Sales
Why Your Business Needs A Dedicated Business Number
Operating with a genuine business telephone number just makes sense. Not only will the dedicated business number improve customer perception, but it also is necessary for attracting more sales inquiries.
Also, more reasons to use a dedicated business number include staff professionalism, personal privacy, security, and protection from opportunistic scammers.
If you haven’t considered the negative implications of using your personal mobile phone or home telephone number for business calls, keep reading this article.
Plus, if you think it’s too late to switch numbers now – wrong. It’s never too late to change your contact details online and on your marketing material.
Why Use A Business Number?
Let’s find the top reasons to switch to a dedicated business number.
Privacy and Security
Your personal privacy and security and that of your staff should be your top priority. One action you can take is to have a business number, so your personal phone numbers are just for your family, friends, associates, and service providers.
When your personal home or mobile number is on your site, social media profiles, Google Business profile, and online directories, you have no idea who may be calling you.
Scammers are out in full force attempting to part you from your money, and once they have your personal numbers, they can contact you with all sorts of scams to gleam information from you that they will use at some stage to either impersonate you or steal your identity.
Only give your personal number to people you know and trust. Use a business number – which can be ported to your home phone line and mobile for business calls.
Customer Perception Of Your Business
With a business number, whoever answers the phone knows it’s a business call, and they will respond professionally. When you use your personal number, you will likely be caught out answering the call too casually, leaving a negative impression on the caller, who may be a prospective customer.
Marketing And Advertising Campaigns
With marketing initiatives able to reach large audiences, that’s a lot of strangers with your personal number. Most marketing is now digital and online. The contact channels are email, site messaging, and live chat. However, some people still want to make a live call to a real person!
Answer inbound calls from anywhere
With a business telephone number, you don’t have to be tied to a fixed-line connection, as used to be the case. Instead, you can have your business number redirect calls to any number you like.
Importantly, this happens without the caller realizing they’re being transferred or causing unwanted delays. As such, you can have your calls answered in your office, on your home number, or with your mobile phone as you see fit.
Generate More Sales
According to Cleartone Communications, a leading supplier of business telephone numbers, opting for a business number will result in more phone calls.
Calling a business number is cheaper
If your mobile number is the one you’re using for sales inquiries, you may want to change it as soon as possible to attract more sales inquiries.
There will also be no inconvenience either as the business number calls can be set up to transfer to your mobile phone service. 🙂
A lo-call or freephone number is even better than a standard business number. When the call is free, customers will use it! Just imagine if you can generate three times as many sales inquiries by phone as you would – how would that improve your sales?
Provide Callers With Additional Services
Plus, there are a few features you can use to keep your business callers delighted with the service, including
- Music on hold
- Business WhatsApp integration
- Missed call alerts
- Business voicemail services
Choosing A Business Number
Therefore switching to a dedicated business number will improve sales inquiries and provide personal privacy, among other benefits. Let’s look at how to choose a business number.
Make it memorable
One of the essential aspects of publishing a business number – as opposed to a home telephone number or a mobile number – is that it should be more memorable.
If you want people to recognize your business and associate it with a professional service, then a memorable business telephone number will make all the difference.
Bear in mind that buying a business number for your company is one of the simplest and most cost-effective ways you have to improve the sense of professionalism you will convey at first meetings and when people check out your website.
Get the correct local area code
Not all business telephone numbers use a local area code. For example, an 0800 number has no geographical association and would work well for a firm that operates regionally or nationally.
However, firms that work primarily in one town or city can benefit from a local area code. For example, in the UK, your number would have the prefix 029 for Cardiff or 0161 for Manchester.
Even better, you can obtain a local area code for your business number even if you don’t have offices in the city. So, for instance, if you’d like to obtain an 0207 number for London, you can have it!