Setting up the perfect telephone system for your company – the best tips and tricks for SMEs

A properly set up telephone system provides you much more than just availability. Happier customers, service on a higher level, and a lot of insights into your company processes are only some of the advantages of having a well-functioning telephone system. Curious to know how to approach this? We have lined up our tips and tricks for the best SME telephone system. 

Your telephone system starts with a choice for VoIP

We consider this a no-brainer: the choice for VoIP is by far the best solution for an SME. VoIP-telephony is affordable, particularly because then you don’t need a physical telephony system anymore. Additionally, VoIP-telephony is scalable, flexible, and easy to integrate with other company systems, such as a CRM. And, quite importantly, you have unlimited capacity, making it easy for your telephony system to grow with your business.

Map your communication needs

The possibilities with your telephony system are endless when you’re making use of VoIP telephony. But let’s be honest: not everything that’s possible is needed. Next to that the requirements for a telephone system are often very specific to an industry: a webshop has different requirements than a general doctor’s practice. 

Pay close attention to the possibilities and requirements within your industry when it comes to choosing a VoIP- telephony system. Because if a telephony system doesn’t offer something that is crucial to you, it won’t be the best solution, even though other customers are very satisfied with it. 

Once you have a clear idea of what your requirements are, there are a few more factors to consider. For optimal communication through your telephone system, keep these things in mind: 

• The amount of colleagues that’ll make use of the telephone system
• The possibilities of working both hybrid and remote
• Scalability in growth of customers and colleagues
• The integration with your most important systems, such as your CRM. 

Set up your telephony system in a user-friendly way

You have them in every organization: that one clever colleague who will set up the telephone system. Usually that person also gets a little too enthusiastic about all the buttons, settings and possibilities, so that afterwards you no longer understand a thing. 

Choosing a telephone system based on good customer support can’t hurt. But if you choose a user-friendly system in the first place, you will make it a lot easier for yourself when setting up your telephone system. That way, you can hardly break anything and mistakes are easy to fix (We’re looking at you now Handy Harry!). 

It would be great if every colleague could make his or her own dial plan. Then you’re always available to customers. Such a dial plan consists of a clear schedule showing when you’re available, on which number and what needs to happen in case you’re not able to pick up the phone. 

Invest in the right hardware for your telephony

With VoIP-telephony you don’t need a separate telephone system, but it is smart to choose high-quality hardware to ensure great accessibility for your SME. 

Invest in good desk phones and fitting headsets. That way you can use your telephone system optimally. At Voys we also offer the app and the webphone next to calling via the desk phone. 

A good desk phone has good audio quality, supports SIP, and has the ability to secure the connection. It’s useful to have a screen, that way you as the receiver can see all the dial information on your desk phone. 

The same goes for the headset, the audio quality is paramount; it makes or breaks a conversation. Of course, this is just as important for your microphone. Check that your headset works well with your other software and hardware. Comfort is also important: it is nice when your headset is comfortable to use on the phone, especially if you wear it for a longer period of time. 

A little tip from our end: with the new Voys feature Call control, answer calls through your headset when you’re calling through the webphone. That saves you a lot of mouse clicks in a day.

These are the deskphones we would recommend for your SME

To get some advice on the best desk phones we asked our colleague Ritske for advice. ‘For static phones I would recommend the Yealink-T series. These phones all have HD-audio, allowing you to always hear customers clearly. They also feature noise filtering, which is perfect if you work in an open office space.’ Do you prefer a DECT-phone? Ritske would then also recommend Yealink’s phones. 

These are the headsets we would recommend for your SME 

Ritske also has tips for the best choice of headsets: ‘For desk phones the headset from the Yealink WH-series work really well, because they feature noise canceling. This allows you to call comfortably, even in busy areas or in places where multiple colleagues are calling simultaneously. Do you like using the webphone and the app? Then the EPOS Impact 1061 is the best choice for you. With this headset you also make use of our new feature: Call control for the webphone. 

You can find a complete overview of all recommended hardware where we also compare all the various desk phones, DECT-phones, and headsets. 

Ensure a perfect internet connection for your telephone system

It’s a bit obvious, of course, but without a good internet connection, your VoIP-telephone system won’t be accessible. Did you know that you can do a lot yourself to keep your internet connection secure and stable? Our colleague Ritske, who is full of tips, recently wrote a blog about it. 

