Auto-attendants often have voice menu tress - "Press 1 for Sales, Press 2 for Tech Support," etc. Voice-enabled auto-attendants are a simple form of Interactive Voice Response (IVR), but the two terms are kept distinct. An auto-attendant just answers and routes calls, while an IVR may be capable of searching account records, reading balances over the phone, faxing documents, and much more.

Automated attendant functions are pretty simple, so their features are often built into office PBX systems. All the owner must do is program the auto-attendant with a directory of names and extensions to dial, and perhaps assign keypad numbers to different extensions. There is no integration with other vendors' accounting software. If answering and routing calls is all you need, then an auto-attendant is right for your business.

An auto-attendant system generally supports the following functions:

• Transfer to Extension
• Transfer to Voicemail
• Play Message (i.e. "our address is ...")
• Go To a Sub Menu
• Repeat Choices

Additionally, many auto-attendants let callers search for people by spelling their names on the keypad. Other functions considered standard in auto-attendants are:

• Designated "zero" extension to which callers are transferred when they press the zero key
• Timeout action - what to do if the caller presses no keys for X seconds; usually, transfer to "zero" extension
• Default voicemail box to which callers are transferred if "zero" extension is not answered

Some auto-attendants have multiple time-based menu trees. During regular business hours, one set of extensions and default actions is in effect. At all other times, another set is in effect. This allows callers to interact with night and day crews, or to go straight to voicemail after hearing "Our offices are closed..."

Auto-attendants are different from more rudimentary telephone system functions such as line hunting. In line hunting, one phone will automatically route calls to a set of other phones, called a "hunt group," until a call is answered. If no one in the hunt group answers, the caller goes to a designated voicemail box. The caller is offered no options and does not interact with the system to direct the call; that's the key difference between an auto-attendant and lower-level functions.

The vast majority of telephone systems rely upon auto-attendants rather than the more complex and expensive IVR systems. Indeed, it's hard to find a business of more than ten people that does not use an auto-attendant these days. The functions built into an auto-attendant are as much as most businesses need, as you can see.

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Software is used by commercial answering services for both "live operator" and fully automated virtual office services. Both live and automated telephone answering services require the abilities to connect to incoming callers; identify the caller; transfer the caller to the appropriate party; keep a record of all call activity; and, in some cases, respond to voice or keypad input of requests from the caller. Those are the basics, but software can do many other call answering services as well.

Call center software is for "boiler rooms" of inbound telemarketing agents awaiting inquiries from potential customers; tech support and customer service reps; and other kinds of people who field calls from many people. Call center software's basic function is to answer high volumes of calls and route them to the first available agent. It can also identify caller's by location from their area codes, or even individuals who have called before from their numbers or caller-ID. Depending on the caller, the software may be able to put detailed information on the monitor of the agent who receives the call even as the call is transferred to that agent. This enables more efficient, faster customer service.

A 24-hour answering service staffed by live operators can use call center software. The software can transfer calls to available operators who may work all over the world. A professional answering service uses software to quickly identify customers and keep detailed records for call management.

Telephone answering software (TAS) can be purchased as a turnkey system, including a computer server, telephone interface cards, etc. It can also be purchased as pure software to be installed on an existing server. Mastar.com offerings integrate readily into other software-based telephony systems such as VoIP, virtual PBX, customer relationship management (CRM), etc.

TAS can cost between $10,000 and $30,000 for an entry-level system. But you can also find free, open source software that does what pricey commercial programs do. One of the most powerful and popular open source telephone answering software packages is called Asterisk.

Asterisk can be downloaded from the developer's Website (www.asterisk.com) or obtained free of charge and bundled with hardware, installation, and training services (which cost money). It's used by many small and large call centers, telephone answering services, and virtual office service providers. It can be used by any business for its in-house TAS needs.

Voicemail services are also bundled into Asterisk and many other TAS. So-called "unified messaging" is a popular aspect of such software; it allows voicemail to find its intended recipient by whatever communication channels are available at a given time, sending voicemail to a landline, cell phone, or email inbox as either an audio file attachment or a speech-to-text translation.

For example, with unified messaging voicemail can reach you even if you don't have a phone. A voicemail message is automatically converted to an MP3 file which is emailed to your computer or mobile device. Transcription software may even convert the sound of a voicemail into text, although the translation is not perfectly accurate. Likewise, faxes can be emailed to you, or email can be read to you audibly over a voice phone. But keeping you in touch is not the only thing unified messaging can do for you.

