Home Office Telephony

Feature Of The Week: Virtual PBX Extension

As you shop around the internet trying to find the best phone system for your small business you may come across Virtual PBX's (VPBX) and decide to try this type of service out. When comparing several providers you may notice that they all offer a certain amount of extensions with each of their plans.

What is a Virtual PBX extension?

Before the era of virtual phone systems, an extension was typically a physical phone wired to a phone system and assigned its own extension number. Callers who dialed that specific extension number would get ring that particular extension.

These days an extension is best thought of as a routing path. In other words, when a caller dials a number what path does that call take and where does that path lead? If a VPBX service provider offers you 5 extensions that means there are 5 paths a call can be routed.

For example, my virtual pbx for Your Telecom Advisor has 5 extensions. My main extension (Extension 0) is the auto-attendant, the traffic cop of my system. It gives people options according to who they want to reach.

If they dial my extension 1, the system is set up to find me. It rings my home office number and my cell phone simultaneously. If I'm not available to take the call it goes to my personal voicemail.

If they dial my extension 2, the caller goes to a recorded message explaining my Phone Image Makeover service and giving the caller instructions on how to sign up for the service.

People who dial extension 3 do so because they are interested in hiring me as an Associate Virtual Assistant, the other side of my company. The caller goes to a message explaining the virtual assistance services I specialize in and gives them the option to leave me a message – a separate voicemail from my personal voicemail box.

Another way to use extensions is to assign a separate phone number to each extension. For example, many entrepreneurs have multiple businesses each with its own separate identity, target market and branding. A separate phone number and extension can be assigned to each one of those businesses. You can answer with the appropriate greeting and each can have its own voicemail. Multiple business entities – One phone system.

There are other ways to use extensions in businesses. Leave me a comment if you are using extensions in a way I have not mentioned.

Home Office Telephony Pick Gets Top Prize

Phone.com - one of my picks on the Top 5 Virtual Phone Services Companies list - has been awarded Internet Telephony Magazine's 10^th Annual Product of the Year Award for 2007. I am currently trialling their Virtual Office product and so far I am very impressed with their features and capabilities. A more detailed review of the product will follow in a future post.

I have "met" Ari Rabban, CEO of Phone.Com on the phone (very fittingly) and discussed what he believes to be his company's main differentiator – a clear focus on the needs of home based businesses. Judging from this award it appears they are most certainly on the right track.

You can click Here to read the full announcement. Congratulations, Ari. Keep up the good work!

Home Based Business Connectivity Primer Part 1 – Broadband Internet Connection

(This post has been slightly delayed by the overwhelming interest in the Phone Image Makeover service shown by you – my fellow independent professionals. I am thrilled and I thank you.)

When I speak with home based business owners, especially ones during the start up phase of their business, I am often asked what I consider to be the essential products and services for the well connected home office professional on a shoestring budget. In this multi-part series I will share what I consider to be the basics of the well connected independent professional. Several are not telecom services – strictly speaking, but they are related enough to warrant writing about in this blog.

1. Fast Access Broadband Internet Connection – Nothing will make a bigger difference in your productivity (and your sanity) than the speed of your internet service. This is an area in which frugality does not pay. I recommend you shop for a DSL or Cable broadband service that offers at least 1.5 Mbps downstream speed and 285 Kbps upstream. Anything slower than that will have you pulling your hair out while you wait for web pages to display and your e-mail to download.

   The fastest and most convenient way to shop around is using a comparison shopping website such as ShopForDSL.Com. You enter your name, e-mail and telephone number (make sure the number you input is a physical land line at your location since that's what the system uses to search) and the system will give you several options of companies that service your area and the available plans. Unfortunately, this service will only work for US based consumers.

   Note: Even if you already have fast access internet you wouldn't lose anything by shopping around. You may find that you could get a much better deal by switching providers.

Now, if you are one of the unfortunate souls who live in an area where fast access broadband is not available I suggest you move.

Nah! Just kidding! There are other options available to you:

• Dial Up Internet – Not the ideal, by any means, but any internet connection is better than none. The choices abound in the marketplace for this kind of service. Look for providers with plenty of access numbers in your local area. You wouldn't want to add insult to injury by having to pay a long distance charge on top of a monthly fee.
• Satellite and Fixed Wireless – being lucky enough to live in an area with available cable and DSL broadband services I did some research to find other options for my more distant counterparts. I found this great article by ComputerWorld titled Rural broadband: Finding alternatives to DSL and cable where it discusses fixed wireless and satellite alternatives. Check it out.

Whatever services you have available I suggest you get the fastest you can afford. You'll thank me later.

Stay tuned for the next installment where I'll discuss E-Mail and it's role in the well connected home office.

Feature of the Week: Virtual Phone Number

Wikipedia defines Virtual Phone Number as "a telephone number without an associated phone line. Usually these numbers are programmed to be forwarded to either a Voice over IP service, or to a different phone line, fixed or mobile."

Let's put that into context. Let's say you have a Virtual Assistant business in Florida, USA and you've discovered that your particular services are in high demand in London, U.K. You want to make it as easy as possible for prospects in London to be able to reach you and for them to get the feel that you have a presence in their neighborhood.

How do you accomplish that? By purchasing a London virtual number that people in that area can dial for free and point it to your local business number or voip service.

