Published on October 8th, 2015 | by Guest

Should you hire an answering service?

If you have been considering hiring a telephone answering service for your business but aren’t sure if it’s the right move for you, ask yourself this: Are you able to answer each and every call that comes into your business personally, or do you have a staff member who can do this? Are you comfortable with potentially losing business form callers who don’t get a personal answer and never call back? If you answered “no” to these questions, you should definitely consider getting a telephone answering service.

Thanks to advances in technology in recent years, most of us aren’t necessarily tied to working a 9 to 5 day anymore. Many people telecommute, and many companies have employees, clients and even colleagues who are located around the world. Although that opens up a world of possibility for a global marketplace, it also poses some logistical challenges. It’s possible to have clients calling during their work day, which may be the middle of the night where your company is located. Sure, they could leave a message, but many potential customers won’t bother leaving a message and, in many cases, they will move on and give their business to another company who can offer personal service 24 hours a day. Those companies almost certainly have an answering service.

Using the services of an outsourced call centre can benefit your company in several different ways. Here is a discussion of some of the best reasons why companies use this service.

It’ll save you money

Let’s say you decide to forego the idea of an outside call centre in favour of employing dedicated call agents yourself, to work onsite. If you do that, you’ll have to spend the money to advertise for the position, recruit applicants, train them, etc. Once you hire someone, you’ll have to pay their salary, bonuses, benefits, etc. With a dedicated call answering service, all you have to do is pay the call centre service a flat fee and they take care of the rest.

It will help keep your customer service standards high

Customer service and personal attention is a big plus for any business. The reality is, however, that as a business grows it’s sometimes quite difficult to keep pace with the growing number of calls. An answering service can help you keep up with your increasing call volume.

Speaking of call volume, there will invariably be rises and falls in your call volume every once in a while. For example, if your business is seasonal, you probably won’t receive as many calls in your off-season as you do during peak times. On the flip side of that, if you are running a sale or promotion, with any luck you’ll receive an influx of calls. Why not use an answering service during those busy times? In the off-season you can save money by handling the lower call volume in house.

Tags: answering, business, call centre, customer, customer service, hire, service, telephone