A unified messaging system can also tie into back-end business process systems, putting information that you and your employees need to deal with customers right at your fingertips. For example, a customer's caller-ID information can trigger a search of your accounts database to put the customer's record up on a customer service rep's screen even as the call is transferred to him or her. From there, the CSR can take a new order; accept a credit card payment; and update notes about every contact with a customer. That's a powerful productivity capability of unified messaging.

"Presence" is another big difference between unified messaging and traditional office communication systems. "Presence" means that the unified messaging system is aware of every user who is logged on to it, what each user's "state" is (busy, available, in a meeting, etc.) and the communication media that are available to each user. The unified messaging system may keep presence information to itself, using it only to decide how to deliver messages to a user. But presence can also be shared with others on the unified messaging network, so you will never again need to wonder if the CFO is in or out of the office.

Audio and video conferencing are also part of unified messaging. These collaborative media can be used in conjunction with other unified messaging channels such as email and fax.

Virtually every business telephone system vendor now offers some product called "unified messaging". Some unified messaging systems do no more than forward voicemail and fax to email inboxes. Vendors such as Avaya Communications, Cisco Systems, Nortel, and Comverse offer the most powerful and configurable unified messaging systems.

The cost of a unified messaging system varies depending on its size and features. Installation is straightforward, consisting of standard computer, telephone, and networking hardware with unified messaging software. Training users is often the steepest part of the unified messaging implementation curve, for there are a lot of new ways to do old things and new things that can be done. Training is important because without it, many of the unified messaging features you buy will go unused.

Consultants, sales reps, plumbers, painters, and many other kinds of professional and trades people do their real work anywhere except in an office. They meet with clients at the clients' premises when necessary, or at cafés, bars, restaurants, and other public places. Why bother with monthly rent, a receptionist, cleaning service, plants and decorations, etc., when all you really need is a phone system that works like an office PBX system?

A virtual office PBX system is a computer server equipped with software that imitates the functions of an auto-attendant hardware PBX. It can accept incoming calls; give the caller options for routing the call to the desired party or department; take and forward messages; and send or receive faxes. The virtual office PBX can do these things with or without the aid of a live operator.

A virtual office system can patch customers through to you no matter where you are or what sort of communication media are available to you there. Your cell phone, laptop, landline home phone, or one "borrowed" from a client you're visiting can become part of your virtual office whenever it's needed.

You can buy the simple hardware and software needed for a virtual office; set it up in just about any space that has Internet access; and run the system yourself. But for small businesses, it usually makes more sense to contract with a virtual office service provider.

Such a service provider may offer two levels of service; one fully automated and the other operator-assisted. Either way, you pay a monthly base fee that includes an allotment of minutes or other units of usage measurement, plus an additional fee per unit of usage if you exceed your monthly allotment. It's a lot like cell phone pricing.

You have to be careful when shopping virtual office services; make sure the service(s) that are most likely to spike during a busy season are not very expensive. For example, if you receive a lot of faxed orders during the holiday season, incoming faxes should be unlimited or very inexpensive.

The physical parts of a virtual office phone system may connect to either the PSTN (Public Switched Telephone Network) or the public Internet. A PSTN connection requires specialized circuit cards in the virtual office server that can accept standard telephone lines; you may need to pay monthly fees for several telephone lines. But a Voice over IP (VOIP) system just plugs into the Internet via a single Ethernet cable, and you may have several dozen phone "lines" or simultaneous conversations over that one connection.

Business phone systems have come a long way from the days of in-house switchboards and closets full of phone wires. Many businesses, large and small, rely upon in-house or contracted virtual office systems for their daily business communications. It's a smart way to go, and a very agile one.

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Voice broadcasting can be used by emergency services, such as police or fire departments, to instantly notify everyone in a given area code or other defined group of a fire, a dangerous fugitive, a missing child, and so on. Weather alerts can be distributed via voicemail broadcasting too. Schools may use voice broadcast to advise parents and students of events, school closures, and other announcements. Political activists also use voice broadcast in some simple, human-driven ways.

Voicemail broadcast is an "unintended feature" of many voicemail services. At the end of a voicemail message you are given the option to forward the message to another number, so that it can be heard by a person who can take action on the message. This is useful when, for example, a sales rep receives a customer inquiry that is best answered by someone in the accounting department. But you can also forward a voicemail message to a group of numbers defined on your phone, and that's simple voicemail broadcasting. It's used to rapidly distribute calls to action among many members of a group.

The leader of a group broadcasts a voicemail message to a handful of first-line lieutenants. Each of them forwards the message to another group, and each member of subsidiary groups forwards to another group, in a geometrically growing "tree" of messaging. This sort of ad hoc voicemail broadcast is essentially free and works fast enough for many purposes.

