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Becoming an Entrepreneur in 2024

There has never been a time more convenient to launch a successful business than now. Would-be entrepreneurs that have been contemplating a shift to starting their own successful venture now have the tools to create businesses that would not have been possible in years past. With the stability of 9-to-5’s becoming a thing of the past, more people want to take control of their future and steer their destiny towards achieving their dreams. Becoming an entrepreneur isn’t easy but the rewards are worth the push.

Becoming an Entrepreneur using Technology

Thanks to Global Call Forwarding’s innovations in telecommunications, you can upgrade your business using some of the technologies now available, thanks to cloud computing, VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol), and more. So, if you are considering the launch of a new business venture, here are some tips for success.

Think 24/7/365 Availability

One significant change in our modern world is being able to harness the 24 hours in a day, the full 7 days in a week, and the 365-day markets that are available at our fingertips. Furthermore, being able to instantly access new customers and clients in different countries can further scale your idea from just a thought you had on the way to work to a booming, successful entity quickly.

By using virtual phone numbers equipped with an add-on called “time of day routing,” you can handle inbound calls around the clock and for different time zones around the world. For instance, if you have a side business with regular business hours, you can forward those calls and voicemails to call centers and other staff using time of day routing. This can help you balance the transition of working a day job while waiting for your business to grow so you can strike out on your own.

Think Outside the Box

Because virtual phone numbers from Global Call Forwarding are an evolving technology, your business can use them in creative ways that can gain a competitive edge. For instance, you may have found that your business is popular in the New York City metropolitan area. However, as you may be aware, New Yorkers prefer to handle their business locally. In response, your business can use virtual phone numbers, with area codes in the NYC area and its 5 boroughs to appeal directly to local communities. Best of all, your business doesn’t have to be based there, especially considering the high cost of living and expensive real estate. Using the techniques of building a virtual office, virtual phone numbers take care of the communication aspect of your business – even if you’re located outside of the country.

Why is this possible? When a virtual phone number is dialed, the call is immediately routed to another phone number, the destination phone number. This destination phone number can be located in nearly any country around the world, immediately broadening your company’s appeal and allowing your new business to be instantly located in favorable business climates.

Becoming an Entrepreneur in 2019
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Leverage Technology to Scale Your Business

When it comes to modern businesses, the keyword is “scale.” In other words, does your business have the capability to grow exponentially while still maintaining the quality of service that you provided beforehand? If the answer is yes, then you should seriously consider using Global Call Forwarding’s add-ons, such as “outbound calling.

Outbound calling is a popular add-on that enables your business to call phone numbers in other countries to call recipients directly. Without this option, the caller ID will register a long string of numbers and letters that callers aren’t likely to answer. With outbound calling, your business can use a virtual phone number – which is identical to “normal” landlines – and have this reflect on the receiver’s caller ID, ensuring they never know the number calling isn’t a local, standard landline.

As an example of outbound calling, if you have a Canada virtual phone number and want to contact potential clients in Montreal, those numbers will appear on their caller ID. Contrast this with calling from the United Arab Emirates, where a +971 country code will appear on the caller ID – not to mention the charges of hefty long-distance fees, or even worse, the potential blocking by either party’s service provider.

Avoid Being a Perfectionist

It is only natural to want everything to go smoothly in the early days of your business. Achieving perfection may be ideal, but in business, it can be detrimental to your new endeavor. For instance, you may be handling a large number of potential contracts with distributors for your new product. By using “call recording” – a popular add-on – you can record those conversations when you’re weighing the various options available. And for some absent-minded entrepreneurs, it helps to have a useful reference for when things become less than perfect. This can help reduce stress in the early days of your business when you’re bootstrapping a new idea with minimal resources and limited attention.

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Global Call Forwarding can help you start your new business in 2019. For more information on the most recent advancements in telecom services and subscription services available from the leading service provider, visit www.globalcallforwarding.com

Using Technology to be an Efficient Entrepreneur

Are you looking to find new ways to use technology to make your business and personal life better? Becoming an efficient entrepreneur takes hard work but its possible. We break down how to get yourself organized for a smoother work-life balance.

Empower Customers

One of the key methods of making your business more productive isn’t necessarily tied with doing more. Instead, it is what you don’t do that makes the difference. And one way that businesses continually make this mistake is by assuming that customers need to be guided every step of the way and don’t want to handle their business directly. For instance, the popularity of the self-checkout line at major retailers enables customers to take care of their shopping without any assistance from staff.

Your business can do this, too, with the help of Global Call Forwarding’s IVR and PBX services. In short, these services enable inbound callers to use your directory to find the information and complete their transactions by themselves. By providing basic information through your directory (ex. store hours), you can simultaneously empower customers and lighten the load of your employees. Furthermore, incorporating specific extensions for staff members can also organize the type of calls that staff members regularly receive. It’s through these methods that you can make your business more efficient.

Making Your Business Accessible around the Clock

One hallmark of efficient businesses is that they don’t waste time. And a clear example of wasted time comes when regular business hours come to a close, locking out customers that may have to wait until your business opens on the next business day; this may cause potential customers to look elsewhere for their needs to be met. In either case, this inefficiency can be fatal for your business, especially in competitive industries.

The solution is to make your business accessible around the clock with Global Call Forwarding’s services, particularly its suite of add-ons and features that can increase the power of your virtual phone numbers exponentially.

For starters, consider the popular add-on “time of day routing.” As the name implies, inbound calls made to your virtual phone number can be routed to other destination phone numbers anywhere in the world based on the time of day that callers dial your number. This means that you can use time of day routing during times when your staff isn’t at work, such as during lunch, meetings, vacations, and outside of regular business hours. By having these hours covered by time of day routing, you make your business accessible no matter which time zone or hour that calls may be coming in from.

