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Growing a Business: Automated Messages vs. Hiring an Answering Service - A Better Answer - ContactCenterWorld.com Blog

Growing a Business: Automated Messages vs. Hiring an Answering Service

There comes a time when every successful business owner hits a fork in the road when growing their business — deciding between hiring more in-house team members or implementing automations to streamline processes.

This fork in the road can occur when owners are overwhelmed with their workload or they’ve hit a spot where they’re ready to scale their business.

If your customer service department is receiving an influx of calls that they can’t keep up with, choosing to automate parts of your process or hiring an answering service to help are two common choices to help resolve these issues.

Choosing between implementing automated messages or hiring an answering service can be challenging. Here are the pros and cons of each option to help you better choose what’s right for your business.

What Are Automated Messages?

Automated phone systems (also called auto-attendants) are used to answer incoming calls.

When a person calls a support number, they will be asked to follow the automated guidelines (“press 1 for sales, press 2 for customer service,” etc.) until they reach the department or person they are trying to contact.

With automated messages, no humans are involved until the end — but automated messages are helpful in saving your staff’s time. They don’t have to answer calls, redirect calls, or help with customer service inquiries on top of their main duties.

As an example, at small companies, employees tend to wear many hats. The marketing manager may be answering customer service calls and ordering office supplies on top of their marketing duties. When an influx of calls happens, it pulls the marketing manager away from their primary responsibilities.

By using an automated messaging service, you can save time and increase productivity.

Pros of Automated Messages

  • Get calls to the right department: Callers won’t be redirected to different departments multiple times. The automated system will ask a few questions and direct the caller to the right department or person.
  • Lower up-front cost than an answering service: Most automated systems are cheaper to implement than a live answering service. 
  • No need for a receptionist: Since automated call answering systems act as a receptionist, your staff is free to stick to their more impactful duties and stay productive. 

Cons of Automated Messages

  • Aggravating customers: In a Boston University study, 90% of respondents said they start their customer service interaction hoping to speak to a real person.
  • Long hold/wait times: While automated systems free up your staff, it takes more time for the customer to get to a live person. Callers are forced to sit through a menu tree, then wait on the phone for a person to answer. The longer a person waits for an answer, the more likely they are to hang up.
  • Loss of human connection: Instead of being greeted by a friendly person, callers will be greeted with an automated, impersonal voice. 
  • More hang-ups and fewer business opportunities: More than a third of callers will hang up if they receive a voicemail or automated message.

What Is an Answering Service?

An answering service is a company that answers calls on behalf of another company. Companies hire answering services as a third party to act as an extension of their company.

With an answering service, there is no automation, and callers are always greeted with a friendly voice.

Answering services for businesses are mainly utilized for answering phone calls but many companies do more than that. They can also make outgoing calls, send reminder texts and emails, enter orders, and perform other secretarial tasks.

Pros of Hiring an Answering Service

  • Increase efficiency: An answering service takes the majority of customer calls off your in-house staff’s plate. An answering service can update systems, answer questions, troubleshoot problems, and send emails without your staff’s involvement.
  • No need to hire an in-house team: Answering services are hired as a third-party service to your company. You will not be responsible for hiring, training, and reviewing new team members.
  • Never miss a call: Call centers and answering services are available to answer calls around the clock — even on weekends and holidays.
  • Personal greeting and a human touch: Customers and clients will always be greeted by a personal message from a friendly human being, starting the call on the right foot.
  • Acts as an extension of your business: Answering service representatives are trained on your company, procedures, and products. They will be as knowledgeable about your business as your in-house team is.
  • Cheaper than hiring in-house help: As a general gauge, an in-house receptionist costs $30,000+, whereas an answering service can cost around $3,600/year.

Cons of Hiring an Answering Service

  • Answering services can only “help” so much: While an answering service can handle the majority of client calls, they will not have the authority to override systems or handle situations outside the scope of their responsibilities.

What’s Best for Your Business?

After discovering the pros and cons of automated messages and answering services, it’s up to you to choose what’s right for your business.

Remember, no matter which option you choose to help grow your business, both will ensure you never miss a call. They’ll both help you increase sales and boost your company’s reputation. 

To get a better sense of how much answering services cost, we break it down for you in another blog post.

