Choosing a Virtual Receptionist Service: 5 Tips for Dazzling Call Answering
As growing businesses make the transition from small to medium-sized, many are finding that hiring a virtual receptionist service not only helps free up time for other projects, but it adds a whole new level of professionalism and customer service. A virtual receptionist is an off-site company that fields all of your phone calls and directs them to the appropriate channel.
Depending on the virtual receptionist service you choose, your call answering may be highly customizable. Some virtual receptionist services are even able to sound like they are in your office, just like an in-house receptionist. To get the most bang for your buck, consider these five preferences when setting up service:
1. Start with a great greeting
Typically, you’re able to personalize what your virtual receptionists will say when greeting callers. Try beginning with “Thank you for calling” or “Good Morning/Afternoon” and follow with your company name. Sprinkle in a “How may I help you?” or “How may I direct your call?” for good measure. The whole greeting should set a welcoming tone for the call: “Thank you for calling ABC Company. How may I help you?”
Bonus: If “Good Morning” sounds good to you, confirm with your service that no matter what time zone the virtual receptionists are in, they will answer with your time zone in mind.
2. Request helpful information from callers
Virtual receptionists can often gather certain information when taking a message or before transferring a call to you. Would knowing what company someone’s calling from or what the call is regarding make your life easier?
3. Pick your messaging preference
Each individual in the company may also be able to customize his or her own messaging procedure. Would you prefer written messages or voicemails? Or would you like the virtual receptionist to offer a choice between the two?
For example, salespeople may prefer to have the receptionist take down a short intake form from their callers (first and last name, how they heard about you, an email address, what services they’re interested in, etc.). That way, they’re able to make an informed return call, and the potential client has a chance to engage with the company.
4. Distinguish between types of calls
Just as you can set specifications for what information to collect before a call is transferred or when a message is taken, virtual receptionist services can also personalize call instructions based on the type of call. For instance, the virtual receptionist may only try your desk line for current clients but try your cell as well for new clients.
5. Ask about FYI messages
Your virtual receptionist service may be able to send you an email every time a caller is connected to voicemail or declines to leave a message. That way, you’ll know that they called whether or not a message is taken, and you can impress clients with a proactive offer of help!
With advanced software and savvy virtual receptionists on your side, there are lots of different ways to set up your phone answering. By customizing your call answering, you’ll be able to enhance your business’s image while increasing your productivity. There’s a great big virtual receptionist world out there – don’t be afraid to ask for what you want!
About the Author: Elizabeth Robinson writes for Ruby Receptionists, a live virtual receptionist service that provides call answering for businesses nationwide.
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Are You Flying High with Good Customer Service?
It was the first leg on a recent return home flight from Kansas City to San Diego that my ears perked up while sitting in seat 19B on a well-known airline. Read more
Get the Right CRM Software for your Business
There are a number of free online CRM packages available in the market today. If you are looking forward to taking your business to the next level it will make sense to invest some time and effort into a business contact management software. That does not mean that free software will solve all your problems. Read more
The Devil is in the Details
How do you get and keep customers? The most important question in business and one that companies spend billions of dollars trying to figure out. I am going to put forth a strategy that works and has worked for centuries: Pay close attention to details. Read more
Effective Greeting Card Marketing Techniques
You can be sure you’re reaching your target customers when you have effective greeting card marketing techniques in place.
Ensuring Your Greeting Cards are Reaching the Intended Audience
If you are a seller or developer of greeting cards you know it can be difficult to make sure that the cards you make reach their intended audience. There are so many different kinds of greeting cards out there and so many different companies manufacturing greeting cards that it can be difficult to be sure that your greeting cards are getting the recognition they deserve. How can you know whether or not you particular greeting cards are getting seen by the customers who are most likely to buy them? There is no one answer to this questions, but those who have been in the industry for years and those who have spent considerable time attempting to establish the connection between the greeting cards they manufacture and the consumers who most likely will purchase them, have found that the very best way to establish this relationship is to develop effective greeting card marketing techniques.
