Virtual receptionists are becoming increasingly popular among start-ups and SMEs. In case you’re wondering, a virtual receptionist is someone who you hire on a flexible basis to take your calls for you; they will screen the calls you don’t need and ensure that you can follow up on the ones that you do.
They are a fantastic resource for growing businesses because, unlike hiring a full-time receptionist, you only pay for them when you need them. It also guarantees you a professional service without needing to use your time and resources on training.
Never miss a call again
If you’re busy trying to get your business off the ground, the truth is that you don’t always make it to your phone on time! If you’re negotiating with a vendor or trying to understand a complicated technical issue, then a phone call isn’t going to be at the top of your list of priorities.
However, that phone call can be the difference between making a sale or not. Missing calls not only cost you money in sales but it also costs you your reputation and the loyalty of your customers.
Flexibility
If you aren’t getting that many calls, it really doesn’t make any sense to hire a full-time receptionist. You would be spending a lot of money to pay someone to wait for calls, which just seems silly.
However, every business has times when they know they are likely to have a spike in calls. Perhaps you’ve just run a marketing campaign, or you’ve written an article for a business publication. Having a virtual receptionist on hand for those busy times and not having to pay them for the less busy times is one of the key benefits of hiring a virtual receptionist.
For details on how virtual receptionists work, check out Virtual Headquarters.
Appear more professional
Professionalism is key when you are running a small business. If you don’t have the proven track record or the customer numbers to back up your proposition yet, then your professionalism can go a long way towards convincing people that you are worth working with.
By hiring a virtual receptionist, you won’t have calls going straight through to the CEO, which can seem a little sloppy. Instead, your calls will be answered by a friendly professional who will ensure that the person calling gets the response that they need every time.
As virtual receptionists are fully concentrated on answering calls, they will also have a much better call answering time than you could hope to achieve. This again helps to enforce the image of professionalism.
Save your time
You probably started your business because you have a passion for something. Whatever that something is, it makes more sense that you direct your time and energy towards it, rather than spending it answering phone calls.
You can utilize a virtual receptionist when you have those days where you really need to concentrate on resolving a specific problem and to ensure that the calls you are spending your energy on are really the ones that need to go to you.
