Planning Telecoms and Data for Small Businesses - 1

If you are starting a Small Business you will need to bear in mind the following:

1. Will you have Fixed Offices, with Staff, or will you work from home or be mobile?
2. What is the cost to your business of missing Calls or Emails?
3. How important are Calls and Emails to your business - ie. will it be New Business Customers calling/Emailing, will it be Customer Support Calls, or do you win business in some other way?
4. Do you need to have a local presence ie. Local Telephone number, to win Local Business
5. Do you want to appear to be a larger National Company by having a National Rate number?
6. Do you need to have Out of Hours answering, or can you simply contact Callers back the next day?
7. Will you be getting many calls from Overseas customers in different time zones?
8. Do you have the skills and the time to manage Telecom and Data systems in house, or do you need to buy them in?

If you have Fixed Manned Offices and they are Serviced, then Telecoms and Data may be part of the package, and this is a good low cost option initially - however you are likely to find them restrictive or of poor quality in the longer term. It is VITALLY important that you contact your own offices frequently as a "Mystery Shopper" - this is the experience new customers have of your company, and if it is poor, you won't win their business! They will quickly look elsewhere.

It is much more important to have good internal procedures and training than the latest gadgets! A good concept is that all phone calls must be answered within 3 rings, by any member of staff - they know calls are usually answered by Reception, so if the phones keep ringing, Reception must be busy, so PICK UP THE PHONE! Its not Rocket Science!

Emails are often forgotten about, but they are a vital source of new business if your company has a website, or on-line trading presence. Again good internal discipline is required to make sure all email enquiries are handled quickly and properly - and for goodness sake dont forget Holiday cover........... there is nothing worse than having to answer a hot sales enquiry 2 weeks late because you went on holiday, it is such a wasted opportunity.

So what alternatives do you have to choose from?

1. Buy a phone system, data switch, firewall and email server, learn how to manage them properly, test them frequently, keep them secure and up to date - ideal for IT Literate Companies that have several PC's in their offices.
2. Rent the phone system functions you need from a Hosted Telecoms Service provider and use Hosted Applications accessible via Web Browser - Better for lesser skilled or time poor Companies.
3. Use an outsourced Answering Service to handle your Telecoms and use a Hosted Service for Emails - ideal for small mobile Companies, that dont want to be breaking off every 5 minutes to answer calls.
4. Rent serviced offices that supply Telecoms and Email services - simple but can be expensive.