Every entrepreneur is asking themselves what should a business expect from 2021? Overcoming the Coronavirus crisis largely depends on how people behave, including how they handle their workflow. Senior executives have to make a decision either to bring employees back to the office or to continue allowing telecommuting. But regardless of what wins in the battle of remote vs. office work, VoIP is indispensable for building strong business communications.
2021 Business Trends
The outbreak of COVID-19 shifted the focus of business by demonstrating the need for changes in corporate culture. Earlier skepticism about remote work disappeared as this new style of work proved its effectiveness. This pushed forward new tendencies of the job market:
- Active digital transformation of infrastructure;
- Outstaffing and remote cooperation increase;
- Decrease in the influence of the physical location of the office on the brand's position.
All these trends are united by the single need companies now have: to have a flexible structure for the customer and team communication that is easy to configure, that is not tied to location. And IP telephony is the solution.
Let's see how IP telephony can help a business to adapt in 2021.
Why VoIP suits any style of work?
No location restriction
Leasing emptied offices during the quarantine is a big hole in the company's budget, in addition to the costs of the transition to remote work. But companies that already had transitioned to VoIP have it easier.
Even a single virtual number can be collectively used by employees, whether they work at home or back at the office. It's enough to set up call forwarding in a way that allows receiving calls on office equipment or personal laptop or smartphone.
The main issue of offices with analog corporate telephony is lack of mobility. Changing network, adding new users requires involving phone network technicians. It's inconvenient, especially with remote work. But with VoIP, you can configure the corporate telephone network remotely. And costs for telephony will decrease because you won't need any telephone wires, only Internet, a virtual number for your company, and virtual PBX for call forwarding.
A simple softphone (an app for calls) installed on an office or home computer will be enough to communicate with your colleagues or customers. Your employees will be able to work from anywhere, quickly adapting to circumstances.
The simplicity of group communication
How to plan and distribute tasks if everyone or a part of the employees are in different cities? Why, online, of course. You don't have to necessarily use Zoom or similar apps. When you have a virtual PBX, you won't feel a difference between being remote vs. in-office because you can just use conference calls to get everyone on the same page in a group call.
Easy productivity tracking
A lot of managers showed an increase in productivity while working from home during the first half of quarantine. It's easier to figure out why if you use statistics. VoIP services from Freezvon will give you the full information about how many inquiries from customers you get, call duration, missed calls. Analyzing this data, as well as call recordings, you will find out how your best agents do their job and implement the practice among the rest of the team.
Real-time customer request monitoring
If your agents work by the standard schedule until 6 or 8 p.m., you're risking losing an active part of customers who prefer a later time for shopping. VoIP can gather information about real customer requests with the help of widgets such as Click to Call and Callback and with voicemail. After reviewing these requests and missed calls, you will know if a pique of activity goes outside your business hours, and if you need to use call forwarding to a manager on duty, so they will be able to process orders from home.
Increasing customer traffic
In this new market, customer support gets a bigger role. Customer managers need to process online requests more and more. If you don't have your telephony up and running, you're losing money. Just one virtual number can contribute to the constant influx of customers, and it will be easy to scale up by connecting new managers in your office or remotely.
You can benefit from such VoIP tools as widgets Click to call and Callback to make it easier for customers to contact your company. And because the system will record all the missed calls, then your agents can process them too, not missing any leads and making new deals.
Dedicated account manager for your customers
Use a little bit of personal touch and offer a dedicated account manager for your customer. This will help you to build more loyalty and trust between you and your customer. If any difficulties arise, customers will know they can quickly get assistance from a specialist they familiar with.
It's very easy to implement with VoIP:
- set up a VoIP number in your virtual PBX;
- add extensions for your managers;
- configure an IVR menu, so a customer could dial the extension number and quickly redirect their call to the dedicated account manager.
Thanks to VoIP, your managers can support your clients both from the office and from home, if they need to work remotely.
Additional ways to cut the costs
Remote vs. the office is not a simple choice for various reasons, but at least you don't have to worry much about the difference in costs for telephony. Just use VoIP in both cases. Compared to analog networks, VoIP is built using cloud technology, and you can be ready to work from any place you choose. It's convenient to use free SIP apps for calls on your office desktop or a laptop if you work from home. All communication your employees will make through a virtual number. An employee won't have to personally settle the cellphone bill and wait for the company's compensation. And a supervisor can track how much time or money a particular agent spends on customers, and how does it compare to their results. The most productive employees deserve recognition.
How to switch corporate telephone communication to VoIP in less than a week
Setting up VoIP doesn't require a long wait. Freezvon sets up virtual phone numbers and additional services within a few days, and it's already ready to use. With virtual PBX you will have an easier time configuring different scenarios for call forwarding and getting remote access to the communication system for all your office and remote employees. If you are getting ready to get back to work, then VoIP will help you do it quickly, without loss of time and contact with your customers.