Match your Marketing Strategy with your Audience
There is no one “right way” to arrive at the effective greeting card marketing techniques that are going to work best for you and your employees. It is important to consider the different types of greeting cards that you manufacture. For one thing, if you are a particular company that creates and distributes a small array of cards with a small niche market, say, Christian inspirational cards, you will very likely focus your marketing on the already established Christian community. If, by contrast, your cards are humorous, irreverent and with an eye to young people, your strategy will be most successful if it targets this particular population by spending marketing dollars to increase visibility in the magazines, subway stations or other forums where young people are most likely to be. For cards with a wide range of consumers or a wide range of cards to choose from, they will most likely find that the best thing to do is to cast a wide net when attempting to determine a marketing strategy. Making yourself visible in a variety of areas including, a presence at major bookstores and gift shops, advertising in periodicals and online outlets strategies will yield growth by giving your products increased visibility.
Is an Outside Marketing Company Best for your Business?
It can seem overwhelming to consider all of the elements inherent in developing effective greeting card marketing techniques. Fortunately, this is not something that you will necessarily need to conquer alone. If your greeting card company is not large enough to retain a dedicated marketing department, it may make sense for your company to outsource some of the work involved with creating and developing these marketing techniques. For one thing, an external marketing agency has the advantage of years of experience where marketing is concerned, and can be supremely helpful in determining the exact route your company should take when attempting to differentiate itself from competitors, while still remaining an effective key player in the greeting card game. Most marketing agencies can come up with a plan of attack that can easily and effectively reach the right consumers, while remaining within the budgetary constraints you have laid out. This is a critical piece of the puzzle because in order to be effective, your strategy must be a cost-sustainable venture, as well as an innovative concept.
About the Author: Floras McLain is a freelance writer for assorted greeting cards. When she is not writing or blogging, she loves to dabble in marketing.
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3 Ways to Develop Quality Customer Service
Providing quality customer service should be a top priority for any business or service provider. Through open communication with staff members and by introducing and adopting a well designed training program, business owners or company managers will be in an ideal position to achieve this outcome.
Develop Customer Relationships
Nowadays, many business owners are aware that developing good customer relationships encourages customer loyalty and return business and is therefore a valuable attribute for enhancing the name, brand and reputation of their business. In simple terms, excellent customer service can be routinely applied by employees in any business or company if they are courteous, respectful, considerate, pleasant, helpful, reliable, efficient, friendly, responsive and punctual to name just a few. After all, one of the main objectives of most businesses and service providers is to deliver quality customer service, so if a customer leaves a business satisfied with the level of service provided, then the overall objective has been achieved.
Workplace Culture
Delivering customer service is a daily occurrence for many big and small enterprises, however to ensure consistency, a high standard of providing good customer service needs to be maintained and in time become second nature for employees during their interactions with customers or clients. It is also recognized that new employees who begin work in a workplace that has a culture of providing friendly helpful service will generally make an effort to maintain the same high standard. By maintaining a high standard of providing quality customer service is therefore the key because the reputation and overall success of a business can be tarnished very quickly by employees who either develop or have an overall poor customer service mindset.
Staff Training Program
Introducing a staff training program with professionally developed workplace modules that are designed to educate and train new employees (and if required current employees) is a scheme that could be introduced into any work environment. Such a strategy would then ensure all employees have the skills and know-how to effectively provide quality customer service. However, because service providers and many workplaces have different routines, functions and requirements when dealing with customers, such a program would need to be carefully designed and structured to suit the designated work environment.
About the Author: Brandon Walker is the creator of customer service skills, a website designed to provide helpful, informative advice to small and large business owners on how they can deliver exceptional customer service to their clients. You can read more of his customer service articles at his website: http://customerserviceskills.org.uk
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How to Find the Right Call Center Software
The call center can be the nerve center of a customer service program. It is involved in handling all customer calls including complaints, orders and other communication from the customer to the business.
It is of the utmost importance that every due diligence is taken to make sure that the client is left feeling satisfied with the experience of communicating with your customer service department. In most cases, this will start with having the right call center software.
The secret to a good inbound call center is making sure that all calls are connected smoothly and to the right people. This can be accomplished by having the right software for your business. In order to make sure that you are getting the software that you need for your business, it is important to go through a few steps. You will have to first determine what your needs are. Next you will need to look at the different kinds of software and what they have to offer you. Last you will have to worry about implementation of the software into your business. If done correctly, the new software will mean an increase in guest satisfaction with every call.
