If you are like countless business owners, you do not consider missed calls as a major deal. You may not like it, but these situations happen regularly. With a huge emphasis on digital communication, you may think phone calls are less important than responding to social media, email, or comments on your website. Unfortunately, statistics tell a different story. 80% of all business communications occur over the phone so when a call is missed, during business hours or not, it impacts your bottom line. Alas, there is a cost-effective solution to this, hiring a 24 7 telephone answering service!
If you choose to continue with business as usual, it is important to understand how missed calls can impact your business.
Why Unanswered Calls Occur
There is an endless number of reasons why missed calls occur but the top six include:
- Employees are not at their desks.
- Insufficient staff to manage an overload of work.
- Lacking the proper technology.
- Prioritizing digital communications.
- Relying on phone technologies like voicemail to answer.
- Too busy focusing on other customer services.
How Unanswered Calls Cost You Revenue
Missed calls significantly impact your revenue, more than you are likely aware. In the short-term, you lose daily revenue by not speaking to a customer. Approximately 85-percent of missed calls never call back. A good way to calculate the lost short-term revenue is by multiplying the average deal size (in dollars) by the number of missed calls.
In the long-term, missing too many calls can reflect how you conduct business. Around 70-percent of customers will stop dealing with a company with weak customer service and 60-percent will go to your rivals for the product or service.
Additional Impact of Missed Calls
To take the long-term impact a step further, poor customer service has side-effects including:
- Costs you your best employees.
- Decreases customer lifetime value.
- Generates a poor reputation with customers.
- Produces negative word-of-mouth advertising.
24 7 Telephone Answering Service
The good news is a 24 7 telephone answering service can solve all these issues. If you are understaffed or have a focus on other areas of the business, an answering service will ensure the customer speaks to a live representative who can answer their questions, gather information, make appointments, and even garnish leads. Also, the answering service is available to speak to customers after regular business hours. Meanwhile, you and your team can focus on the business side of the organization and let the answering service deal with daily customer service inquiries.
Phone calls continue to be business opportunities you cannot afford to miss. Statistically, missing phone calls equates to poor customer service that can cost you immediate and long-term revenue while damaging your brand. By hiring a 24 7 telephone answering service, your business will be on the road to excellent customer service and overall success!