Nowadays most communication is done by the medium of the typed word, whether that is via texting, emailing or social networking. We simply aren’t talking to each other as much as we used to in a traditional way.
Businesses are also following this trend. Customer service departments tend to be managed through web based portals and most of our inter-office communication is done via text message, online chat or emails. So although we now write more than ever, do your business a favour and pick up the phone.
Nurturing relationships with your customers is a crucial part of growing a successful business. In this age of automation and innovation, caring for your customers has never been more important.
The phone system in your office is still as essential as it ever was and perhaps even more so if you want to get ahead of your competitors by showing your customers that you have taken the time to pick up the phone and speak to them.
At any moment, an unhappy customer can share their opinion with the masses through social media and the web and negatively affect your business. That’s why it’s even more important than ever to understand exactly what it is your customers are telling you as sometimes this does not come across in online chats, emails and text messages.
Undoubtedly, verbal communication is still the best method of interaction; it helps build rapport, develop relationships and offers a clearer understanding of what the other person is saying based upon their tone of voice.
21st century phone systems have come a long way from the old fashioned switchboards. IP telephony also known as Voice Over Inter Protocol (VoIP) is designed to replace the telecommunications’ infrastructure of circuit switched public data networks (CSPDN) and public switched telephone networks (PSTN) with packet switched IP communication networks.
IPT uses Internet technology to deliver your conversation. Put simply, you can talk to your customers or co-workers using a traditional handset, but your conversation is sent over the Internet in the same way as an email, rather than over your existing telephone network.
With fibre broadband now becoming available in many more areas, it can now offer speeds of up to 300Mbps even at the busiest of times and with a reliable connection of 99.99%, transmitting voice at high quality is a piece of cake.
You might have thought that you were saving your business money by ditching the telephone for other forms of communication but in the long run it could end up costing more when you customers get fed up of talking to a computer.
In terms of cost, just like with broadband you pay a flat cost for IPT and all of your calls within the network are free of charge.
When it comes to calls you make outside of the network, the IP phones are clever – they can communicate with phones on a traditional network easily. When you are on a call you would never know you were using different technologies.
Verbal communication will never be replaced by written communication, no matter how innovative technologies become. At the end of the day your customers need to know you care and what better way to deliver this message than to tell them direct.
We hope the above information is useful to you. If you would like assistance in understanding your best options then please contact us on 0800 505 3350. Alternatively you can download our telephone systems buyers guide as useful reference material or visit our Call Recording Software & Call Logging Solutions , where you can even run a quick quote to obtain a budget cost.
