If you run a business, you already know about the ease and convenience of Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP). This powerful business tool is less costly than a traditional phone system, but it is packed with features that help make your business operations run smoother. Not every VoIP will offer these features, but many providers can add them to your system. Let’s take a look at those essential VoIP features that you cannot live without.
Are you looking to add these exceptional features to your VoIP?At SE Telecom, we can help you find the right system and features for your organization. Request a demo today.
1 – Advanced Call Management
When you have incoming calls, you want a way to prioritize them. With an advanced call management system, you can route, hold, or block any of those calls. This feature can help you relieve some of the burdens off your front desk operators. Along with that, it can prevent or reduce frustration for your customers.
In many cases, call management allows you to direct any incoming call. You will be able to route inbound calls by customer type, agent performance, staff availability, or purpose of the call. Your customers will never be sent to the wrong department or agent again with this system.
2 – Anonymous Call Rejection
You will have calls that are not worth taking throughout the day, such as crank calls or solicitation calls. These calls can keep your team away from customers with real-life needs and issues. With this feature, you can prevent calls with blocked or anonymous caller IDs from reaching anyone in your business.
3 – Auto Attendant
When there is a steady stream of inbound calls, it can be hard to remain upbeat, friendly, and effective at handling them. If you have customer-facing team members, you need an auto attendant. This feature will help answer, route, and escalate those incoming calls. You might not even need a human operator for incoming calls. This virtual receptionist can help make customers happy, save on hiring costs, or keep your existing agent from getting overwhelmed.
4 – Business Text Messaging
Many people prefer to communicate with texts rather than calls in today’s world. If you have VoIP, you might consider this business SMS texting feature, with some companies offering unlimited messages. You will be able to update your field teams or send notifications to customers instantly. SMS texting is an exceptional tool to add to your communication system, and it is the best way to keep everyone and all teams connected.
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5 – Calling Features
There are plenty of calling features to add to your VoIP plan. Call analytics will be valuable for your company’s customer insights by collecting and analyzing real-world data. Since VoIP operates on different devices, the system can record and process that call data. These collected metrics can include individual agent performance, session metrics, and customer behavior trends. You can see where to make improvements.
Some businesses have issues with unanswered calls. With call forwarding, you can always be available for your customers. This feature allows you to route calls to mobile or office phones. Your team will have the flexibility to take calls from any location, helping to boost those customers’ satisfaction rates.
For those important calls, you want to be instantly notified. Call notify will send an email notification to your agents when a specific call comes through the system. You can use this feature to define a set of call criteria to optimize your call notification features. For example, use this feature to alert an account manager when there is an incoming call from a high-value customer.
With call parking, your team can enable call waiting on incoming calls. When the right agent is available, the call is sent to them. This option allows your team to address those priority calls before answering the parked one.
When you are working with customers, you need to keep them happy. Call presence is an option that provides you with a way to know the visibility of everyone in your business. At a glance, you can tell who is free to take a call or who is already busy on another line.
With call pulling, you can move the conversation seamlessly from one device to another. For example, an ongoing call can be switched from an office phone to a smartphone without any disruptions.
If you have a large volume of calls, consider the call queuing feature. You will be able to automate a large number of inbound calls, organize your organization into strategic tiers, and answer these calls. Call queuing is an excellent way to reduce wait times for customers.
For some businesses, they need to record calls. With VoIP, you can easily add these features to your service. Recording and rating calls are ways to boost your team’s performance and improve customer service.
Call screening is a good feature when deciding whether to take or reject any incoming calls. You can filter these calls to be sent to a voicemail. Call screening reduces spam, unwanted calls, or even crank calls.
Finally, call transfer is one of the most helpful VoIP features. You can make a short introduction for a warm transfer or send a cold transfer to an agent. With this option, you can easily connect the caller to the recipient.
6 – Conference Bridge
This feature enables you to add several people to a single phone call. You can use it to hold remote meetings with participants across the country or world.
7- Custom Hold and Ringback Music
No one wants to be waiting on the phone. These VoIP features allow you to upload and play audio files for your customers as they wait. If you want to establish your brand identity, consider using custom ringback tones (like a jingle) that will play when the customer calls your business.
8 – Do Not Disturb
When you enable this feature, you can turn off the ringer and redirect customers to busy lines or voicemails.