Publish Date: May 21, 2021


2024 Buyers Guide Computer Telephony Integration

 
1.) 
Premium Listing
Call Center Studio

Call Center Studio
Call Center Studio is the world’s first call center built on Google and is one of the most secure and stable systems with some of the industry’s best reporting. It is one of the most full-featured enterprise grade systems (with the most calling features, one of the best call distribution, outbound dialing features and integrations—including IVR, AI Speech Recognition, blended inbound/outbound calling and includes Google’s new Dialogflow and Speech API. Call Center Studio is the absolute easiest to use (with a 10 minute setup), and is the price performance leader with lower equipment cost and less setup time.


2.) 
AMC Technology

DaVinci
DaVinci provides Computer Telephony Integration (CTI) to a library of pre-built applications + UXiPaaS (User Experience Integration Platform as a Service) built specifically for contact centers. As contact center needs evolve, organizations need to have access to extend or create new functionality, without waiting to be a part of a software roadmap. Get the benefits of CTI within your CRM like screen pop, click-to-dial, screen transfer, speed dial and more, but future-proof your contact center so you can expand and integrate how and when you want.

3.) 
IntraNext Systems

IntraNext Systems develops agent efficiency tools and data security software solutions for medium-to-large contact centers. Our Event Intelligence® Platform solutions include SmartCTI™, iGuard®, and SmartSIP™. SmartSIP is based on our patented SIP layer technology and provides a DTMF masking solution for VoIP environments.

4.) 
PhoneIQ

PhoneIQ
What is PhoneIQ?
PhoneIQ is the modern cloud phone system and contact center platform built exclusively for companies on Salesforce. Our all-in-one cloud communications platform brings together power dialing, local presence, voicemail drop, Salesforce call routing, call recording and a complete PBX replacement that lives within your CRM. With support for desktop, mobile, and desk phones, PhoneIQ works seamlessly at the office or remote, logging all interactions in Salesforce and generating reports in real-time.

Best For
Companies using Salesforce and looking for a phone system, dialer, or contact center software that provides deep integration capabilities with their CRM and expert Salesforce support.

5.) 
PRILINK

Easy Contact Center Traffic Analytics (Ec2Traffic)
Prilink Ec2Traffic provides network traffic analytics (NTA) for Internet, SIP Trunk and WebRTC traffic for on-premises and cloud Contact Centers.

Ec2Traffic analyzes network layer 2 to 4, RTP and SRTP packet loss and SIP protocols in real-time from the demarcation point or network edge, generating NTA metadata and requires little telemetry bandwidth.

Ec2Traffic provides:

- Year-round NTA metadata

- Daily CSV files upload to Customer business applications

- Capture packet to Wireshark for Deep Packet Inspection (DPI)

- detect traffic anomalies

- and more ....

6.) 
Teckinfo Solutions Pvt. Ltd.

InterDialog UCCS
InterDialog UCCS - a robust contact/ call center software that helps organizations provide a seamless customer experience across all channels in the customer service journey. All interactions from various channels come to a single unified queue on the InterDialog platform. With unified view agents get to see all historical interactions , enabling him to give a resolution quickly. InterDialog UCCS is a comprehensive Contact/Call Center Software with robust CTI, Unified Q ( ACD), Reporting, Unified Agent Management, Administrator, Supervisor - Monitoring (Pmonitor)

7.) 
The Primas Group

Primas CX
Primas CX is a CTI-based contact center enhancement suite that takes your contact center software to the next level.
It provides a set of tools that every contact center needs, over and above their vendor features.

*Advanced Call Back in Queue & SMS in Queue
*Agent Screen Pop
*Chatbot Automation
*Welcome Back Greeting
*Post Contact Survey
*Dropped Call Reconnect
*Digital Front Door & Many more

As a Vendor Agnostic ISV, we pride ourselves on delivering the best COTS & Custom solutions for any contact center in any industry.


 



View more from A Better Answer

Recent Blog Posts:
5 Thoughts You Need To Stop Ignoring When It Comes to Customer ServiceAugust 19, 2021
How To Provide 24/7 Customer Service Without Working Around the ClockJuly 22, 2021
How AI Is Changing the Customer Service SpaceJune 28, 2021
Virtual Assistant vs. Answering Service: Which Is Right for You?June 22, 2021
Live Chat vs. Phone Support: Choosing the Right One for Your BusinessJune 21, 2021
6 Most Common Call Center Myths DebunkedJune 21, 2021
Tips To Help Improve Your Company’s First Call ResolutionMay 30, 2021
The Importance of Stellar Customer Service for E-Commerce BusinessesMay 25, 2021
Growing a Business: Automated Messages vs. Hiring an Answering ServiceMay 21, 2021
5 Benefits of Using an Answering Service for Educational FacilitiesMay 20, 2021

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