Then there's the bad kind of voice broadcasting: Spam. Marketers of all kinds buy lists of phone numbers and broadcast "special offers" to them, often without regard for whether anyone has any use for their wares. Cell phone owners are especially irked by voice spam if they are paying for it by the minute. In the U.S., it is illegal to make unsolicited commercial phone calls to cell phones for this very reason. Still, many cell phone owners add their numbers to the national "Do Not Call" registry to put marketers on notice that they don't want special offers.

Fax broadcast is also used for legitimate purposes and for spamming. Fax broadcasting is the same as voice or voicemail broadcast, only the numbers called are fax machine numbers and the machine doing the calling is a fax machine. Fax broadcasts can even be sent from desktop and laptop computers using fax software built into Microsoft Office or a third-party fax management service on the Web.

There are some legitimate uses for fax broadcasting, but again, the recipient is burdened with the cost of receiving and printing a fax, so unsolicited faxes are illegal in many jurisdictions. But that doesn't stop spammers. Do you have something to say about voice or fax broadcasting? Post your comment or question below...

Choosing a small business phone system involves some planning. There are plenty of options when choosing a small business phone system, including PBX systems, VoIP (Voice over IP) systems, and a virtual PBX. A traditional PBX system is a computer-based phone switch that sits in a closet on your premises; all phones connect to it via standard telephone cable. A VoIP system is also a computer, but it uses the Internet to carry voice traffic; its phones are wired with Ethernet cable or may even be WiFi-based. A virtual PBX is actually a service provided by a third party; your phones connect to the service provider's PBX over the public Internet.

The features you need in a small business phone system depend on the number of employees, their location(s), and the workflow of your office(s). Do you need to transfer calls to remote offices? How about mobile device access to voicemail? Analyze your business needs carefully before going shopping for a small business phone system. Most phone systems on the market support these features, among many others:

• Multiple extensions
• Call-forwarding and transfer
• Route-to-fax
• Remote voicemail access

Some systems include teleconferencing, although that feature is readily available from third-party teleconferencing services. Likewise, with videoconferencing and other collaborative voice-data services such as Webinars and whiteboarding, you're probably better off not bundling those services into your business phone system.

Other Phone System Features

Other features you may find useful in a small business phone system include "call hunt" and auto-attendant. Call hunt means an incoming call never goes unanswered; the system hunts through all extensions in a given group or department until it finds someone who is available to take a call. An auto-attendant can be a simple computer-generated greeting that helps callers select a person with whom they wish to be connected, or a more complex Integrated Voice Response (IVR) system with voice menu trees and many options.

An IVR can let customers serve themselves to many simple business functions you offer - such as checking account balances or requesting a fax of an instruction manual. But an IVR is commonly called "Voice Menu Hell" because, if the menu system is poorly designed, people get stuck in it forever.

You can purchase entry-level small business phone systems at electronics and office supply stores such as Staples, Best Buy or OfficeMax. And installing one of these systems is usually just a matter of plugging them into the existing phone jacks. If you need additional phone lines or jacks installed, it's probably best to contact a local business that specializes in business phone systems.

Choosing a small business phone system correctly can give your business a big edge in professional image, productivity, and cost savings. Choosing the wrong small business phone system can lead to lost customers, dropped calls, and frustrated employees. Many small businesses turn to phone system consultants to help them figure out their needs; explore their options; and purchase the right system.

Training staff to use a new small business phone system is another service that consultants and vendors offer. Don't skimp on the training; it will get your people up to maximum productivity faster and give them the confidence to use all of the features for which you paid.

Certain kinds of businesses can justify 24-hour answering services by the incremental profit they pick up. If having a live person answer a call at midnight stops a potential customer from calling your competitors, then it may be worthwhile.

Other businesses absolutely must have a 24-hour answering service to meet their customers' expectations. Doctors of humans and vital machinery are examples of professionals who, when customers call day or night, had better not give them voice menus if they want to keep doing business with those customers!

Doctors' answering services are especially critical; not just any 24-hour answering service will do. The operators who take calls will deal with panic-stricken patients, more than likely. "Little Johnny is running a 102 degree fever - what do I DO?" cries Mom. Specialists in medical answering services should be as well-trained and professional as 911 emergency call takers. Often, such people are recruited by physicians answering services. Former nurses who no longer want to change bedpans make good doctors answering service operators, too. Ask questions about the backgrounds of operators and the training they receive.

Emergency repair services need 24-hour answering services because callers often don't know exactly how to explain what's wrong with the failed equipment. A live operator, properly trained, can ask questions that help pinpoint the nature of the equipment problem. Then a repair technician can be dispatched with the proper tools, parts, and know-how. It's a big help if the answering service has operators experienced in handling calls for your type of equipment. Ask about the industry experience of the answering service's operator pool.

