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If you’re a main street business owner such as a salon, restaurant, landscaper, or service and repair business, every incoming call is a potential sale. You simply can’t afford to miss an incoming call.
According to a recent study by BrightLocal, making a phone call after finding the right business online is the quickest way to get what you need. And yet, small business owners don’t answer 62% of their incoming calls.
Main Street is at the Intersection of a Rock and a Hard Place
There are nearly 4 million small business owners in the US who aren’t sitting at their desk and answering the phone. They are working.
- 967,000 hair salons
- 1.2 million nail salons
- 106,000 HVAC contractors
- 52,000 appliance repair contractors
- 660,000 independent restaurants (not chains)
- 123,000 small law firms
- 230,187 physicians offices
- 189,000 small dental offices
These business owners find themselves unable to serve customers AND answer incoming calls. And, it’s costing them new customers and increased sales.
Incoming phone calls are 10-15 times more likely to generate a successful sale or follow-up activity than digital form submissions.
If you’re a local business, you can’t be in two places at the same time. You need a way to grab those calls while still serving the customer that’s right in front of you.
Tips to Increase Sales When You Can’t Answer the Phone
So many business owners are desperate for new customers and spend marketing dollars on generating new leads. But, what good is that if you aren’t able to answer the phone, answer caller’s questions and get them to your business?
Here are some tips on how to convert those incoming phone calls into new sales:
Use an answering service:
If you can’t afford a full-time receptionist, you might consider outsourcing your incoming calls to a third-party answering service.
But is this a good idea? Like most things, the answer is — it depends.
Lots of local businesses use an answering service. But answering services can be expensive and they often don’t answer the caller’s immediate questions or concerns.
Forward your calls:
You can forward incoming calls to your mobile device or a team member’s mobile phone. This is an inbound calling option many local businesses choose. Today’s mobile phones make this a cost-effective and easy solution.
The problem, however, is that if the business owner is working with a client or customer, they still can’t answer that call and this becomes a lost opportunity.
Use text messaging to engage with customers
Younger generations prefer sending and receiving text messages to calling or talking on the phone. Text messages get read more often. The open rate for SMS is 98% with 90% read within 3 seconds.
This is especially true for local businesses because their text messages are typically wanted and anticipated as they often contain important information the customer wants such as an appointment update or reminder.
While this is a workable solution, it still doesn’t solve the problem of the working business owner who still has to stop their work in order to respond to the text.
How Many New Customers is This Nail Salon Losing?
Recently I asked a nail salon owner what his most common incoming calls were, he told me that most inbound callers asked if he could see them that day, wanted to set or confirm appointments, and get the address or directions to the salon.
Then he told me something astonishing — he told me people will often ask for their address and even after he gives it to them, they show up at competing salon! How often? Almost every other incoming call that comes from either a
It’s too bad that he wasn’t able to send them a text message with his address so that they show up at the correct salon. While I was at the salon he took three calls and one of those calls was someone who ended up at the wrong salon!
How to Capture Inbound Calls and Serve Customers At the Same Time
Wouldn’t it be great to grab those incoming calls AND give the customer you’re working with your undivided attention?
“Online ordering and text message ordering takes the place of an employee, so I’m not having to pay a third or fourth person to be there to handle these orders,” said Ryan, “It’s just pushing a button and accepting them.” — Ryan Schwarz, CD’s Wings
I’ve recently come across a super new tool called Numa.
Numa is an artificial intelligence (AI) powered answering service that makes it possible to take incoming calls from customers while you’re working with another customer.
Here’s how Numa works:
When a customer calls your business (or mobile device) they have the choice to either leave a voice mail or text their question.
“Numa has absolutely improved our customer experience,” Courtney said. “Customers find it really easy to use and like that they get fast responses.” — Courtney Brough, Waterman’s Fresh Local Seafood
If the customer leaves a voicemail, the voicemail is transcribed and you can respond when you are free.
But it’s the text feature that I find most helpful.
Numa is set up to automatically reply to common questions such as your hours, location or setting an appointment.
How Much is Numa?
Numa is insanely affordable. At $49 per month, you’ll get a return on your investment with just one or two calls.
“With just this one call, Numa, immediately paid for itself!” — Dustin Locke, MW8 Apartment
Numa also offers a free 30-day trial without a credit card! That makes it really easy to try and see how it works for your business.
Until now, every missed incoming call was a potentially lost customer and lost revenue. But Numa is an easy, low-cost way for local businesses to actually serve two customers at the same time.