incoming messages were to be saved on the same folder as you’d spend a lot of time trying to understand what message relates to which of your businesses, especially if the query is general.
Therefore, choose software separating messages from different lines. This saves your time and mental energy when reading received messages.
3. Global Calling And Messaging
In this time and age, globalization is fast advancing to its peak, and there’s no turning back any time soon. Whatever your business is, you can’t overlook the need to serve the interests of the international community, and this is especially true if you’re running an e-commerce store.
You’ll often find yourself communicating with clients and business partners from both neighboring and far away countries, so do yourself justice by choosing a phone software that allows you to call and message anyone in the world.
4. Group Messaging
In business, it’s commonplace to communicate with many people at the same time. It may be your employees, clients, or business partners, and you understand not every small issue needs a physical meeting to be addressed.
One convenient way to pass the same information to a number of people is by creating a group messaging. Any message you send goes to every member of the group, who can also respond on the same thread for everyone to see.
It’s virtual discussion made easy, so ensure the software you choose has this feature. In this way, everyone would be on the same page constantly.
5. Call Recording
You’ve certainly received abrupt business calls with no pen and paper near you to help jot down important details. It sounds unprofessional on your part if you keep calling again for clarification of some missed details, that’s why you need software recording phone calls. You can replay these at your convenient time and note down details you can’t remember.
6. Integration With Other Software
You certainly use other software with your phone including:
- E-mailing software
- Contact organizer
- Work collaboration platforms
- Customer relationship management (CRM) software
- Marketing, sales, and service software
It’d be great if the phone software you choose can directly connect to most of these, so you’ll end up saving time and improving your general work experience. Maximize your efficiency by looking for software integrated with these, so you could easily access everything with just a few clicks.
In A Nutshell
Software solutions for phones are a great way to improve your operational efficiency. It’s rather cumbersome to get a different device for every phone line, and carrying around several phones everywhere you go feels a burden to do.
Change for good by installing an appropriate software that’ll enable you to use different lines and correspond to messages and e-mails on one phone without the need for additional SIM cards.