What is Cloud Telephony and How Can it Help You?

In today’s world, automation is the key. It helps keep the teams on the same page while making the process transparent. Moreover, it also helps reduce the effort and time consumed for every activity. Managing business calls is one such activity where there is a requirement for a dedicated workforce.

And this is where cloud telephony can help, as it is an automation tool for phone systems. It helps eliminate the requirement for a receptionist or manual handling of phone calls. The faster you adopt cloud telephony in India, the greater the benefits you can reap, as you will have an advantage over your competitors.

What Exactly is Cloud Telephony?

Cloud telephony, or hosted telephony, is a modern technology that helps take the telephone system to the cloud. Unlike the conventional PBX, it can be set up without capital expenditure. There are many advantages that cloud telephony providers can provide, which will result in the efficient management of business calls.

Below are the products that are part of cloud telephony services.

• Virtual Number is a business number where multiple phone numbers can be mapped.
• Toll-free number is a virtual number that helps in letting your callers connect for free.
• IVR, or interactive voice response, helps interact with callers with keypad tones, voice, and further route calls as required.
• Distributed call centres help manage all the call centres from a centralised cloud location.
• Bulk SMS allows you to send large messages to multiple recipients at once.

How Can Cloud Telephony Solutions Be Beneficial?

If you still need to start using cloud telephony providers in India, you are already lagging behind your nearest competitors and losing out on growth. The transition to cloud telephony in India is simpler and more economical than maintaining the traditional PBX system.

Let us see how cloud telephony services can be beneficial.

Helps in Keeping Your Business Awake When You Sleep

Running a business is about passion; you want to earn profit throughout the day. Cloud telephony solutions can help ensure that you continue earning while you sleep.

An IVR can help ensure that all calls are attended to 24*7. No matter the customer's time zone, they will get the necessary information. You can also assign an agent to attend to calls for a specific duration. And even if your agent is unavailable, your voicemail will take the message on your behalf.

Now there is no need to worry about your phone system, which earlier would sleep when you leave the office.

Use a Single Number to Expand Your Business

Having different contact numbers for other locations can confuse your customer. Having a single business number can be highly beneficial to the business. A virtual number lets you map different business numbers under one primary number.

The callers then can easily choose the language, location, or other details when calling on the direct business number. It will help them directly connect with the agent in a particular location. No location or language can come between your business profits, as a single number will keep your identity uniform.

Let Your Receptionist Rest While IVR Does the Job

There are instances when your receptionist is on leave, and the entire call management becomes a mess. You do not have to worry, as IVR is the solution.

An IVR will act as a virtual receptionist and route your business calls effectively and efficiently to the proper departments. Moreover, it can also deal with high call volume as it will not impact efficiency. So even during the peak season, your customer experience will be top-notch.

Your customers will always leave smiling, even during the busiest peak times.

Set Your Agents Free

Do you want your agents stuck to their wired phones in today's digital and wireless world? Cloud-based IVR can help direct business calls to the concerned agents on their mobile phones, irrespective of location. Of course, it doesn’t mean you will lose track of their performance availability. But cloud telephony providers will help you put everything in one place as you can unchain your agents, allowing them to work comfortably.

Ensure that You Are Getting Worth of Your Marketing Budget

Measuring the ROI of the marketing campaigns that you are running is as critical as other business operations. With the help of unique virtual numbers for every marketing or ad campaign, you can track the campaign that results in the maximum number of calls. Moreover, you will only need a few clicks to retrieve this information.

With this information, you can assign more budget to the most successful campaign in the future. Again, data-based decisions will help you get the best results as you won’t have to beat around the bush.

Make Your Presence Felt Globally With The Virtual Identity

Are you planning to take your business global yet to prepare funds for the new location? No need to worry anymore, as you can expand globally only with a virtual number. Your international customer will also be able to connect with you on your virtual number. And you can connect them to employees in that particular country.

It will also help you assess the market before putting in more money. Getting a virtual number is an excellent investment as the initial investment is small, and the returns are enormous. It is a win-win for businesses as you can build your brand before entering a new geography.

Mask Your Customer-Agent Identities

There are instances where your agents or customers are concerned about their identity getting revealed. But now there is no need to worry as privacy will not come in the way of profits.

Cloud telephony providers in India also provide a call masking feature for all incoming and outgoing business calls. It means that the agent answering the customer will not be able to see their number, and the customer will not be able to see the agent’s number. Instead, there is a temporary disposable number that appears.

With this, your agents and customers will be unbothered after completing their work. Privacy will help you in building trust with the customers as well as the employees.

Monitor Your Employees from a Distance

Your call helps set up your business and brand for your customers. And thus, it is critical to monitor how your employees deal with your customers. Rather than sitting beside your employee and manually looking at a deal with the customers, you can use the call recording features with cloud telephony.

Call recording will help you record the customer and employee conversation. You can hear it anytime and anywhere to monitor how your employee talks to a customer. It can be beneficial for training purposes as well. And you can also use this feature to ensure all your conversations are uniform. Moreover, it can also serve as evidence in any dispute.

Make Your Customer Feel Special All the Time

Your employees will have many calls to deal with; thus, gathering customer details during the call can get complicated. Whenever you receive a call from a customer, the CRM integration will help the employee by displaying all the customer details in a single window. It will also highlight previous queries, tickets, chats, call logs, and other events.

It will also help your employee provide a better and more personalised experience to the customer. And all this while reducing the total call and waiting times. So a good customer experience can be highly beneficial for your business.

Stay in Touch with Your Customers

When you have a new feature, a sale, or some seasonal discount, it is critical for you to convey the same to your customers. You can simultaneously send a single message to multiple receipts using the bulk SMS feature.

And the best part is you do not need a smartphone or a working internet for the message to get delivered. So it helps with maximum reachability with the least effort.

You can also use this feature to facilitate transactions like OTP, order confirmation, etc.

Remarket Your Product To Convert The Customer

Sometimes it isn’t easy to convince the customer on the first go. With remarketing, you will be able to keep your customers engaged. In addition, you can advertise or promote any of your products to the customer through bulk SMS or other modes of advertisement. Use attractive product ads to engage your caller and convert them into customers.

Final Thoughts

Many cloud telephony features can be beneficial to different businesses. You can choose the features that can help your business and get a plan. Some of India's renowned cloud telephony providers are Tata, Reliance, Exotel, and others. So get ready to maximise your profit and optimise your business with the help of cloud telephony features.

The decision is yours if you want your business to stay redundant or move forward and invest in automation to increase efficiency.