About Inbound Calls

The majority of business calls in the UK are made to landline geographic, non-geographic or airtime mobiles.

Most businesses print their geographic telephone and fax numbers on their stationery.

Our research suggests that these businesses use the same numbers on their sales brochures, business cards, web site and in their media advertising; and yet that they have little knowledge about the calls they miss.

Most small companies have hitherto installed analogue lines, as and when they need them, because they are simple and use the “plain old telephone system.” (POTS).

Many larger companies install ISDN which uses digital technology (Integrated Subscriber Digital Network). An ISDN 30 bearer can provide up to 30 open channels/lines.

The advantage of ISDN is that as any member of staff can use any free line. Rarely will everyone be on the phone at the same time, so an ISDN 30 can generally readily serve a business with say 40 or even 50 staff. ISDN enables sharing.

To save on the staff costs of employing in-house telephone operators routing all incoming calls, DDIs (Direct Dial In) can be assigned to each staff member, so that if an outside caller knows the DDI of the person they want to contact, they call that person direct. Only if all 30 lines are busy will the caller receive an engaged tone.

Whether a company benefits from individual analogue or integrated digital connectivity, their monthly or quarterly telephone bills rarely include statistics on inbound calls.

This is because their provider is not usually responsible for providing billing or statistical information on who calls them. Besides which, the costs of their inbound calls are being paid for by their callers, who are likely to be using different providers.

So, unless these businesses have installed specialist in-house call logging hardware/software, they won’t be provided with a breakdown of who called, where from, who to, time-of-day, day-of-week, or how long staff take to answer calls.

Even with ‘call loggers’ if their lines are busy at certain times of the day, they simply have no idea how many customers are calling them which don’t get through.

When callers get an engaged tone, our research indicates that most will ring back again in case they mis-dialled the number. This actually increases the missed calls, clogs the lines and can lead to caller frustration.

The sad truth is that most companies have no way of automatically monitoring enquiry response.

They invest huge amounts of capital employing sales staff and advertising their products and services - but often have no automated reports showing how efficiently enquiries from their potential customers have been handled.

So, what are the Solutions to these problems?

Knowledge, valuable up-to-the minute information and total control - all of which are available via our Empowerment Packages that provide Statistics in real-time and instant routing and divert controls over your inbound calls.

NGNs do not replace existing numbers. They provide added benefits. The underlying geographic numbers can always be used in the normal way.

Features

• NGNs reside at Network Level.
• All calls to the NGN are directed by the callers’ carriers to the Hosting Network. Through this Network all calls are routed and delivered to the underlying number.
• One or multiple NGNs can be linked to one underlying number.
• Each media advert or campaign can be given a different NGN yet all calls can be directed to the same phone or hunt group.
• The Hosting Network has much larger line capacity to handle calls than the user’s own lines. With a Network Interactive Voice Response module, every call can be answered and held until a line is free and then transferred.
• NGNs are not geographically based and therefore can be used by companies who wish to provide a national as opposed to local or geographic image.
• NGNs can be re-directed to other underlying numbers within seconds using our Customer Empowerment, Call Care package, which enables our customers to re-route calls instantly to other destinations in the event of an emergency.
• NGN ranges include: 0800 and 0808 Freefone, 0844, 0845, 0870 and 0871 Business Rate. The NGN therefore provides the user with a range of options. These options carry different pricing, costs and/or revenue sharing opportunities.
• Our Customer Empowerment Tools are accessed by a secure password protected web portal.

Benefits

• The Hosting Network carries all the details of where the call came from, date, time, if answered, engaged or unanswered, and how long it took to answer. This information can be disseminated into valuable reports. Knowledge is power.
• It is quick and easy to measure the Return on Investment for each advertisement or media campaign. The Staff do not need to question callers on where they saw the advert.
• This ensures that callers won’t find the lines engaged, so all calls can be answered. Also, there is no longer a need to bear the costs of installing, running and maintaining the excess lines that are only used to handle peak traffic. This produces big savings
• An aspiring company selling a product that has national appeal will generally obtain much greater response using NGNs than by promoting its underlying geographic number.
• An NGN can be for life.
• If an office moves location, the NGN stays the same. No need to re-print a new number. Calls can be diverted if busy to another UK landline without divert charges. Allows business to continue and offers DR solution.
• NGNs enable customers to maximise likely response rates.
• For example, a company selling loans would be likely to obtain most business with an 0800 or 0808 Freefone. They also enable companies to keep in line with competitors’ NGN types.
• Hosted at the Network, the key benefit of all these packages is the absent need to spend Capital. All these modules are therefore highly affordable, with no maintenance costs.