Holidays, such as Valentines Day, can be stressful for everyone, but more so for seasonal businesses that depend on them to drive revenues. Even if you rely on orders placed over the Internet, you often need phone networks – such as 1-800 numbers to handle customer service inquiries. Since traditional phone services are often inefficient and expensive, more and more small businesses are turning to business VoIP technology to streamline their customer interactions increase sales and public satisfaction with their service. Valentines Day is particularly important for companies that sell everything from flowers, to chocolates, to jewelry, since an outsized portion of their revenues depend on their performance handing the flood of orders that occurs on February 14.
In 2012, the average American spent $126.03 on their Valentines Day, buying everything from roses, to cards, to jewelry. In fact, an estimated 198 million roses were sold on Valentine’s Day 2012 alone. With all those orders, it is important to maintain free and clear lines of communication both online and off. For some companies, like 1-800-Flowers.com, phone service is even implied in the name. Great phone service comes at a price, however, with traditional analog phone systems costing considerably more than modern VoIP service providers.
For example, FiftyFlowers.com, a wholesale flower seller, relies both on their company website and their phone lines for customer service. In order to maintain a growing, efficient global workforce, they switched to a business VoIP system capable of keeping their employees connected and their customers satisfied.
In addition to the ability to scale alongside a growing company, a business VoIP system provides bottom-line savings and a reduction in IT operational expenses and resources a business would incur with a traditional private branch exchange (PBX) system. These savings vary between VoIP service providers, so it pays to shop around.
In hyper-competitive, seasonal markets, dropped calls and high overhead costs are generally not the way companies do business. Those companies that are able to stay lean and efficient while maintaining a professional image and high degree of customer service are the ones that stand out as market leaders. If this is your business’s goal, then a business VoIP phone system should be a fundamental part of your success strategy.
