VoIP connectivity continues to go mainstream for thousands of businesses across the U.S. This includes home based businesses as well. The home telephone number continues to morph into someone’s cell phone number and the old telephone continues to lose land lines daily.
What is the advantage of having a VoIP number at your home for connectivity. Well for one, this number can usually be setup as a follow me number. If someone calls you and you are not there, then after, let’s say 5 rings, the number will automatically forward to your cell phone.
Normally you have access to a web portal, where you can change the settings to your requirements. For instance, you may not want your number to follow you after 5pm or on the weekends. You can set that up in the portal. Another advantage is that you can change your call delivery to read your first-last name instead of your business name, or vice-versa. This may be an advantage if you are calling on businesses or to someone’s home.
The cost for this type of service is usually between $30 and $50 per month and may be tax deductible if you are using it for business. You can have it programmed for E911 delivery, so you can make an emergency call if necessary. You can also transport your handset with you and make and receive calls over the internet with your same number. You just need a high speed internet connection.
For more answers, give us a call at 405-253-3885 if you would like to learn more about VoIP!!!
Text Messaging Marketing is one of the newest ways to help drive more customers into your door.
How does it work?
Simple, and very easy for your consumer to get signed up. Normally all they have to do is text a known word, usually the name of your business, to a 5 digit number and they are signed up to receive your text messages. Yes, it really is that simple.
You can then send 4 messages a month to their text enabled device, usually a cell phone, and they can show you the text they receive to get their discount.
How can this work for you?
Just to give an example, restaurants are typically slower on Mondays than any other day of the week. So a restaurant could send a text message at 10am on Monday morning with a “Monday Special”. The message could read, “Monday Lunch Special. Free Soft Drink with any purchased Lunch today. Show Your Text, bring your friends. Expires at 5pm.
This is just an example and can tailored to your business and used any number of ways. You could also:
*Introduce a new product.
*Market some “dusty” inventory.
*Let customers know about a special of the week.
*Let customers know if you are at a special event.
The possibilities are pretty much unlimited to what you can create.
Now, let’s talk about some of the features of your text messaging marketing service.
First of all, you need to make sure that it includes an opt out feature where a consumer can “stop” the messages from coming. There is no reason to annoy someone with unsolicited marketing.
Second, don’t overload your consumer, about 1x per week is enough and keeps you on the top of their mind each week.
Thirdly, make sure your service has an easy to use Graphic User Interface where you can manage the messages that go out, usually via the web.
Lastly, if you have a web site, and who doesn’t nowadays, put your window on your site so that customers can sign up via the web.
This should help with your text messaging marketing needs. Please call New Biz Com for more information or if you have any questions. 405-225-8146
Many Businesses have put together their strategy and spent their advertising budget for the year in the month of January. Unfortunately, that leaves little room for maneuvering through new concepts and ideas that come along later on. It is impossible to anticipate everything about a consumer from the beginning.
Time will be saved, by working through and making a commitment for advertising before the year begins, but 15% of your budgeted annual amount should be saved for decisions that can made throughout the year.
The Reasons Why?
- Your business may go through a change in their product or service or add a new product or service.
- You may need to market that product quickly and effectively.
- You may want to get a new message out to the marketplace through advertising.
- You may get a “Hot” product through consumer demand and want to put out a promotion to take advantage of buying habits that always change.
The bottom line is make sure you have some funds available for additional advertising buying throughout the year. The numbers show you will probably spend it anyway and go over your budget by at least 15%.
We help companies everyday with managing their marketing strategy.
You can contact us directly or via the web for more info!
I have been often questioned since 2003 about the security of MPLS and how the information is kept secure in a Layer 3 environment. If you are not from the world of “Data”, hold on for a couple sentences as we will go into some “tech talk”.
The internet protocol or I.P. connections you have with the your home based computer or any computer connected to the internet is operating in a Layer 3 environment. What that means is, unless you create some type of secure connection with encryption or “label switching”, your data could be seen by someone, probably someone you would rather not have see your data.
Most Banking institutions have transmitted your data via frame relay over the last couple of decades and now are transmitting your information via MPLS (Multi Protocol Label Switching).
Yes, most banks have converted to a Layer 3 environment and are now transmitting your banking information across the same type of connections that you can connect to from your house. The difference is that there are RFC requirements that demand your carrier implement secured ways of transmitting information. So if your bank processes an ATM transaction for you, it will send the information across their own MPLS network to a previously established authorized source and authorize your transaction, thus allowing you to withdraw cash.
So, why have Banks and Corporate America converted their bits and bytes from moving across Frame Relay to moving across MPLS?
- MPLS is normally the less expensive option for companies that have 20 to 2000 locations.
- The latest and fastest switching technology operates in an MPLS environment.
- Carriers (AT&T, Verizon, etc.) are pushing Corporate America to upgrade, thus fulfilling their vendor agreements and showing Wall Street new sales that only slightly exist.
- VoIP. It has become much less expensive to move voice calls across an MPLS network vs. a traditional network.
Another Blog will be coming soon about how to move your voice traffic to an less expensive mode of transport.
For more information and a quote on your existing network, contact us via our web site and will be happy to assist you.
SEO is one of the key factors in making your web site viewable to the world wide web.
