Why image is everything to stand out in 2018

Make 2018 the year you sharpen your image and rise above the competition

The drive towards digital and technological advancements in business continues to thrive and what better time to tweak some of the ways your business operates than at the beginning of a new year?

Companies are under increasing pressure to adapt to changing customer demands, and utilising new technologies is one of the easiest and most successful ways to achieve this.

However, with so much technology and platforms readily available for businesses to take advantage of in order to fulfil this, the playing field can remain relatively even. Therefore, the challenge can often be how you use your technology available at hand rather than solely what you use it for.

We look at how using new cloud based telecoms technologies to their full potential can help your business refine the image it presents, ensuring you make that immediate connection with customers and stand out from the competition.

Look the part, feel the part and make your customers believe you are the part

Whilst your overall website may be considered your primary shop window, it doesn’t necessarily build trust. This comes the contact details placed on your website, namely your number and address. If all that is there is an email address, it can leave doubt as to how much customers can trust you as well as how professional and established you are.

Customers want to know exactly which number to call you on and personal numbers – home and mobile – are far from ideal. They are personal numbers for a reason; you don’t just want anybody to be able to ring your home landline, whilst you don’t want to inadvertently take an important business call in a loud pub on a Friday night.

What’s more, mobile numbers are not cheap for customers to call. A low-cost, dedicated virtual landline number prevents any of this happening and gives your business a feel of permanence and establishment. Meanwhile, with the features you get inclusively it means you’re still free to take calls on your mobile wherever you are – but with options in place to prevent receiving any calls on those occasions you’re down the pub enjoying your weekend!

Use greetings messages as a way to automate part of your rapport building

Gaining the trust of your customers and building rapport go hand in hand with many basics attributed to achieving it, from delivering promises to keeping to commitments and meeting expectations.

But striking a chord with customers and making that connection can be achieved through a multitude of other ways, including simply setting up your stall correctly when it comes to how you present your business over the phone. After all, apart from perhaps your website, telephone is likely to be the most popular way for customers to reach out to you.

Taking advantage of the ability to play introductory greetings messages to callers, or when they’re placed on hold, gives you the opportunity to immediately set the tone and communicate to customers on a personal level. The same applies for your voicemail or out of hours routing greetings messages, whilst you can even use customised audio to communicate offers and promotions.

Seamlessly handle calls with professionalism

As the telephone is probably the most popular and convenient way for customers to reach you, it can pay off to consider the different ways you can handle different scenarios using clever features rather than settle for handling them as you would with a standard landline or mobile phone.

Whilst standard landlines and mobiles are fine for giving customers a medium through which you can simply answer their telephone enquiries, utilising newer and more modern systems allows you to go that extra bit further to ‘wow’ your customers.

One example of this is that if you’re already on a call and suddenly have another call waiting you can see exactly who is waiting on the second line, then easily switch between the calls within the click of a button. Likewise, tasks such as transferring calls to colleagues, automatically routing calls outside of operating hours or when you’re unavailable is equally as simple so you can impress clients.

Create a big business perception at small business affordability

One of the many benefits thanks to technological advancements is how they have levelled the playing field in terms of the services open to both big and small businesses, despite the gulf in budgets.

“For customer services, press one”; playing music to customers while they’re on hold; and teleconferencing – among many others. These are all features typically associated with large, corporate businesses. But now small businesses using cloud based telecoms systems can also take advantage – and at little to no extra cost.