Analyzing Your Needs
Before you can do anything with call center software, you will have to analyze exactly what it is your call center needs. Take a look at how many agents you have working in your telephone answering service. You will also need to pay attention to the manner in which your company is contacted. Even the volume of connections being made each day will weigh heavily in making a decision about which software is right for your company. Make sure to choose the one which will make it easy for all of your agents to make the right connections with your customers.
Considering the Software
Any time you use call center software, the idea is to make it possible to route calls to agents faster and to make sure that your phone systems are able to be integrated into the system. While most software these days is made to be used with a VoIP service, it is important to make sure that the software you are considering will integrate with your system. You should also consider whether you want for the software to be in your location or if you would rather have your call center routed from a hosted location to avoid the hassle of computer crashes or server mishaps.
Implementing the New Software
Once you have chosen your new software, it is time to use it. Perhaps it is a good idea to have a few of your top agents use the software before you purchase it. Most companies will offer a free live demo or a trial period for your call center. If you intend on using either one of these, ask ahead. While many companies do offer them, you do not want to find out too late that the software you are considering does not allow you to test it out first.
About the Author: Resource Nation provides free tools, tips, and purchasing advice for business owners and entrepreneurs in over 100 business categories ranging from inbound call centers to credit card processing. Whether it’s connecting businesses with local and national pre-screened vendors, or offering easy service comparisons on a telephone answering service, Resource Nation empowers business decision makers by providing the information they need to make smart choices.
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The Legitimacy of an MBA Online
One of the biggest concerns for prospective students is the legitimacy of an MBA degree online. Nothing could be worse than spending your finances, time and effort on obtaining an MBA online just to have it dismissed as an illegitimate degree by prospective employers.
Survey Says
In a 2001 Vault survey conducted to gauge the general perception of online degrees versus traditional degrees, 61% of the participants rated online degrees as having less credibility than traditional degrees but still being generally acceptable.
Such a lukewarm response may put certain doubt in your mind about the legitimacy of an MBA online. However, genuine online MBA programs are now held to high educational standards to provide new business students and experienced professionals looking to boost their careers with legitimate online MBA degrees respected by employers and recruiters alike.
How MBA Online Programs Become Legitimate
Employers conduct job position interviews and sift through countless resumes to check the legitimacy and accreditations of prospective employees. They want to know who you are, where you’ve been educated and who can vouch for you. Online institutions require the same type of accreditation in order to be considered a serious and genuine MBA degree program.
Institute accreditation is achieved with the help of third party agencies who effectively investigate the program’s education and business processes before the organization can become accredited. Naturally, it’s easy to think that an online MBA program could become accredited under false pretenses by simply hiring an accrediting organization to give them the rubber stamp of approval. The truth is that accreditation mills, who offer accredited status for a mere fee, are as common and worthless as online degree mills.
The prevalence of degree and accreditation mills online makes the task of finding a legitimate MBA online program that much harder. However, there are genuine accrediting agencies and organizations that strive to improve the legitimacy of online degree programs.
Genuine Accrediting Agencies
The Council for Higher Education Accreditation (CHEA) is the leading US based organization. The council is essentially designed to recognize the highest quality accrediting agencies available. They keep track of approximately 60 accrediting organizations, including the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business (AACSB) – a highly regarded accrediting agent for business schools.
There are over 500 accredited members in AACSB and over 18,700 programs that hold recognition from CHEA’s rigorous standards or the US’ Department of Education so there is no shortage of legitimate online institutions to choose from.
Most importantly though is the fact that online only MBA programs are quickly being joined by long established traditional universities interested in offering their MBA programs online. Universities such as Duke, East Carolina, Texas A&M, Houston Victoria, Oklahoma State and several others all operate online MBA programs and there is little doubt about their legitimacy and reputation.
How the Job Market Views Online MBAs
Online MBA programs have made leaps and bounds over the past decade but receiving an MBA degree through distance learning or online programs is not universally accepted in the business world.
