virtual number Archives - GlobalVirtualNumbers Blog

Virtual Numbers Call Forwarding for Small Businesses

On days when you work from home, you can switch the ring to number to your home phone line.

Companies have long used international virtual numbers to appear local in markets where they lack a physical location.

They do this by establishing a local virtual phone number and then using call forwarding to route those calls to a call center located internationally.

For example, a caller in Savannah, Georgia might dial what appears to be a local number, yet the call will ring to a call center located in some other city, or country for that matter.

As a small business owner, you can use call forwarding in a similar fashion. For example, if your ideal clients are located in New York City but you’re in Los Angeles, you could order and publish a New York City virtual number and then instantly divert those calls to your LA office. Your clients and prospects do not necessarily need to know that you’re on the other coast.

Establishing a local phone presence with virtual numbers

In addition to establishing a local presence elsewhere, many business professionals use call forwarding to ensure that they never miss a call despite frequent travel. While you could use your cellphone to ensure this, you may not want your customers, prospects, and colleagues to have your cellphone number directly. By using call forwarding, you can control when and where you’ll receive calls.

For example, you could order an 800 or local phone number and set up call forwarding to your main office line. On days when you work from home, you can switch the ring to number to your home phone line. When traveling on business, you could forward your calls to your cellphone or hotel room.

By using call forwarding in this manner, you can be reached wherever you are without having to give out your private phone numbers. In addition, should you move your office, you will not need to change your business cards, stationary, and advertising materials. Simply change your ring to number.

Global call forwarding using Virtual Numbers is a flexible tool that allows for localization and portability. It’s an affordable option that works beautifully for international, domestic, big and small businesses alike that do business globally but need to be accessible locally.

More….

Virtual Phone Numbers as a business tool

Some companies use virtual numbers to expand their presence by adding additional local phone numbers in other cities or additional states. For example, a California company may have a main office location in San Jose but they have customers in Los Angeles, San Diego and Sacramento.

Whenever you browse the Web or watch a TV commercial, or listen to a radio, no doubt you will be asked to call a phone number by a sponser.

They all utilize virtual phone numbers. Of course not all virtual numbers are used for advertizing products and services.

The numbers you see and hear in the media are typically diverted to landlines or a mobile phone number. Many possible uses of a virtual phone number include a virtual office in a remote location, IT support, and international virtual numbers are used by businesses located in any country to create easy access by their customers or potential customers.

Where do you want a Virtual Phone Number

Most of the time a virtual number is acquired in an city or country other than where the office is physically located. This is one of the high value aspects of virtual phone numbers for businesses, the ability to provide a phone number in a locale where the enterprise wants to do business by offering a ‘local’ number even though the real office can be on the other side of the planet.

Adding additional virtual numbers creates a phone presence in remote areas of interest without adding a physical office or staff.

Learn more about virtual numbers….

The Virtual Number Solution

Companies of any size can benefit from a virtual number. In fact, a toll free number can help a business compete by taking long distance charges out of the equation and adding credibility.

A web site needs more than a local contact phone number. It does not help the customer that wants to talk to a representative before they order a service or sign up online if they are located overseas.

The solution is to remove the international calling obstacle that your customers need to overcome to simply gain a comfort level with your company and know that you are sincerely interested in assisting them.

Companies of any size can benefit from a virtual number. In fact, a toll free number can help a business compete by taking long distance charges out of the equation and adding credibility.

With economical per minute rates, you may want to get a virtual number for your web site so visitors can call from the country where you do the most business.

View details….

Expand your Brand Internationally

Many companies already market products or services internationally and have established a customer base overseas.

How do new customers discover your company? No doubt by doing a search on the Web.

When they get to your website, is it easy for them to make contact by phone? As much as we all seem to like chat and email, many customers want to actually speak to a human before they order a new service or product.

Many companies already market products or services internationally and have
established a customer base overseas. While some enterprises wish to target specific new
markets.

The easiest approach and also the most cost effective, is to enable a
virtual phone number in your target country. A virtual number will divert calls from a country to your office location in any other country.

For example, you may be a software company located in the UK, however your company
may desire to offer your products in Brazil. If you created a Brazil virtual
number, the Brazil customer can dial a familiar phone number in Brazil and
connect immediately to your UK office.

What you have effectively done is created a local Brazil phone presence quickly and easily without the expense of staffing and building a brick and mortar office in Brazil.

