Google Voice Chat - Is Google the Killer of Business Phone Service?

I recently took a test drive of the much-hyped Google Voice Chat service. If you are not familiar with Google Voice, it is the latest "app" in a series of great collaboration tools from the giant, Google, to come to fruition. It allows you to get a single phone number and route incoming calls to any other phone number you own based on personalized routing settings.

The service is based on GrandCentral, which Google acquired a couple of years ago. I am lucky enough to have a an account as a previous holder of a GrandCentral account. As of today (when I wrote this article), only previous GrandCentral customers are lucky enough to have an account.

What is Google Voice for?
If you are a like me, you have multiple phones, phone numbers and email addresses. You are on the run (constantly) and you have many people trying to reach you at all times. Google Voice helps you by giving you ONE phone number to announce to the world and lets you configure your inbound calls to "Find You" wherever you are.

How Does It Work?
Callers who dial your number are prompted to announce their name while the service "searches" for you on whatever phone you are currently using. When you pick up the inbound call, Google Voice tells you who is calling and gives you the option to answer or send to voicemail.

There are some additional nice features including voicemail transcript, SMS and conference calling.

Is this right for your business?
If you are a one-person team, this is great for you. You will never be out of reach. If you are a company with, let's say, 25 employees, you need a full-scale business phone system and should look for other options. For a multi-person business, Google falls short in its ability to help colleagues stay connected behind a set of PBX-like features such as extension dialing, auto-attendant, corporate directory, multi-person ACD queues and more.

To get the virtual aspects of Google Voice, a multi-person company should look at a hosted business phone service. There are plenty of business VoIP solutions such as hosted PBX, many of which incorporate some of the find-me anywhere features at the user level inherent in Google Voice.

While I don't think Google Voice is quite ready for corporate deployments as a complete phone service alternative, kudos to Google for snapping up GrandCentral and bringing it to the mainstream. I was a fan back in the day and will continue to use it!

OnSIP is a complete business phone service delivered over the Internet and capable of supporting hundreds of users for any sized organization.

Joseph DeBari
Junction Networks

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Joe_DeBari

Email Marketing Software - 3 Big Mistakes When Sending Emails

Plenty of software developers on the Internet will claim their software is user-friendly. They will also give 100% assurance about its performance. The reality, however, suggests otherwise. You should select email marketing software only after you've conducted a comparative analysis of the options available to you. Remember that the software you select has to make email marketing an easy process and reduce your workload. People generally select marketing software based on their email campaign requirements. The following are some of the mistakes that people make, when selecting email software:

They don't consult experts

An elementary mistake that people make is not consulting experts. No matter what your email campaign requirements are, always consult an expert before you purchase new marketing software. You cannot make this decision on your own as you've not used the software before. You can gather information about various tools available to you, from the people who use them. Once this is done, ask for professional opinion. The cost of marketing software depends on the features it offers, the number of people using it and the functions it can carry out.

They don't consider customer reviews

Another mistake that people make is they do not take into account customers' reviews. You may find a few reviews exaggerated; nevertheless, they will surely give you a nudge in the right direction. User experiences and observations are a useful source of information. Once you've selected the tool, browse through forums and blogs associated with the tool. Based on the information you find, make a decision.

They invest in low quality apps

There are several email tools available on the Internet. However, not all of them are of the highest quality and dependable. Free email marketing campaigns have become very popular and marketing tools have become an integral part of the setup, therefore, be cautious about what you buy. You can choose to use free software for email marketing but those might limit your options greatly. Various portals do offer free services for creating groups but they might freeze the number of subscribers for one free session. You might be able to send an unlimited number of copies of your email newsletters only when you pay for the email software.

Email marketing is an effective means to promote your products or services when organized and executed carefully. It can help you develop long lasting relationships with your customers. However, if it's not used carefully, it can damage your business prospects and company reputation. Selecting reliable email marketing software is very important to ensure a successful campaign.

Gary San is a best practices activist and advocate for Benchmark Email (http://www.benchmarkemail.com/email-marketing), a leading Web and permission-based email marketing service.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Gary_San





Email Marketing Podcast:







Email Marketing Tutorial:

Web Based CRM Software - Increase Your Business Profits with This Sofware

Creating a dynamic business that thrives in every economic climate is not as difficult as you might think. Web based CRM software can help you to improve your sales and get more from your customer database.

One of the most overlooked sources of new business is your past and existing customers. After all, if they've already had some interaction with you and your products or services, you have a much greater chance of winning their business again.

Web based CRM software can enable you to fine-tune your customer relationships in several ways:

- You can use it to figure out which of your customers are just shopping around and which ones are ready to buy right now

- Turn enquiries into qualified leads who become customers sooner rather than later

- Target your correspondence to suit the stage your customers are at, such as sending alternative product offers or price offers to existing customers and reminding casual shoppers about the great deals you can offer them

- Use it for detailed analysis to figure out how many inquiries you're converting into actual sales and then work on ways to improve that conversion rate

- Create and manage a marketing database

There are many more ways to increase your profits from using effective web based CRM software, but perhaps the biggest is the convenience.

You see, accessing a web-based service means you can even access your data and your information when you're on the road or away from the office. It also allows you greater security when it comes to protecting your customer's private information.

Once your data is being compiled into a web based CRM software platform, you'll be able to use that data to figure out sales forecasts, sales analysis, effectively manage projects, event management capabilities and much more.

While it might sound tempting to have all this information installed directly onto your business's central computer system and then spread across your business network, often the cost of licensing your own software package can be less competitive. You also run the risk of the entire database being lost if something happens to your business's central computer.

By using a web based CRM software platform that offers you a free trial, you'll immediately begin to understand the power you have at your fingertips. As soon as you begin to put that information to good use for you in your business, you should notice how easy it is to track, monitor and increase sales profitability.

For a free trial of SwiftCRM, a hosted CRM application focused on sales automation, please click through to the website.

For more information, visit http://swiftcrm.com/a/web-based-crm-software.php and see learn to boost your sales easily.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Roger_Vetruba