Traditional business phone numbers are getting replaced by Virtual numbers across the globe, and India is not leaving behind in it.
Big brands including TATA, ICICI, OYO, FoxStar and more are choosing easy to remember the virtual phone number for their marketing and customer engagement campaigns, which shows these numbers are becoming a trend for top marketers.
Virtual phone number in India is spreading in a lightning way across businesses including Startups, SMEs and big enterprises.
In the game of customer experience, organizations don’t want their customer to suffer while connecting with them.
Old wired telephone network already caused a lot of pain by constant downtime and heavy cost which overall affected ROI.
But these issues were overcome by the invention of virtual numbers.
What is Virtual Number?
Unlike traditional phone numbers, it is not connected to any physical line. So when customers call on this numbers, it allows businesses to forward customer calls to fixed lines, Mobile or VoIP according to preset call flow. It is also recognized as a DID number.
This makes a sense for better first point of contact number for customer. As it is not connected to any line, it doesn’t require any setup like old EPABX system, thus no maintenance cost as well. These numbers are hosted on the cloud by Virtual number service providers.
As per business operations, users get to choose from Virtual mobile number and virtual landline number, even some cloud telephony providers offer free virtual number for trial purposes
Why Virtual number is necessary?
Most important advantage of this number is to increase revenue for companies by providing better customer experience. In the old times when customers were calling any business, most of the times the lines were coming busy or not reachable due to not having call waiting or automated call transfer features.
Because of that businesses have lost huge numbers of leads and ended up in bad customer service image by customers.
With virtual number there are zero chances of missing leads, as it intelligently transfers customer call to suitable agent.
The best thing is when agent is not available to answer the calls, a customer can leave a voice mail and missed call will be stored in the system.
Notification of missed call will be sent to the admin with all the customer details. This works magically in case of after hour calls.
It also gives business a professional image in terms of customer service.
Setting up a company greetings when a customer is calling or music on hold gives your business a whole new look. It makes clients feel if they are calling a big enterprise.
Having one number for the entire team or multiple branches makes it simple for business operations. This one number can be used in advertisements, website and contact details. A single number is easier to remember for customers thus it becomes a brand identity.
When customers are reaching out to business; virtual number takes care of call going to the right agent.
The interesting part about virtual phone number is its mobility. Bigger organizations have their employees traveling for work. In that case, calls can be forwarded and received on the go.
In this Data war zone, privacy is the major concern for the customers. To overcome security concerns virtual number comes with some great features like number masking. It is provided by only a few cloud telephony providers like yako voice.
And what is more important than having number secured from unwanted threats. Brands and customers can mask their original number with a virtual number. Number masking enables businesses to use local virtual number for different regions.
Apart from all these, Virtual phone numbers are highly cost-effective and scalable. When expanding to a different location or having increased call volume, it becomes easy for organizations to manage the traffic without any further cost, and that too without purchasing any additional infrastructure.
Additional features of the Virtual phone number
There are certain features that come along when choosing a virtual number for a business. One of them is customization. Once the number is purchased, it is very easy to customize the call flow as per the business need.
Admin can change the parameters and call transfer to particular agents anytime with few clicks.
The virtual number for SMS verification is also gaining popularity among the e-commerce websites and logistic companies recently, as it saves a lot of manpower and time at the time of executing orders.
With traditional phone numbers, there was a lot of disturbance in the live call. This was ultimately creating a lot of disputes among business and customers. DID number come with superior voice quality which ensures agents clearly understand what customers are saying, ending in better customer satisfaction?
It has options to integrate the CRM system to dashboard. After attaching CRM, agents have all the data of customers, leads and follow-ups. These data become handy when a customer is calling for any complaints.
There are options to segment leads in various status like cold, warm and hot. This feature works like a magic when it comes to measure agent performance or call quality. One single dashboard is able to generate detailed business reporting for in-depth analysis.
The best part about it is called differentiation. Your business calls can be forwarded to your mobile number and that is why it gives an option to separate professional and personal calls at the same time, that too without paying anything extra or buying a new device.
A virtual number can be paired with outbound calls to automate the process for better marketing campaigns. As per a study, customers respond more to voice calls rather than any other medium.
Overall Effect
Customers are generating more inquiries thanks to digital ads and creative campaigns. After these promotional activities, it becomes important to handle a large volume of calls smoothly if you want to convert those leads into customers.
A virtual phone number can work as the best medium to handle multiple calls at same time without any expensive software or infrastructure. Once sales teams are able to handle calls effectively, the revenue will go up automatically.
Virtual phone number not only attracts more customers but it can also work as a weapon to excellent customer experience, which leads to better brand equity.