The vexing part of SEO is how do you work towards making that happen?
What I have found to be true is that you (and your web site) should be true to yourself.
Focus on your business and what you provide in goods and services to the customer and you will be found on the internet.
Focus on what made your company a great company and in the same breath make sure you have covered the back door by optimizing your online presence. If you have a poor web site, you have a poor web site. Online browsers can see that instantly and will move on. Your site should be easy to navigate throughout and have good information.
Many of the “new” online buyers go here first to check you out. Many companies now focus on their web site exclusively to promote themselves in marketing campaigns and advertising.
We will support you in creating the right online presence through our free consultation at any time.
Just contact us via the web.
This is the time of the year to review your voice and data configurations for your business! There are a couple of reasons for this. First of all, this is something that should be completed on an annual basis, typically a year end exercise. So, if you weren’t able to get to it in 2009, now would be the time.
Second, this is something that you can do to help improve your company’s profitability for 2010. Remember that if you can find some monthly savings right now, it is equal to 11 more months of savings for the accounting team.
If you have made changes to your voice or data services over the past couple of years, there is a chance something got left behind. For instance, many times you will change your voice or data carrier and a phone number or fax line got missed. If you had originally made the request to have it disconnected, then you may be able to receive a credit for that lost disconnection.
Many times you won’t know unless a technician comes out to phone room and does some testing with your phone system and phone lines. This is also a great time to look at your bandwidth utilization and find out if it is time to upgrade.
Right now, carriers have become ultra aggressive in their pricing and new equipment is easily available with the service for almost no charge. So, if you have 1.5MB, now could be a great time to double or triple your bandwidth without incurring much of a change in your monthly rate.
Our company will complete a audit of all of your services and give you our best recommendation at any time.
For more information, please call or contact us via the web!
That is a good question. The answer is: “It depends”. Not a great answer by any means, but a truthful one.
Before you can determine the amount of bandwidth you need, you need to understand the type of traffic you have on your Local Area Network. Here are some of the key questions.
- What type of files are being sent and what are the size of the files being sent?
- Are your users sending a lot of personal files, including video and pics across your LAN?
- What are the identifiable peak times of the highest traffic flow?…and what is causing it?
- What is the percentage of E-mail vs. Internet browsing vs. other internet access requirements?
1.5MB is the standard minimum amount of bandwidth you could use for 20 users, more than likely you will need closer to 3MB. Don’t get confused with the MB that Cable Companies use. They usually offer an asymetrical product that has less upload speed and more download speed.
For a business that depends on the internet, stick with T-1’s and a Router Brand that is supported 24/7. If you are in a Tier 3 or higher metro area, then ask about the fiber redundancy.
Many CLEC’s built out fiber networks in the late 90’s and were then absorbed by the Larger Telcos and use their fiber optic networks for multiple paths across your city.
For more information and pricing, please contact us via our web site!
The answer is yes, you can keep your telephone number by having it “ported”. What you may need to evaluate is whether you need to keep your same telephone number or not. Obviously if it is a number that is constantly being used by your customers or important clients, then you want to keep it. But if it is a non published number or in a block of DID’s, you may not want to keep it. This may be a good time to reallocate parts of your business with a specific number identity. i.e…..Accounting….xxx-xxx-3100 to xxx-xxx-3199.
But, should you absolutely want to keep all of your numbers, then by all means do so. You should be aware that some carriers will charge a “porting” charge which could add some additional costs into your monthly bill.
Some carriers will provide the service at no charge, but incur the charge on their services.
If your business has moved locations in the last couple of years or is constantly moving, adding and changing its phone lines and data lines around, then you should also be aware that potentially you may have “lost track” of your lines, but are still being billed for them.
Our company, New Biz Com will provide a free 30 minute consultation to review your bill.
One of the greatest advantages of Voice over IP is usually the Graphic User Interface that comes along with the service. Most carriers provide one for free or for a minimal charge. Why is this an advantage? Well if you are a little bit familiar with the technology and how the IP Handset operates in conjunction with your LAN (local area network) and provider of service, you can normally move your handset from location to location by plugging in your handset via an ethernet cable and have a moving connection for your one telephone number.
For example, if your service is configured correctly, you can unplug your handset from work and take it home with you and plug it into your high speed internet connection and no one will know the difference when you dial your direct number. When you call someone, your same number will show up on caller id at their location.
The GUI, managed from your web connection should allow you to then change the 911 location, so if you should need to make an emergency call, help will be dispatched to the correct location. In addition, via the GUI, an individual will be able to review calls going in or out, and return calls with the click of a button.
In the traditional PBX world, this type of mobility is not an option. Thus the popularity of the VoIP technology.
VoIP
Voice over IP (Internet Protocol) is one of the hottest topics of the last several years. This topic will receive significant attention in our upcoming newsletters. Some questions that will be answered in future newsletters are:
- What up front costs are involved?
- How do my calls get routed across the internet?
- Does VoIP always go across the internet?
- Do I get charged for long distance calls?
- How do I make changes for moves and disconnects?
- How much bandwidth is required for VoIP?
- Can I redirect my calls to “Follow Me”?
- Can I keep my same telephone numbers?
…or contact us today for more information on Voice Over IP.