Top tier business sectors such as venture capitalist, hedge funds and other Fortune 500-centric fields still give priority to MBA degrees obtained from full time in-residence at a renown university. Human resources departments for business specific companies will know whether an MBA degree comes from a traditional MBA program or an online program and may readily prefer the former.
However, this leaves plenty of job sectors and opportunities where legitimate online MBA programs are looked upon as solid career building tools. According to a Vault’s 2001 study on online degrees, job industries embedded into the online world such as Internet media, information technology and high-tech sectors have much greater acceptance ratings for online degrees like an MBA when compared to the more traditional medicine, law and marketing industries.
The Choice is Yours
Ultimately, the true legitimacy of an MBA online depends on how serious you are about obtaining a quality level of education that carries academic prestige. Top tier accreditation agencies for business degrees make sure that your online MBA is worth its financial value and won’t be dismissed by employers and recruiters who truly know the difference between legitimate online MBAs and phony degrees.
About the Author: This article was written by Anthony Benedict who helps run and maintain OnlineMBA.com, which is a website that directs people to the best ways of obtaining an MBA on the internet
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5 Essential Things You Need to Know About SEO to Have an Effective Website
SEO, or Search Engine Optimization, is a hot topic right now. Everyone is wondering how to get a website to “rank”, to be one of the top results when someone enters a term in a search engine. Most small businesses need a web presence of some kind. A healthy web presence is essential so that your customers or potential customers can find you. The higher you rank, the easier you are to find (people really just don’t scroll down past the top results!).
SEO can be complicated, but understanding these essential truths about SEO will go a long way to helping you to maximize your website for search.
#1: You Can’t Trick the Algorithm, Google is Smarter than you
Search Engine Optimization is a collection of strategies designed to help you to rank higher in searches. SEO strategies are usually divided into two categories; White hat, or good strategies which can take a long time and are based on understanding how people search, and Black hat, or strategies which attempt to trick or manipulate search engines. Black Hat strategies, in addition to being shady and dubious, also DON’T WORK. If an idea seems sneaky, or too good to be true, or in any way dishonest, then don’t bother. Such strategies include: hiding superflous keywords in white text (so they aren’t visible to the naked eye), link farms, link exchanges, anything that you don’t earn by providing a quality product or content. Not only is Google smart enough not to give you credit for these sneaky tactics, this kind of behavior can actually get you banned on google, which means your website wont show up at all.
#2: Pick Good Keywords
Choosing SEO keywords is all about understanding how people search. Imagine I am someone who wants to find you. What would I enter in a search box if I was looking for you? Imagine a circumstance where I am looking for something, find your website and then become completely ecstatic that I found you… What keywords would I have entered? Understanding how people search is the heart of white hat SEO. Your keywords are the root of that understanding. Using only your keywords, could people understand what your mission is/what your business does? SEO is all about helping people find you, and knowing what they are searching for is the first step for SEO.
#3: On Page Optimization requires a professional web designer
Any tactic worth doing is worth doing right. SEO On page factors are those factors that live on your website which you can control. Things like meta tags, URL structure, site directory navigation, and anchor text. If you don’t know what these things are, you are not alone. These are not simple, do it yourself, concepts to implement in a web page design. There is a reason that people go to school and get degrees in computer science and engineering to be able to build websites. Get a professional to set up your site so that it’s done right, the first time.
#4: The most important place to put your keywords is in the title in the <head> tag
In fact, this may be the most important text on your entire website. If you don’t know what this means, see #3 above.
#5: At the end of the day, SEO is all about inbound links
When you talk about search engine optimization it’s important to understand that the Search Engines like Google, Yahoo and Bing want to provide the searcher with the best results for their search query.
That’s their business. And how they compete is by providing people who search for them with the best possible results for their search.
How do they decide who’s site is “the best”? Google was created by two Stanford grad students. They based their evaluation of websites on the same structure that thesis papers are evaluated.
