4 Ways to Get the Most Out of Business Voicemail

When somebody calls your business—much less leaves you voicemail—you know they are eager to reach you. With more customers using email and even social media for their business interactions, calls are sometimes reserved for the most critical or urgent of communications, says Tim Singleton, president of Strive Technology Consulting in Denver.

“Given today’s culture, if someone takes the time to call and leave me a voicemail, I know that it’s probably something important,” he says.

On the flip side, this age of instant access has trained customers to expect near-immediate responses to their messages, regardless of how they were delivered. That means it’s critical that businesses find ways to check and manage their voicemails efficiently and ensure no important messages fall through the cracks.

Thankfully, today’s leading business voicemail platforms are much more than digital answering machines, Singleton says. Advanced voicemail systems such as Spectrum Business Voice can help you manage your time and your business more efficiently, boosting productivity and profits. Here are four ways to maximize business voicemail:

1. Send all voicemails to email

A full voicemail box triggers two major headaches. First, you have to listen to all your messages in the order in which they come in—so it’s nearly impossible to prioritize them. Second, once you delete a voicemail from the system, that communication is gone forever. A platform that can automatically send voicemails to your email solves both of those dilemmas.

For one, by getting audio files of all the voicemails sent to your inbox, you can access your voicemails quickly from wherever you happen to be. Moreover, you can store important voicemails on your device or computer even if you delete them from your phone system.

2. Automatically forward voicemails to other people

If you can’t always respond to your voicemails quickly, make sure that someone else in your organization can. Look for a voicemail platform that allows you to automatically forward emails of all your voicemails to other people—ensuring someone can receive and respond to them promptly.

3. Check voicemail from multiple devices

Dialing into your voicemail box from your office phone is probably not always convenient, or even possible. So, make sure your voicemail portal lets you access your messages through a desktop, laptop or smart device—and provides the same functionality as your office phone by using the device’s microphone and speakers.

You can scroll through messages, read the transcriptions or listen to the message itself; save it or delete it; or forward it to someone else (with or without a personal message attached).

4. Improve your customer relations

For many professionals, whether lawyers, accountants or financial advisors, keeping a complete record of all client interactions is critical to operations. Moreover, such recordkeeping can help many different types of businesses improve their customer relations.

Converting voicemails to emails provides far better documentation than simply making a note of calls in client files. Those archived emails can be pulled out years down the road, long after the details of that message have faded from memory.

In a time when much of our communication has been reduced to hashtags and memes, hearing someone’s voice can have dynamic impact. Make sure to choose a phone system and provider that allows you to maximize your voice interactions with your customers and other callers.

Spectrum Business Voice offers more than 35 advanced business calling features, as well as many advanced voicemail capabilities, at a low monthly rate of $19.99. Learn more about our business voice services by contacting us at 855-299-9353.