Be careful of 24-hour answering services whose operators only work during regular business hours. How would they do that, you might ask. Simple: an answering service can employ operators who are physically located in any time zone, spreading work around the globe so that no one has to work the graveyard shift. But you can see what happens: in the wee hours of the morning, someone in India or the Philippines who your customers can barely understand will be answering their calls.

Global financial services may also need a 24-hour answering service, and an international answering service may actually be a plus for them. It depends on whether the answering service can rapidly transfer a customer in, say, Saudi Arabia to an operator who speaks his or her language.

A 24-hour answering service will cost at minimum several hundred dollars per month. If you are accustomed to using an auto-attendant for after-hours callers, you may have to experiment with a 24-hour answering service for a few months to see if it justifies its cost. So look for a service that won't lock you into a long-term contract.

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In many cases, pressing the zero button at every prompt will soon get the point across that you want an "operator". In IVR systems, repeating the word "operator" may have the same effect. If the IVR system says it doesn't understand "operator" try "live help." Often, the thing will give up and say, "OK, let me connect you to a customer service representative" or something similar.

There are some tricks, though, for bypassing the robo-attendant, and getting connected to a real person. If you bank with Bank of America, press the zero key twice after the first recitation of the voice menu options and you will be connected to a live human being. If you bank with Chase, press 5 and wait a moment; then press 1, 4, and zero.

A number of Web sites let frustrated callers share the tricks they have learned for cutting through the voice menu mazes of major companies. GetHuman.com is one example. The magic sequence of keys to get a live human being at Comcast, for example, is "Press the # key at all prompts; say 'no' three times".

GetHuman.com also lists the "top secret magic phone numbers" that are answered by live humans always, although it can take a while. The average wait time for Verizon Wireless is 12.5 minutes, according to reports from GetHuman.com users. As they say in coffee shop lines, "You'll get fast, friendly service no matter how long it takes."

Here's a neat trick: pretend that you speak Spanish, then change your mind. Press the key to select voice menu prompts in Spanish, then say you don't speak Spanish, in English. Most systems will transfer you to a live person who speaks English (although there may be a foreign accent). The trick is to get yourself into the shorter line of Spanish-speaking callers who need live help; they don't have to wait as long as the English speaking majority.

Web-Based Services That Can Help

Fonolo is a free Web-based service that does "deep dialing" for you, connecting you directly to the option in an IVR menu that you want with just one click of your mouse. You don't have to wait while voice menu options are recited or press multiple keys to get to the key that you need. There is also an iPhone app that does Fonolo deep dialing. For companies that use IVR systems, Fonolo sells an enterprise software system that adds deep dialing functionality for frequent callers' convenience.

Oh, and if do finally reach a live operator, and end up getting put on hold, the LucyPhone service can help. Lucy is a free service that connects you to the number you want, and if you get put on hold, just press "**". Your call will be disconnected but Lucy will stay on the line, patiently waiting on your behalf. When the operator returns, Lucy calls you back and reconnects you to the conversation.

Voice menu mazes and annoying "on hold" situations can be trimmed with these tricks, saving you time and frustration.

Do you have something to say about how to avoid voice mail menus and connect with a live operator? Post your comment or question below…

You've undoubtedly heard interactive voice response systems in action when calling your bank, making hotel reservations, or when booking a flight. "To make a reservation, press 2 or say 'reservations' ..." AVR systems do a pretty good job of understanding a discrete set of spoken words, and providing you with the information you want. And if necessary, an IVR system can connect a caller to a live human being.

When linked to a company's databases, an IVR system can do much more than speak canned scripts and transfer calls. Given a customer's name or account number, it can look up the current status of orders; tell the customer how much money he owes; and even accept and process payments without any human assistance. That sounds pretty tempting to many business owners.

Profits can be increased in two ways by an IVR system. First, a lot of labor costs can be saved. You don't have to pay live operators to answer calls or to just sit there waiting for calls. Second, callers who want to give you money don't have to wait on hold to do so, with the danger that they might get tired of waiting and spend their money elsewhere. If that sounds good to you, there are two ways to implement an IVR system.

You can buy a turnkey IVR phone system from a system integrator. That's a complete hardware and software solution that includes a server computer; specialized telephony cards that handle incoming and outgoing voice traffic; and the software that makes everything work. The system integrator will analyze your business processes and program the system to do what is needed.

