How many rings, how many minutes on hold, and how many transfers does it take for your customers’ calls to be answered? If you have to think about it, chances are the answer is too many.

Nothing can be more frustrating these days than connecting with a business the old-fashioned way: by phone. While customers today have more options than ever for communicating with a business — email, text, chat, social media and web-based request forms — many people still prefer the real-time, personal nature of a phone conversation, especially pre-Millennial generations.

Communicating by voice can be faster, easier and more effective than typing messages back and forth and can provide a level of comfort when making high-value purchasing decisions. Media intelligence firm BIA/Kelsey estimates that businesses will receive 169 billion calls a year from mobile phones alone by 2020.^[1] All those calls can make a difference: Call intelligence firm Invoca found that 70 percent of consumers are likely or very likely to choose another business after a negative phone experience with a company, while 80 percent are likely or very likely to become a repeat customer after a positive phone experience.^[2]

The challenge for businesses is making sure customer phone calls get answered quickly, accurately and productively in today’s mobile, remote and on-the-run business environment. Many are finding a solution in a unified communications (UC) approach driven by cloud-based, mobile-enabled advanced voice systems such as Comcast Business VoiceEdge®, VoiceEdge Select™, and Business Voice Mobility.

Be Anywhere Your Customers Are

Cloud-based, mobile-enabled advanced voice systems free you from the confines of a desk, four walls and telephone wires, allowing you to strengthen customer relationships and provide exceptional customer experiences anytime, from anywhere — a concept called “Be Anywhere.”  

Be Anywhere capabilities let you can seamlessly transfer and transport calls from one device to another, accepting calls to your landline phone on your mobile phone while you’re outside of the office, for example. You also can start a call from an office-based landline or desktop call app and then take the call on the road via a mobile device, with one easy click instead of having to hang up and re-dial. Even better: no matter which device you use, your caller sees a single business number, letting you maintain an extra level of professionalism and avoiding confusion.

Always Reachable

Additional features available with Comcast Business’ cloud-based advanced voice systems, such as Auto Attendant, Hunt Groups, Call Queue, Call Forwarding Selective and Call Notify, help ensure you’ll never miss a call — and the opportunity to provide an exceptional customer experience.

Cloud-based advanced voice systems also let you integrate voicemail and email, making it easier to reach out and respond to customers. Plus, calls can be prioritized so important customer calls ring directly through while unknown callers are directed to voicemail. The days of leaving a message and waiting for a response in order to help a customer are over: Presence information, combined with instant communications functionality, allows you to quickly find internal subject matter experts and check their availability for an immediate call or a future meeting.

Changing the Way Business is Conducted

Businesses of all shapes and sizes are using cloud-based, mobile-enabled advanced voice services to improve their customer experiences.

For example, customers calling Catlett-Va.-based Golden Rule Builders, Inc., used to get disconnected or couldn’t reach the company by phone. Now, with Comcast Business VoiceEdge, customer calls are now forwarded to cell or home phones of on-the-go-employees. Chicago-based CLK Engineers counts on Comcast Business VoiceEdge for advanced call features like call forwarding, so field engineers never have to miss an important client- or business-related call. And employees working for Mattress 1 of Jacksonville, Fla., can answer business line calls and access voice services even when away from their desks, with softphones and mobile devices.

A Case for Clarity

Not all cloud-based voice systems are created equal. When choosing a provider, be sure to demand a system that guarantees crystal-clear, HD voice over a dedicated connection that doesn’t have to fight for bandwidth with Internet traffic. Your customers will appreciate the good connection, and the good experience they’ll have with your business.