Smart phone and comms choices for ambitious start-ups?

With so many options of mobile phone, traditional landlines and new Voice over IP (VoIP) services available for businesses, making the right choices can be difficult. And being easy to contact and presenting the right image are vital- especially when just starting out. Ian Philip, CEO at Anvil Mobile provides some hints and tips for better business communications:

Utilising local numbers to grow your business
While mobile phones have revolutionised business communications for people on the move, calling a mobile can be more expensive and an 07xxx number may give the impression that there is no substance behind the business and no indication of location. Many potential customers still prefer to look for an advertised local number to call.

You can divert a local BT number to your mobile, but the line rental and divert charges are expensive and return calls always display a mobile number. But now an existing 3G SIM card can be replaced with a new generation of SIM with one or more landline numbers directly assigned to it. This way, callers are charged only for calling a landline, voice quality is enhanced and the local number is displayed on the caller ID. In fact, some smart businesses that have advertised London, Birmingham and Manchester numbers, for example, have seen a rapid increase in revenues. This is ideal for internet retailers, for example – but not so good for geo-specific businesses.

Presenting a more professional image
Another way for businesses to present a more professional image and capture calls is to use an intelligent call management service. With a local number ported to the service, an auto attendant will answer in-coming calls and route them to the right mobile or fixed handset. It is possible to set up rules based on the day and time, while a ‘hunt group’ can be set up so each number is tried until the call is answered.

A further optional feature of the new generation of mobile services is call recording. Set to be always-on, this will capture a customer order, specific instructions or list of customer questions that may be difficult to write down while you are out and about. The full recording can be emailed automatically to a pre-set address as an attachment to action or forwarded to a colleague.

Broadband and VoIP
The next area of business comms that can be a minefield is choosing a broadband provider. In most cases, it’s true to say that you get what you pay for. Some low cost business packages look very inexpensive and attractive, but the service is variable if the connection at the exchange is shared by many others. When everyone else is busy on the internet, the capacity drops drastically and services such as broadband access or VoIP phones are disrupted or stop completely for a time. In addition, most contracts are for two years, so you must take into account potential business growth in that period.

Always ask a supplier what the ‘contention ratio’ is. This sounds complex, but it simply means how many other people will be sharing the connection to the internet at the exchange. If the answer is 50:1, that means one connection at the exchange shared by fifty people/businesses – so leave well alone. Also ask a potential supplier: “do you have access to the WLR3 portal?” In plain English this means that BT Openreach carries out all of the actual implementation of new lines and also does the troubleshooting for any faults that occur. A WLR3 portal gives a broadband supplier direct access into BT Openreach systems, so that orders and fault reporting can be accessed without going through a third party. It also lets the broadband provider see the status of orders and faults at a glance and makes a big difference to the quality and speed of service that you will receive.

We do not realise the full value of good business communications until something goes wrong, so making the right decisions from the outset will be a major factor in your success or failure. While it’s clear that technology opens up exciting new opportunities for budding businesses, it also makes it more confusing – so it’s well worth doing your homework first.

www.anvilmobile.com