9 – Extension Dialing
This feature allows you to manage those extensive numbers within your organization. Depending on your specific VoIP system, you might be able to define extensions with only two or five digits. With this, your team can quickly respond to calls, reducing wait times for the customer.
10 – Free Local Phone Number
When working in a specific market, you want a number that matches the local area codes. Some VoIP vendors will provide you with a free local phone number to stay visible in the market.
11 – Instant Messaging
Many younger customers would rather use a messaging app than make a phone call. Your VoIP system should come with instant messaging capabilities. That’s another excellent option that you can offer your customers.
12 – Mobile App
VoIPs are driven by software more than hardware. With that in mind, you can use a VoIP app to run your operations from a smartphone or virtual office. An app allows you to have conversations with customers, partners, or team members on the go.
13 – Number Porting
Customers don’t like change. If you have an established phone number, you don’t want to change it. Number porting allows you to keep that existing number and port it to your new VoIP system. That option can help you avoid the hassles of alerting customers to another number.
Related: The Pros and Cons of VoIP: Should You Switch?
14 – eFax
Faxes do not need to be received by those big, bulky machines anymore. With VoIP, you can have several options to send a fax. You can get your faxes sent to an email, saving you a trip to the fax machine.
15 – Push-to-Talk
Push-to-talk is one of those essential features. You can keep everyone on the same page with this option. Think of it as a traditional intercom. All you have to do is push a button to connect to team members or customers.
16 – SIP Trunking
SIP stands for Session Initiation Protocol, allowing you to make calls using an internet connection instead of a traditional phone line (PSTN).
17 – Speed Dial
You only need to punch in a few numbers to call those frequent recipients with speed dialing.
18 – Three-Way Calling
Sometimes, you need to connect with a third person. With VoIP, you can quickly and easily link to another party. For many systems, this is a standard feature. With three-way calling, you can have a more efficient conversation to solve any issues faster.
19 – Toll-Free Number
Most customer-centric companies will have a toll-free number for their customers. These numbers allow customers to call without getting charged on their phone bills. Toll-free numbers are a convenient way for your customers to reach and connect with your business.
20 – Unlimited Voice Calls
Many phone plans have call limited and per-minute charges. That is never good for business. Those charges can reduce your revenue, weaken customer relationships, and strain your operational efficiency. When you get unlimited voice calls, you never have to worry about any limits again. Many VoIP providers do offer unlimited calling in most of the packages.
21 – Upgrade Options
You can always upgrade your VoIP service into a unified, comprehensive platform for your customers and organization. Use UCaaS to unlock those advanced features, like AI-powered chat, comprehensive analytics, and ticketing.
22 – Voicemail Options
Any phone system should have an option for customers to leave a voicemail. If you don’t have this feature, you will have many unhappy customers. Voicemail allows you to address issues, respond to priority calls, and take action. With a basic voicemail, your customers can leave a short message for your team. You can even create your own voicemail greeting for customers. That little message can go a long way to make your visitors feel appreciated and valued.
With voicemail forwarding, you can be alerted to new voicemails on any device. Some of these features can be programs to send voicemail to a group of people. There are several ways to get a new voicemail alert: email or text. The voice message will be sent to your inbox from voicemail to email. With that, you can quickly respond to customers. Voicemail to text allows you to have a written transcription of the message. It can be easy to mishear numbers, names, and addresses. With this feature, you will never miss out on those vital details.
23 – VoIP Caller ID
Another helpful feature is caller ID. While this technology is not new, it is still an essential part of any phone system. VoIP caller IDs enable you to see who is calling your organization. With that information, you can prioritize calls for an efficient management system.
In addition to that, don’t forget about a VoIP switchboard. This control panel allows you to send, receive, and transfer calls through the internet. You can keep the conversion going no matter where you are located.
Related: Make and receive calls in Teams anywhere using your existing phone service
24 – Video Conferencing
Over the past two years, there has been a bigger emphasis on video conferencing. Video can make a big difference when communicating with customers. These features are essential when negotiating contracts, closing those deals, or showing off a product demonstration.
Add These Features To Your VoIP
With all of these features, you can help your organization and team members with their workloads. Customers can get faster answers to their questions, and it can help prioritize those calls in your system. Along with that, you will have access to analytics and other data from the calls. You always know the advantages of VoIP; use these features to unleash the true power of these systems.
Are you interested in VoIP for your business? At SE Telecom, we can design the right system to meet your needs and budget. Request a free demo today!