VoIP Voicemail

Voicemail management is an integral part of any enterprise business phone system. The voicemail greeting that customers hear when connected to a voicemail box, and how quickly employees are able to retrieve their voicemails and reply to them go a long way in presenting a professional image for any business.

With the multitude of options that are available for customers to reach a particular business – including email, mobile, voice etc. – managing voicemail has become more complicated.

Employees are not always at their desk, they may not have access to their office phone or they may forget to note down an important voicemail that can even lead to loss of business.

VoIP voicemail features in hosted VoIP systems are far more advanced than those available in legacy technologies and enable employees to manage their mailboxes more effectively.

Accessing VoIP voicemail

Setting up and accessing a voicemail box on a VoIP network can be done in a number of ways. The user can check voicemails from their VoIP phone, externally by dialing the voicemail number, by logging into their online dashboard or via email.

The availability of these options significantly reduces the risk of new voicemails being missed or old ones forgotten. Users can also make changes to voicemail settings through their phone or the online dashboard.

Voicemail to email

Email has become so essential to any working professional that there are many circumstances in which an employee may not have access to their phone but are able to retrieve emails (through tablets, client computers etc.)

Most VoIP service providers offer clients the ability to forward voicemails as audio attachments through the email service.

Employees can choose to receive voicemail notifications, the actual voice message or a transcribed version in their inbox. Organizations can even add more sophisticated features that allow employees to respond directly to such messages, forward them to other users for sharing information or sending the voicemail to a CRM software for follow-up later.

Since the voicemail messages are received in the inbox, they can be saved to a particular workstation, backed up for safekeeping or kept in folders for better organization.

Personal vs. department mailboxes

Some departments such as sales and customer service may require their own voicemail box to better serve customers. The VoIP voicemail system can be set up to direct callers to the department mailbox if no employee is available or if it is after business hours.

Customers can also choose to be redirected to the individual voicemail box if they know the extension number of the person they wish to contact.

This way customers can be served by whoever is available within the department at the earliest possible time instead of having to wait for a particular individual, especially if the issue can be resolved by any employee.

Customizable greetings

Quite a few VoIP providers offer the ability to customize the voicemail greeting for individual users, departments as well as for the company mailbox. The business can even change the greeting depending on time of day, if the office is open or closed, for holidays etc.