Let’s say 2 people write graduate theses on the same subject. One get’s referenced/cited (essentially “linked back to”) 1,000 times and the second is referenced 10,000 times, who’s is the best? The obvious answer is the second one. The one referenced the most is better, more relevant, higher quality etc. The foundation of most search engines is the idea that the one gets referenced or on the internet, linked back to, more is “better” and should therefore rank higher for that search term. Now that you have your keywords, you need to focus on getting inbound links. The more links the higher you will rank.
But not all links are created equal. What you really want are links which point from that keyword to your website. This is quite possibly the most important step people miss when they start looking for links. If possible you want that outreach to get you a link that looks like this: accounting software… not this: Workingpoint (you should hopefully already rank for your own name!).
With these 5 essential pieces of knowledge, you should be ready to start thinking about developing an SEO strategy for your website. SEO doesn’t produce overnight results, but when done right, can be an important and cost effective alternative to pay per click advertising.
About the Author: Dena Stern is the Community Resources and Marketing Manager at WorkingPoint, a financial accounting tool for Small Businesses. She is responsible for community outreach and is a frequent contributor on the subject of technology trends, social media, SEO and marketing on the WorkingPoint Blog.
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The 5 Major Pitfalls of Business Start-Ups and How to Overcome
Entrepreneurship demands the ability to understand, appropriate and make use of risk. Successful entrepreneurs are those men and women who can develop a gut feeling, hunch, instinct or curiosity into a tangible project. Among the obstacles facing entrepreneurs, one must include self-doubt, hesitation and the inability to make wise decisions. New entrepreneurs in particular can be faced with a particularly powerful kind of doubt, one that suggests that an entrepreneurial idea “cannot be done”.
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An entrepreneur must engage in intelligent, proactive risk-taking in order to succeed in a new start-up. Paying attention to the process involved is crucial, and this article explains five major pitfalls and how to overcome.
1. Failure to Transform an Idea into a Sound Business Plan
Entrepreneurial success begins with two key factors: a good idea and its subsequent development. However, having a good or unique idea is not enough to form an entire business or launch a project. Your idea must be analyzed for its weaknesses, its strengths, and how it will unfurl into a marketable and potentially profitable project.
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For this to happen, you must transform your idea into a disciplined and thoughtful business plan. Your business plan outlines the execution of your idea. It takes the abstract aspects of an idea and transforms them into something tangible. Your business plan must include a cost analysis, a timeline of potential growth with various benchmarks, the expertise required to launch your project, and an analysis of the risks involved.
2. Failure to Overcome Fear
Fear is healthy and understandable but do not let it cripple your potential success. The obstacles you face are not yet mistakes! They are simply challenges.
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For young entrepreneurs, facing the rounds of self-doubt can be particularly daunting. Consider your status as a uniquely affirmative one: you are a maverick and not a wallflower. Act as such and you will start to believe it.
3. Failure to Find the Right Mentors
As you create a business plan and conquer self-doubt, be sure to surround yourself with people who complement and enhance your project. You cannot accomplish everything on your own. Recognize where your expertise lies and where it does not and form alliances with those who add what you do not have. This can include hiring experts in finance, negotiation, marketing, business strategy, law and tax. Engage such experts from the start to optimize your project’s potential.
4. Underperforming by Over Committing
Part of recognizing where your expertise lies involves recognizing what you can and cannot do in terms of personal resources, time and effort. As a new business owner you may also have an active family life, which may include raising children, running a household and holding down a job. These responsibilities will not lessen. Understand early on how to balance entrepreneurship with the rest of your life, or else both your project and your family life will suffer.
5. Overexposure
Whether male or female, first-time entrepreneurs run the risk of encountering untrustworthy individuals who are prepared to rob you. In your business start up you may face additional hazards because some may assume that you are a novice when it comes to business negotiation. Careful preparation of your business plan and your projected capacity for work and growth should help limit your exposure to swindles and scams. However, taking a small amount of time each week and reviewing the trust you have invested in certain people, companies, facilities and practices is crucial. Do this on your own or with your most trusted advisor. The key is to weigh the risk you are taking when dealing with any person or company.
About the Author: Alex Papa is an investor and owner of several offline and online businesses. He often helps people find new business ideas, build their own small businesses and enjoy the lifestyle they desire. In his blog he also offers a business start-up audio CD course and the latest Norton 360 Coupon Code.
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