IVR Vendors and Services

The technology to run automated telephone response systems, even on low-end personal computers has been around for 20 years or more. If you are interested in creating your own voicemail or voice response system, check out the entry-level products sold by Talking Technology Inc. About 10 years ago, I used a 386 computer, a digital thermometer, and a BigmOuth system from TTI to create a "time & temperature" service and some simple games that interacted with the touchtone keypad. I'll admit that's a bit geeky, but you don't have to be a programmer or even a 'computer person' to make use of a voice response system.

Some well known IVR providers and system integrators include Database Systems Corp. (DBSC), Genesys, Avaya, Cisco, Convergsys/Intervoice, Holly Connects, Nortel, Syntellect, and Voxeo. You can download a report prepared by Datamonitor market researchers that describes the IVR technology and these leading vendors.

The cost of an IVR system can range from a few thousand to over a million dollars. Much of the cost lies in the consulting, programming, installation, training, and maintenance services provided by the systems integrator. But hardware and software are expensive, and then there is the monthly cost of enough phone lines to handle peak traffic. You can save substantial up-front dollars by outsourcing your IVR needs to a hosted IVR service provider.

With an IVR provider you will pay a setup fee that covers the analysis of your needs and custom programming of an IVR system hosted at the service provider's data center. Once the system is in operation, you pay only for the services you use. Service fees are generally based on a per-call fee, and perhaps on "transaction fees" such as customer records accessed, credit card payments processed, etc.

The same vendors who sell turnkey IVR systems offer on-demand services too. Additionally, hundreds of second-tier AVR and IVR service providers are out there. You have to ask questions and check references to make sure you are getting a well-established professional service provider, and not someone with a computer and a couple of phone lines in his spare bedroom.

Do you have something to say about interactive voice response (IVR) systems? Post your comment or question below...

Recording a customized voicemail greeting is important. Often, people don't recognize the number of an incoming call; if they don't hear a recognizable name when they call back they may well hang up. A custom voicemail greeting can be as simple as,

"Hi, this is (insert name), you know what to do..."

It doesn't pay to get too fancy or cute with voicemail greetings. No one wants to hear you burp, or the first 90 seconds of your current favorite song, before they get to leave you a message. So keep it short and sweet, unless you're trying to discourage the leaving of voicemail messages.

Business voicemail greetings should be as succinct as possible while telling callers how to reach whoever or whatever they want. Professional voicemail greeting recording services are available to help you write a script and even record the greeting with professional voice actors. It can be worth the investment if you want to project the best phone image possible.

Optional Voicemail Features

Voicemail groups are handy for business or personal voicemail users. A voicemail group is a list of phone numbers that belong to people who have something in common; i. e., "family," "customers," "bill collectors," etc. Your voicemail service can be programmed to handle calls from members of a voicemail group in a specified way. For example, bill collectors can be told, "the number you have reached is not in service," while calls from family members are forwarded to you with a special ring pattern or ringtone. Voicemail groups are set up by creating a group name and adding phone numbers to the group, either manually or by just pressing a button to add the last incoming call's number to the group.

Call forwarding is great if it's managed properly, or it can result in missed calls. If you set up voicemail to forward calls to another number, remember to change that number when you move to a new location.

Listen carefully to the setup options when managing call forwarding. You may be able to give the caller choices such as, "press 1 to leave a message or 2 to look for (you)." Another option often provided by voicemail services is to tell callers from unfamiliar numbers, or numbers whose caller-ID data is blocked, that you do not accept voicemail or calls from unidentifiable callers and then hang up on them. The first "find me" option is useful with customer voicemail groups, while the latter is handy for avoiding telemarketers and bill collectors.

It can take several minutes to set up voicemail options correctly and professionally. But once set up, most options remain the same. Then you will get more voicemail you want and less of what you don't want.

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Before we talk about the advantages of a virtual receptionist, we'd better discuss exactly what that is.

You may have heard of a virtual PBX – an office phone system that takes up no office space and requires no phone lines. A virtual PBX consists of software on a remote server connected to the Internet. It provides all calling, call management, and reporting features of a physical PBX without the up front hardware cost and ongoing maintenance. You pay only for the PBX services you use. See the related article Virtual PBX for more info.

A virtual receptionist works the same way, essentially. It's expensive and time-consuming to recruit, hire, and train a live receptionist. Then you have to pay another employee; pay the employee's taxes and benefits; pay for office space and equipment; and perhaps hire another, Human Resources employee to take care of inevitable "people problems." But with a virtual receptionist, you just call up a vendor; provide your office phone directory and the words you want the receptionist to say; and pay only for the time that the virtual receptionist is receiving and directing callers.

