Ever wonder why your customers complain that they are having a hard time reaching you? Maybe you lost a key customer or prospect because a phone call or voicemail wasn't returned? Call Accounting software or applications can track all of your calls from "cradle to grave" meaning that you can visually track a call from the point that it hit your phone system through the hang-up. Did it get to an extension? If so, which extension? Was a message left in the voicemail box? How long was the message? All of these questions can be answered with Call Accounting.
Call Accounting can also collect and provide reports on your call volume highlighting your busiest call flow times and how many of your lines you are using. This info will help you decide if you are paying for too many lines or if you need more lines to more effectively field your customers calls.
A little research will show you that you can purchase an expensive 3rd party software. Many companies offer such a product. But many times, your business phone system will only require a one-time license activation to fire it up.
Imagine you are calling into a Call Center for tech support because your Internet or Television is not working. Your call rings and rings or even worse, you get a busy signal. It's a busy time for the Call Center and they cannot handle the call volume. Now imagine that you call a Call Center and you immediately hear a greeting assuring you that you are 3rd in line and your wait time is approximately 5 minutes. You will be a lot more likely to stay on the line if you know when your call will be answered. This feature is called Automatic Call Distribution or ACD and it's not just for Call Centers. Some phone systems do require a hardware or software add-on to provide this service but many business phone systems offer it as a one-time license activation.
Have you ever reached your desk one morning to see the message light blinking on your phone. Of course you have. You check the message and find out that your biggest customer left a message last night at 5:30pm your time but 4:30pm their time. They wanted to place a high priority order and were willing to pay for expedited shipping if you could get the order out. Well that plan is shot now. Maybe the customer will be ok with receiving the order tomorrow but maybe they went elsewhere. What if you received an email while you were driving home yesterday and had that message. You could call your customer and make plans to get the order shipped.
You have a hot lead on the phone and he wants to place an order immediately but needs pricing like yesterday. Your boss is on a conference call for another hour but your customer wont wait. Should you put your customer on hold, walk down the hall and interrupt your bosses call to ask for pricing? Maybe you could email him and hope he sees it quickly and responds. With Unified Communications (UC) Desktop feature you can see your bosses extension, click on his picture and send a chat request for the pricing. The message pops up on his desktop with a "boop" and stares him in the face. He can respond with the special pricing and the chat will be saved for later recall.
Your son's baseball game starts in 15 minutes but you are stuck on a conference call with your West Coast office. Wouldn't it be nice to be able to move that call to your cell phone and take it with you to your car and then to the game? Many phone systems today offer such a mobility feature. Many times it just an Android or IOS application that you download and integrate to your desk phone or phone server.