When you run a mobile small business, you need to communicate as much as possible. Whether your staff meets briefly in the morning and then spends the remainder of the day with customers or is otherwise on the move, your company needs the technology to keep up with your employees. A cloud VoIP service can help by keeping you connected with clients and colleagues wherever you happen to be working.
Softphones
A softphone is a phone service that runs on tablets, computers, smartphones and web browsers. Utilizing software, it provides standard telephone features like hold, mute, transfer and external calling along with a screen interface. A softphone allows other tasks like voicemail play and delete, video calls and drag-and-drop transfers. The majority of business VoIP providers offer their own softphone interfaces, but you can use third-party apps as well. Softphones are beneficial for communication because they are cloud-based, allowing employees to use the service from any location. Whether by laptop or smartphone, staff can take customer calls the same as if they were sitting in the office.
Video Calling
When you have staff that works remotely, staying engaged with them and keeping them updated is challenging. Video calling and conferencing is a great way to stay in touch. Cloud VoIP and a softphone interface make video calling simple and fast. Mobile employees can call one another to discuss work projects and schedule client meetings. You can hold a group video conference when there are many different parties involved. This feature also works well for sales leads and client meetings. Cloud VoIP brings everyone together.
Voicemail to Email
This feature is one of the biggest benefits of cloud VoIP. When you have a workforce that is always on the go, it can be challenging to keep up with voicemail. Setting up voicemail to email will push all voice messages to an employee’s email account. The audio file is attached to the email notification, allowing the worker to listen to the message right from their inbox. This feature is especially helpful to staff that are on the road. Rather than having to use a voicemail manager, they can receive and listen to messages every time they open their email. Another benefit is automatic deletion. This removes messages from the voicemail box after they are sent by email.
Call Forwarding
It is vital that staff receives their incoming calls. Cloud VoIP can help that process with the following features:
- Multiple device registrations. Workers can register a number of phone devices, like an office phone, a home phone, a smartphone and a softphone. When a call comes in, all of the phones will ring, allowing the worker to take the call on the closest and most convenient device.
- Find me and follow me. This feature allows employees to set a path of devices for calls to ring through. The path can start with the office desk phone. If this goes unanswered, the call is then pushed to a softphone. If this goes unanswered as well, the last step is sending the call to voicemail. No call or sales opportunity will ever be missed.
Administration
Your business likely has an individual who administrates the company’s phone system. A cloud VoIP solution will make this person’s job much easier. The administration portal is accessed through the web and provides everything that is required to manage phones and features. Once logged in, phones can be registered, users can be added and features can be activated. All additions, changes and moves can be done in real time with no need for a service representative to handle the requests. This allows your business to have full control over the company phone system, even when you and the staff are away from the office.
If your business is predominately mobile, a cloud VoIP service will give you the phone features you need while keeping your staff productive and connected to customers. It will also scale as your business expands, eliminating the worry for costly upgrades or downtime. As the world continues to move forward in the digital age, cloud VoIP will allow your business to keep up and stay profitable.