Last, as an entrepreneur, you may be looking to have some off-time from your business. You can use time of day routing to redirect calls made to your phone or extension to another staff member or voicemail.

Using Technology to be an Efficient Entrepreneur
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Simultaneous Ringing

Another add-on that functions in a similar manner is “simultaneous ringing.” Also, like the name implies, all devices connected to your virtual phone number will simultaneously ring when a call is made to your business. This enables any staff member on hand the ability to answer the call, which ensures that customers are retained and not left waiting to be serviced.

Call Recording

Being an entrepreneur can be hectic at times. And while we all wish to remember every single detail discussed over the phone, sometimes things get lost in the mix. The easiest solution is simply to record the interaction and use it for reference in the future. Global Call Forwarding enables entrepreneurs this efficiency with its popular add-on, “call recording.” Call recording enables you to record and store conversations. This is useful for customer service training purposes, as well as for certain industries, such as finance.

Call recording can be used to verify if your employees are handling calls efficiently. For instance, you may notice that some customer service agents get bogged down in minuscule details that can be solved by redirecting customers to online resources (such as blogs, FAQs, videos, and more). With call recording, you can analyze your business from afar or when you’re not in the office. It is often these small, yet detailed changes that ensure your business is running smoothly and reducing waste.

Delegation with Voicemail to Email

Global Call Forwarding offers a very handy feature with its voicemail to email service. When setting up, you can have your voicemail messages forwarded as an mp3 directly to an inbox. For large businesses that need to delegate tasks based on their specialty, having a document that spells out what customers need from your business can make it easier to assign to the right employees.

Interested in learning more about Global Call Forwarding’s telecom services? If so, visit www.globalcallforwarding.com to learn more about how you can make your business more efficient.

Delegating Tasks and Managing a Team

One of the primary tasks of an entrepreneur is to delegate tasks and managing a team. Without proper delegation, business owners run the risk of using up too much of their energy, ensuring burnout and inefficiency.

Effectively Managing a Team with GCF

Luckily, modern business models have made it incredibly easy to manage their staff, especially with the recent innovations made in telecommunication. In this article, we’ll take a look at several ways to delegate tasks efficiently using Global Call Forwarding’s telecom solutions.

Time of Day Routing

One of the more popular add-ons that aids delegation for subscribers to Global Call Forwarding is “time of day routing.” As implied by the name, time of day routing redirects inbound calls based on when the call is placed. This means that you can delegate tasks by the department, for example, when another group is in a meeting. Similarly, you can redirect calls with the time of day routing to ensure that even outside of regular business hours, customers can get in touch with a representative from your organization to answer their inquiries. This helps offset overwhelming your team with an abundance of callers daily, spreading the workload around.

Also, time of day routing enables your business to outsource inbound calls out of business hours to call centers that are located in more favorable time zones. For instance, if you have a business in New York, you’re probably aware of how few hours of overlap there are between London and your headquarters. To cover those early morning hours and late afternoon calls, time of day routing can enable your business to employ a call center in the United Kingdom.

White Listing & Black Listing

Using Global Call Forwarding’s whitelisting and blacklisting capabilities can focus on which department and staff members receive calls from various sources. For instance, you may want to keep your sales team whitelisted to ensure that only important company calls are made between departments. Or, you may want your accounts receivable department to blacklist problematic callers that can gum up the workflow. By limiting and enabling different parts of your company’s communication networks, your business is more easily managed and a natural flow of delegation is possible.

Managing A Team Woman on Phone
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The Use of Directories

Having a directory for your phone system automatically delegates inbound calls to the appropriate sources. By empowering your customers and clients with the option to self-select through your directory, each part of your organization and individual staff members have a higher likelihood of receiving inquiries from the appropriate caller.

Global Call Forwarding offers many customizable ways to create a functional directory system for your organization. These include IVR and PBX. PBX, short for Private Branch Exchange, helps create a system where customers can dial their choices numerically. For instance, using it, you can add extensions for key staff members for high-priority calls. IVR, or Integrated Voice Response, allows customers to use voice recognition technology to navigate through your directory. By having the ability to reach a staff member directly through your company, communication is easier when it comes to assigning tasks (especially in comparison to email, which may contend with important messages relegated to the SPAM folder).

Voicemail to Email

Voicemail messages are important for communication in your company, particularly when contacting staff members that have a busy schedule. However, they can be hard to access for team members on the go. Being able to access emails, however, can be an easier option. That’s where Global Call Forwarding’s voicemail to email service can make delegating through emails a cinch. When enabled, voicemails are immediately converted to mp3 files.

The advantages of voicemail to email are numerous. First, having a reference document for team members helps make sure your orders are carried out to your specifications. Second, it opens up access to documents that can be easily duplicated from user to user. Third, these voicemails can help log information and serve as a backup.

Simultaneous Ringing

Simultaneous ringing is just as the name implies: when a virtual phone number is dialed, devices connected to a particular virtual phone number ring at the same time. While this feature enables customers to have a minimum wait time, it also helps ensure that each available employee can handle incoming customers. For large volume businesses, simultaneous ringing is a must, but it can also serve as a great benefit for workplaces with a number of employees performing different roles. For instance, a call may be answered by a secretary, salesperson, or a customer service agent – which helps evenly distribute the workload depending on your team’s current availability.

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If you are interested in learning more about how Global Call Forwarding can make delegating tasks throughout your business easier, be sure to explore our website. You’ll find in-depth topics that can answer your questions and spark new ways for your business to manage itself effectively.