The service is billed much like a toll free number. You pay a monthly fee for the number and termination charges depending on where your number is pointed to. If it's pointed to a local land line or mobile phone line you will pay a certain amount per minute. If it's pointed to a SIP phone or other VOIP type service there are usually no per minute termination charges.

Most Virtual PBX's and VOIP service providers offer virtual numbers. There are also companies such as Virtual Phone Line whose main offering is virtual numbers.

My VANA Presentation Tonight

The Virtual Assistant Networking Association (VANA) has invited me to speak this evening on the topic of "How To Make Your Home Based Business Sound Like a Fortune 500 Company – Telecom Technologies To Consider This New Year". This free seminar will be tonight January 9^th at 6:00 PM EST. For more information please visit VANA Seminars.

I know this is short notice so if you can't make it make sure you visit that page when it's convenient for you. The seminar will be recorded and available for download.

Introducing: The Phone Image Makeover

On Monday I finally launched my brand new service – The Phone Image Makeover – and with it a brand new website. Check it out at Your Telecom Advisor.Com . I am really excited to finally be able to work one-on-one with home based business owners and help them enhance their phone image and implement the most cost effective phone systems for their businesses.

This blog will continue to be the vehicle with which I intend to share information about the most innovative technologies for micro-businesses. Stick around. There's lots more to come. And if you have any suggestions on what content you would like to see here please leave me a comment below.

Feature of the Week: Fax On Demand

One of the most important skills every solo-preneur must master in order to be successful is the ability to leverage his/her time to the max. After all, there are only so many working hours in each day and there's only so much you can physically do yourself. This is where automation can be extremely helpful.

This week's feature of the week – Fax on Demand – is an automated system which allows you to upload documents to a server and make them available to prospects by fax.

For example, let's say you are a Realtor and you've acquired a listing for a $1 million dollar home. You will likely place a lawn sign on the property with your phone number and a message saying "For more information call xxx-xxx-xxxx ext 103." When the potential client dials that number they will be given the option to listen to details about the property and to have a listing sheet faxed to them. They can then enter their fax number and the system will fax them the appropriate listing sheet.

Notice how this whole process has required no work on your part aside from installing the lawn sign and uploading the listing sheet. However, you will be able to look at the call detail and see who has requested listing sheets by their caller id and allowing you to follow up with them at a time that's convenient for you.

There are many possible applications for this system. You could upload your company brochure, service list, sale flyer, spec sheet, white papers or even articles. Anything that you believe will be of interest to your prospects and that will make them more likely to buy from you when they are ready.

The Cure For The Holiday Hangover: Get Busy!

At the end of each year many business coaches and self-development gurus encourage entrepreneurs to do an assessment of how their business fared that year. Did they reach their revenue goals? Did they control their expenses? Did they keep their promises to their clients?

But, really… during the holidays, who has the time? For the home based business owner the holidays are usually the time of year when it is toughest to separate your business life from your personal life. With visiting relatives, children off from school or daycare and all the social engagements that must be kept it's amazing if we get any work done at all – let alone do things like assessments and goals review.

This is why I prefer to do such things the first week of the year. There is something about the optimism of the new year that makes the sins and foibles of the previous year somehow easier to take. Since the topic of this blog is telecommunications, here are a few items I suggest you check out that may have had a big impact in your communications expenses:

• Check your cell phone plan – Take a look at your cell phone bill. Actually, it is usually best to look at 3 consecutive months since usage can vary greatly from one month to the next. Compare your usage to your included plan minutes. Are you consistently over? Consistently under? Many people assume that when they sign a term contract with the cell provider they are stuck with whatever plan they signed up for. With most carriers that is not typically the case. You can usually upgrade or downgrade your plan without a penalty. If you are consistently going over plan, it might be worth it for you to upgrade to the next level up. Overage minutes tend to be outrageously expensive. The same holds true if you are significantly under plan every month – could you maybe downgrade your plan and save some money?
• Check your home/business line bill – Do you really use all those features you are paying for? Do you need that second line for your business or could you get away with using a virtual pbx plus your home line?
• Check your long distance usage – Are you paying more per minute than you should for long distance calls? How do you know if the rate you are paying is the best out there? Easy. You use one of the many calculators available on the internet. With bill in hand, plug in the number of minutes and the dollar amount and these calculators will calculate how much you are paying and if there are plans out there that could save you money. I use one by Cognigen. Click here to access it: Best Rate Calculator. It is my affiliate link so share the love if you feel so moved.
• For heavy Long Distance Users – Although I've had a love/hate relationship with voip solutions, you can't beat their unlimited plans. There are two things you should do before you look into subscribing to a VOIP service. The first one is to test your broadband connection to make sure your speed can support voip calls. There are many speed checkers out there. I use MySpeed PC VOIP. It's a downloadable application. There are web based ones available out there as well. The second thing you should do is read as many user reviews as you can for the companies you are considering. A couple of really good review sites are VoipReview.org and WhichVoip.Com. If a company continually gets bad reviews from users take heed. If you don't have the right broadband speed or don't want to use Voip, check with your local phone line provider to see if they offer and unlimited LD plan. Most do.

Of course, if you are too busy or would rather not deal with all these details sign up for a Phone Image Makeover and I will make sure you are not paying too much for your telecom services. Click here to request more information about the makeover. Hope you have an amazing 2008!