View details…

Customer Account Management

Virtual Number customers can easily manage their account including changing account settings, adding additional services, start up or modify advanced features, change the ring-to number, modify call forwarding preferences, view invoices and call details– including caller ID, date, time and call duration.

Customers can access account anytime from any web enabled computer.

Customized Greeting for your Virtual Number

For example, if you record ‘Welcome to Innovative Solutions, please wait while we connect your call’, then this message will be played right after a caller dials your local or toll free number. It will also play if you have your virtual number on ‘do not disturb’.

Create a Custom Greeting for your Virtual Number

The customer can use their own phone to record a personalized gtreeting that a caller will hear.

You have the option to replace the default greeting with your own a custom greeting. Some customer simply use their own phone and record a message to be heard by callers. Other users opt to upload a studio produced custom message to their account.

Whenever someone dials your local or toll free number they will listen to your custom greeting message while the system connects the call. For example, if you record ‘Welcome to Innovative Solutions, please wait while we connect your call’, then this message will be played right after a caller dials your local or toll free number. It will also play if you have your virtual number on ‘do not disturb’.

The benefits are many when you provide a personal greeting versus a generic greeting that sounds like everyone elses.

View details….

Selective Country Call Divert

Your call centers are in different time zones and also have certain language capabilities.

A useful feature, selective call divert. For example, let assume you have multiple call centers in an assorment of countries. Your call centers are in different time zones and also have certain language capabilities.

You could use this feature to automatically divert the calls based on their country origination and route those calls to a specific call center or on-duty call center that speaks the same language as the country of call origination.

Learn more about features…

Voicemail to Email

Alternatively, if you need to retreive your messages by phone instead of by email, simply dial your Virtual Number, enter (*) key and go to your voice mail menu and listen to your messages by phone.

Simply enable the Voicemail to Email feature through your account dashboard preferences.

Your ‘Voicemail’ will answer with your personal greeting. If you prefer not to answer any calls, you can optionally enable the ‘Do Not Disturb’ feature. This automatically directs all calls to your voicemail.

You can easily set-up your voice mails to be forwarded to your email address. When a voicemail is received, the email notification will be automatically sent along with the audio file of the voice message. You can simply click on the audio icon and listen to your voicemail message.

Alternatively, if you need to retreive your messages by phone instead of by email, simply dial your Virtual Number, enter (*) key and go to your voice mail menu and listen to your messages by phone.

Learn more

International Call Forwarding and Virtual Numbers a Closer Look

Similar to the planning associated with a new physical office, if one were included in a company expansion plan, a virtual phone number also needs to be planned carefully even though there is no brick and mortar.

Most already successful enterprises and probably most start-up ventures will agree that acheiving growth in new international markets is mandatory for revenue expansion by increasing a global corporate footprint.

Global call forwarding makes it possible to expand into a new international locale without a physical presence.

Below are some tips on how to create a virtual phone presence in another country.

Why use virtual numbers or international call forwarding in the first place

That’s easy. For example you have an existing customer base or want to have a customer base in country ‘A’ but your corporate location is in country ‘B’. Your potential customer in country ‘A’ must place an international phone call to reach someone at your company in counry ‘B’. That is a sales obstacle -the international phone call. They would much rather make a local call inside their country to contact your company sales or service departments.

Choosing a virtual number

Where are your international callers?

The main purpose would be to set up a virtual number in a country where you want to market your product or service. You would of course need to know if your potential customers have access to a payment method that is compatible with the type of you accept, or would you need to expand your resources to accommodate the new country? This includes any new shipping requirements that might need to be addressed if shipping a product overseas.

Call Routing

With today’s call routing technologies, it’s possible to have calls terminating to your call center between certain times of the day or night. And then to a different termination number at a different time period. You can even have calls forwarding to different cou

ntries automatically based on call origination number. So if you have a France virtual number, the inbound call would be identified as such and then could be diverted to a French speaking call center.

Call Quality

Call forwarding call quality is all over the map. Companies that are just getting their feet wet with the whole idea of a virtual number might try and look for the cheapest rates. And why not? no one likes to overpay.

But with virtual numbers, it’s the quality of the network that matters. If going for the lowest rate means getting mediocre call quality, then does that not defeat the purpose of setting up a virtual number in the first place? In other words, if you go to the extent of subscribing for a virtual number in another country, do you really want to focus on rates but not quality connections? You probably need to hear the caller well, not just every third word, correct?

And you probably do not want to start with one call forwarding company and then, after the fact, need to change companies because of issues with call quality.

We offer the best international call forwarding services at very flexible and affordable rates.

Learn more