You can choose between a live or automated receptionist. Either can work on a virtual, "not in my office" basis. A live remote receptionist physically works in a call center somewhere, or perhaps even from home; it doesn't matter to you as long the calls get answered professionally and routed correctly. A software-based automated receptionist is a specialized program running on a computer in a data center somewhere. There are pros and cons to live and automated virtual receptionists.

A live receptionist has a personality, usually. Callers don't smile and feel good when a computer answers the phone, even if it calls them by name. On the other hand, an automated receptionist can handle many callers simultaneously so no one hears interminable ringing or "Can you hold a moment, please...? ". A live receptionist cannot work around the clock, although several shifts of them can. But an automated receptionist cannot think, so it cannot respond to callers' requests that are not pre-programmed into its software.

Perhaps most importantly, an automated receptionist can't do anything but answer phone and route calls. A live virtual receptionist can also provide virtual secretarial services: typing, making travel arrangements, ordering office supplies or pizza -- just about anything except make coffee for you. (Actually, that *would* be possible with the right home-automation hardware and software.)

Such virtual administrative assistants cost more than less versatile virtual receptionists. But remember, you pay only for what you use. You don't have to pay someone to sit around waiting for you to need something. A virtual office assistant works with multiple clients and is seldom idle. Therein lies one potential disadvantage of virtual office solutions.

If you need something done instantly – like a package delivered to the Fedex drop-off box before pickup time – then it's good to have a live person at your beck and call. But if your days are less urgent (and they should be) then waiting a few minutes or even hours for something to get done won't matter. An online virtual office assistant may well work for you, and save you a great deal of money.

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Why hire a professional answering service for your business? There are several good reasons. First, people hate voicemail. They feel vaguely insulted to be answered by a machine, as if they aren't important enough to be greeted by a live human being. That's not the impression that a businessperson wants to give. (Inhuman corporations don't care, of course.)

Second, people have questions when they call, as often as not. It is well-known that automated speech-recognition voice response systems do not understand questions very well. Again, people hate that; they don't want to repeat themselves to a live person, let alone an infernal machine. Many a sale has been lost because questions have gone unanswered.

Third, a live person implies that you have employees and therefore are a "real" company. You must be doing well if you can pay someone to answer your calls, and people with money want to do business with other people who have money.

That said, we can define "telephone answering services" as companies that provide live human beings to answer your phone calls and customers' questions. A live person who merely states your company's name and demands, "How may I direct your call" may as well be a machine. An answering service provides answers, not questions.

A live telephone answering service costs more than an automated system but less than a full-time employee. That's because answering services get higher utilization rates from their pools of live operators. A dedicated live receptionist may sit idle for hours in between calls. But an answering service operator has multiple clients. You pay only for the time an operator spends answering your calls.

It's difficult to tell how much a telephone answering service will cost without calling for a customized quotation. It depends on your average monthly call volume; the complexity of your customers' questions and their answers; and other factors. But generally speaking, a live telephone answering service will run between $100 and $500 for a small business.

Hiring a Telephone Answering Service

You do have to be careful, when hiring an answering service, that they are able to represent you well. Ideally, they will have the savvy to know which company the inbound caller was trying to reach, and answer the phone appropriately. Callers who hear "Answering Service" instead of "Gidgets Widgets" may be put off right away. The telephone rep should always give the impression that he or she is your employee, and never say "I'm just the answering service." And of course, basic English skills are essential, whether the call center is offshore or in the USA.

How often have you called a business and heard a greeting like "Hulloo, dis is Tom. How can I be helping you today?" You know darn well the guy's name is not Tom, and that he's sitting in a cubicle somewhere in Bangalore, India. In some cases, that's fine, but most US-based companies don't want callers to know their call has been outsourced to an answering service ten thousand miles away. And since the service has to relay the name, phone number and message from the caller to you, the ability to communicate well in written English is a must.

Telephone answering services are distinct from inbound telemarketing services. The latter's operators are trained to do one thing: sell something to each caller. "I don't have that information" is the standard answer to any other question a caller may ask, even "Where is your business located?" A telephone answering service is more helpful, hospitable, and gracious – the sort of image that human-owned businesses want to project.

However, an answering service is not a specialized department with deep expertise in any aspect of your business. Don't expect a receptionist to close deals or provide technical support. An answering service's job is to make callers comfortable enough to do business with you, and make them happy to wait for you (or an appropriate employee) to call them back. If you have a business that requires a telephone presence, and you (or your staff) can't answer the phones directly, a telephone answering service will be a good investment.

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Here are mini-reviews of ten internet-based voicemail service providers. Each has it's own set of offerings, price points and unique features. Some even have free online voicemail services or free trial periods so you can try them at no cost and find out if it's right for you or your business.

