There are two primary call forwarding technologies used in VoIP phone features. “Find me” and “follow me” are call forwarding services commonly used together to locate the party you’re calling, wherever they may be. From a business perspective, these tools are incredibly powerful. Not only can find me follow me route calls when you’re on the go, there is no costly hardware or software that you need to install. Let’s look at find me follow me and how it can help your business.
Understanding Find Me, Follow Me in VoIP
Today, most of us are used to having a cell phone that sticks pretty close. But what if you don’t want to give your mobile number out to work colleagues or clients? Find me, follow me call forwarding software automatically tries one number after another to track you down until the call is answered or it goes to voicemail. You can even have multiple numbers ringing simultaneously, which makes for very fast call routing so that the caller is in no way inconvenienced. This is also helpful if your schedule is subject to change and you don’t know exactly where you’ll be at what time.
To understand this VoIP phone feature, you first must realize there are actually two applications working together to create the service:
- The “find me” feature automatically routes incoming calls to a specific location, such as from your office to your home. The call routes from a single virtual number that connects wherever you need it to.
- “Follow me” can be programmed in several ways. You could route incoming calls to all your devices simultaneously, or you could program the features based on a specific schedule (e.g., from 9-5 it goes to your phone; after 5 it goes to voicemail or an after-hours call center). Alternatively, the numbers could be tried in sequence. All of this happens at the speed of the internet so the caller doesn’t have to wait.
For both of these services, the caller can end up in a voicemail system, which on many platforms can email or text you to let you know a call has come in. Some of the benefits of find me, follow me include:
- Your private numbers stay private.
- Your private numbers stay private.
- Calls from important clients will be received no matter where you are.
- Customers who need specific types of help can be automatically routed to the right person.
- You’ll never miss a call again.
While find me, follow me is just one of the VoIP features you can take advantage of, it’s an important way to increase your responsiveness to customers while improving productivity.
Five Best Use Cases for Find Me, Follow Me
Now that you understand how find me, follow me works, let’s examine some of the best ways to leverage this important VoIP feature. Here are five suggestions for using find me, follow me software to help your business.
- Customer service/Account management
Taking care of your customers is an important way for you to keep them long-term. This is especially important, because it’s far more expensive to garner new customers than it is to keep the old ones. If you have account managers assigned to specific accounts, you know that access to that employee along with their responsiveness is what will make or break the relationship.
Find me, follow me allows that customer service rep or account manager the freedom to go take a walk at lunch but still be reachable by phone. Your customer can be given a single direct phone number and the find me, follow me feature will hit the employee’s cell or other number in a seamless way that keeps their information confidential but also allows them to respond quickly to a customer request. That makes find me, follow me a win/win for everyone. - Remote workers
Since COVID, many employees have moved their base of operations to their kitchen table. Large and small corporations needed a way to route calls from their office PBX to the employee’s home in a seamless, efficient way. Business VoIP with find me, follow me literally tracks down your worker no matter what part of the house they’re in. It’s a vital service for any company that plans on keeping their teams remote long after COVID-19 is behind us. - Solo business owners
The small business owner is always on the go. That makes staying connected even more important. Say you are a solo restauranteur. You may be upfront at the register one minute and checking in on a shipment of vegetables in the back the next. At the same time, you need a way to always answer your phone to take new orders, handle inquiries from customers or even field a call from a sick employee.Find me, follow me lets busy entrepreneurs wear as many hats as they need to by routing the primary business number to your private cell. While the customer never knows what line they’re talking to you on, you have peace of mind that your business phone will always be answered. - Sales executives
Often, new sales depend on your ability to respond quickly to a customer. For example, if a prospective customer Googled “plumbing repair,” and is working their way down the list, another company may take the business if you miss the call. Whether it’s a high-end service with a six-figure deal or a small business owner looking to catch every new client, find me, follow me gives your sales executives a way to always respond quickly to new customer inquiries. - Faster faxing
You may have thought faxing is an outdated technology, but you would be surprised at how many businesses still relay on these tools. One standout is the medical practice. According to some estimates, the fax machine still accounts for about 75% of all medical communication.With the find me, follow me feature for business VoIP, doctors faxing information back and forth never have to deal with a busy signal. Say the clinician or practice administrator is faxing an insurance company. Instead of being frustrated by a busy signal to one fax line, find me, follow me can run through a bank of fax lines until it finds an open machine. While the doctor has to only dial one number, behind the scenes, the call is being routed quickly until the fax sends.
VoIP First Media offers our business customers state-of-the-art service to ensure their communication success. Talk with our team about all of the VoIP features we offer and how we can help your business.