• Google Voice: offers a free voicemail to email service, voicemail transcription, custom greetings on a per-caller basis, and call routing. Wouldn't it be nice to read your voicemails via email, instead of listening to them? You can also easily forward an email - the audio or transcribed text - to someone else. Google Voice also offers call blocking, call recording, and conference calling - all for free!
• My1Voice.com: includes a toll-free phone number dedicated to your business; virtual receptionist (voice menu) to direct callers to appropriate extensions; you provide script and they record greeting in pro studio; dial-by-name directory; informational messages such as hours and location; starting at $10/month. Free 30-day trial.
• MaxEmail.com: Internet voice and fax services, and voicemail to email (audio file attachments, no speech-to-text translation); pricing ranges from $7 to $40 per month base, plus extra charges when you exceed allotments. "Custom solutions" for very large enterprises.
• RingCentral.com: Voice-over-IP (VoIP) phone and fax services tailored for small, large, and mobile businesses. Bundled plans start at $50/month for 1 user (up to 10 extensions), range to $180/month for up to 8 users. Custom pricing can be quoted for 10 users or more. Each plan includes a separate fax number, and either a local or toll-free main voice number. High-quality conference calling VoIP is also available, with microphone range up to ten feet.
• Grasshopper.com (formerly GotVmail): virtual office services "for entrepreneurs," meaning cheap and rapidly scalable. Start with a portable, toll-free or local number for as low as $10/month. It comes with a customizable main greeting and voice menu with informational and fax-on-demand menu options; unlimited extensions; dial-by-name directory; on-hold music; and conference calling. Includes voicemail and fax to email and email to fax. Supports Blackberry and iPhone. Intelligent call routing so if Joe is unavailable Jane gets his callers, etc. Optional voicemail-to-text, "true" 800 number service, studio production of greetings and voice menu scripts.
• Kall8.com: Instant activation of 800-numbers starting as low as $2/month. Includes voicemail and inbound fax mailbox; call tracking and blocking tools; customizable call forwarding; conference calling. Web interface lets you change numbers to which 800-callers are forwarded, add features, and generate call detail reports. Optional features include local numbers; hunt groups; international numbers; and more.
• VoiceCloud.com: Voicemail-to-text SMS and email forwarding; or listen to messages by phone or email file attachment. Unlimited message storage, "forever," means callers never get "mailbox is full" and you can find messages via the Web interface. Works on any phone including the iPhone. Basic $7.95/month plan includes up to 50 transcribed messages; $19.95 unlimited. 7-day free trial.
• Phone.com Virtual Office: one phone number lets callers reach any of your staff, anywhere they are. Designed for companies with multiple, distributed employees. As you may guess from the primo domain name, phone.com, this firm has been in business a very long time. Its enterprise-class virtual PBX services are extensive; read the downloadable brochure. Pricing starts at $14.88/month for up to 300 minutes, plus 4.9 cents per additional minute.
• FreedomVoice.com: toll-free numbers and virtual office services, starting at $10/month. Vanity toll-free numbers available, e. g., 1-800-UNI-CORN. Includes auto-attendant, call forwarding, Internet fax, voicemail-to-text transcription or MPe email attachments, conference calling, and more.
• Onebox.com: LIVE receptionist and virtual PBX for small businesses, starting at $170/month for 100 minutes of live receptionist. $400/month for 250 minutes, $1.95/minute over allotments. Larger volume plans available. Both packages include 2000 minutes/month of call forwarding/transferring, fax, conference calls, and other hands-off VoIP services.

Do you know about an internet voicemail service that's not on my list? Post a comment and tell me about it...

Almost every business owner would like an 800 or toll-free phone number. Customers don't want to make a toll call to place an order, and a toll-free number also lends an extra measure of credibility to a business, whether you use it as a sales line or for voice mail.

Some companies have built an empire based on their 800 number alone. Ever heard of 800-Flowers? But how do you get one? And is it still possible to get a "vanity number" that spells out the name of your business?

The concept is simple... a toll free number is assigned to you, and calls are then forwarded to any local number you choose. No special equipment or extra phone line is required -- you'll use the same phone you have now to receive calls on the toll-free line. All of the features you have on the local line, (Call Forwarding, Caller ID and Voicemail) will work just the same for incoming toll-free calls. You may want a separate line for your incoming toll-free callers, but that's completely optional.

Toll free numbers were introduced by AT&T in 1967, and originally, all of them started with the 800 prefix. But over the years other toll-free prefixes, such as 888, 877, 866, and 855 have been added to meet the demand. And of course, AT&T no longer has a monopoly in the toll-free number business. Almost every phone company now provides toll-free numbers. They all work exactly the same way, in that there is no charge to the caller -- the receiver pays for the call.

What About Vanity 800 Numbers?

A vanity number is a number that spells out the name of your business, or some other relevant or memorable words, on the telephone keypad. A well-known example is 800-356-9377, which translates to 800-FLOWERS. Check out PhoneSpell.com to see what word(s) a given phone number spells, or vice versa. Vanity numbers are useful because it’s easier for customers to remember your number, especially if you advertise on radio or TV. If your brand matches your phone number, that's a powerful marketing tool.

One website that I've found useful when digging for available toll-free vanity numbers is TollFreeNumbers.com. Just enter the name of your business, or related keywords, in the search box, and the site will present you with a list of matching 800, 888, 877, 866 or 855 numbers that are either available or in disconnect status.

Any number that shows as "Currently Available" can be yours for a one-time fee of $49, and will be activated right away. You can even reserve (hold) a number for 15 days for free.

If a number shows as "Disconnected" that means it's in the process of being returned to the available pool, and can be backordered. There's no guarantee that you'll get that number, but the experts at TollFreeNumbers.com will monitor it and then try to grab it the instant it becomes available. The backorder fees are $195 for an 866 number, $395 for 877 numbers, $595 for 888's and $795 for an 800 number. If they're not able to grab it, you pay nothing.

For numbers that are immediately available, you get free temporary service upon activation, for 30 days or 100 minutes. Yout toll-free number can be ringing to any local number you want within minutes. TollFreeNumbers.com specializes in helping customers get the toll-free number they want, but does not provide ongoing toll-free service. They will assist you in transferring it to another service provider for the ongoing service, and you can use their website to compare prices and service plans offered by various telecom companies.

The TollFreeNumbers.com website is loaded with helpful information about the 800-number industry, service providers, details on the process of obtaining a vanity number, and what goes on behind the scenes.

Do you have something to say about getting a toll-free number? Post your comment or question below...

First, let's define the term PBX. In a nutshell, a PBX is a fancy business switchboard. It connects all the internal phones of a business, routes calls from one person or department to another; and provides features such as auto attendant, customized greetings, call forwarding, conference calling, music on hold and voice mail.

A traditional hardware-based PBX is a bulky, temperamental piece of equipment that requires a substantial closet, at least, to house it. You also need multiple copper phone wires coming into the PBX closet, which often get wired to the wrong terminals on the PBX or disconnected inadvertently. Each copper wire carries a monthly phone line fee. A physical PBX’s price starts at several thousand dollars and can run up to several million. A physical PBX generates substantial heat, and so its closet must be air-conditioned at additional ongoing cost. All of that hardware hassle goes away when you opt for a virtual PBX.

What remains are the telephone handsets on each desk and some sort of connection to the Internet. The connection is often a standard office (ethernet) network, which can carry telephony data as easily as any other kind of data. Some wireless networks can handle voice traffic, eliminating even the shared wiring of an Ethernet network. All the copper wires coming into a physical PBX from the phone company are eliminated, along with their monthly fees. But that's not the only way you save money with a virtual PBX.

You don't buy expensive hardware up front. You don't buy future capacity that you can't use right now. You pay only for Internet connectivity and the virtual PBX services that you actually use each month.

Where is the Virtual PBX Equipment?

But where's the PBX hardware if it's not in your office closet? It's in a data center owned by the virtual PBX service provider, somewhere "in the cloud" of the Internet. A virtual PBX is software running on a computer, just like a Web server, only it serves telephony functions instead of Web pages and their many functions.

Your connection to the virtual PBX is made via the Internet. If the party you call uses such VoIP (Voice over IP) telephony too, then all the traffic of your two-way conversation may travel over the Internet only. But the service provider also has all those copper wires that connect to the PSTN (Public Switched Telephone Network) so you can call anyone, whether they use VoIP, landline or mobile telephones.

The potential downside of a virtual PBX is fairly small. Your telephony traffic will share a physical server with that of other companies. It's possible to overload the server if everyone talks at once, but in practice this hardly ever happens. Most virtual PBX service providers maintain plenty of extra capacity to handle peak loads smoothly.

Another potential vulnerability is that your Internet connection may go down. If you have landline or cell phones as backup you can continue to carry on essential business. But few Internet outages last more than a few minutes.

RingCentral, My1Voice and other companies offer virtual PBX services for small, medium and large businesses. You can even use a virtual PBX if you're a one-person operation, to give the appearance of a larger company.

Virtual PBX service makes a compelling cost-savings case for businesses of all sizes. The bigger your telephony needs, the more money you save. Enterprise-class virtual PBX services are available starting as low as ten dollars a month, even for businesses that need only one phone line.