The minimum bandwidth for a single VoIP call is about 100 kbps (kilobits per second) for both uploading and downloading speeds. This is incredibly little data and has virtually no impact on your internet connection. An average internet connection can handle thousands of VoIP calls simultaneously without any problems in terms of bandwidth. 

Do you doubt whether your internet connection is working optimally? There are online tools on the market that measure the speed of your internet connection. HIt’s handy to know if your current internet subscription is adequate. Our experience is that in most cases it works flawlessly. 

Will you be making large-scale VoIP-calls? Then it is useful to do a network test. This is easily performed by your own IT department or an outside expert. 

Choose the features that support flexible working

Hopefully, you don’t work 24 hours a day. So let’s assume that your SME is closed from time to time, for example because you’re on vacation, you want to go to your kids school musical performance, or you’re sick. After all, that happens to the best of us. 

A good VoIP telephone system allows you to set your own opening hours. That’s useful, because a loud ringtone during your kid’s solo performance won’t do you any favors. 

At Voys, we have the Opening Hours Basic and Opening Hours Advanced modules for this exact purpose. The basic module is for SME companies where opening hours are not very complex. In the advanced module there are a few more options, allowing you to adjust the opening hours completely to your company and wishes. 

(Not available during the school musical, definitely available when it’s your mother-in-law’s birthday). 

Make hybrid and remote work easier

Working has long since ceased to be done only in an office. And in the future, hybrid and remote working will only become more popular. When setting up your Voys telephone system, there are plenty of options for choosing modules that support hybrid and remote working. 

If colleagues like to work from home, it’s a bit of a shame that the settings of your telephone system are hindering your company’s progress. 

An app or a plugin that also allows you to make business calls from your cell phone or laptop is a real godsend. The Voys App and the Voys Webphone are the solutions we offer for this. We notice that they are used a lot in practice. 

Support personal customer contact in your telephone system

With a few simple settings, you can make customer contact ten times easier and more fun. Not only for customers, but also for your colleagues. When setting up your telephone system, make sure that calls go directly to the right person. 

This makes endless menus and transfers a thing of the past. And thankfully: the telephone system should serve your way of working, not the other way around. 
At Voys, this feature is called Voys Pulse. With this, you can indicate exactly which route a call should take in your call plan, meaning that it will never ping back and forth, because you have direct insight into the reachability of your colleagues. Customers find nothing more annoying than being sent from one place to another, so take advantage of this feature.

Integrate your telephone system with your CRM

With a few mouse clicks, your VoIP telephone system and your CRM should work nicely together. And that’s really handy, because you help your customers so much better when you have all the necessary information in front of you right away. You’ll know exactly what has been said, when, and by whom, without having to start up or search for separate systems. Asking for names or customer numbers is a thing of the past.

Not to brag (ok, maybe a little), but Voys integrates with more than 80 CRMs. From Hubspot to Exact Online, Teamleader and well, at least 77 more.

Get more insights into your business processes

Setting up your telephone system properly will give you more insight into your SME’s business processes. This is quite surprising for many, because many companies see the telephone system primarily as something you just need to make calls to customers. 

That’s true, of course, but a little VoIP telephone system is so smart that it provides you with all kinds of valuable information. This way you can tune your business processes accordingly, saving time and money and using your resources optimally. 

Because what if it turns out that customers keep calling at times when you have too few people, and are on hold for a long time? Then you can see from the queue statistics that something needs to be done, because they are displayed in real time and can be checked throughout the day. In this way, you can better recognize where your customer contact gets stuck, whether a problem is structural, and what solution is appropriate.

Set up smart queues

Waiting is no fun for anyone. But waiting when you have a big problem is pure misery. And that, of course, is a feeling you’d rather not give your customers. If only there was a way to assign different priorities to people in the queue. 

And there is a way. A good queue feature ensures that customers in a hurry get someone on the line immediately. Customers in less of a hurry will then wait a little longer. But because even the nicest customers do not have endless patience, a good call queue feature also allows you to set the maximum number of people in a queue before you call a colleague. 

You get it: before you know it, you’re delivering top-notch customer service. And your customers will really appreciate it. 

(Coincidentally, Voys has such a queue feature and it works amazingly well.)

More tips for your SME company’s telephone system? 

Of course, we hope that the above tips have helped you on your way to setting up your own telephony system. Do you still have questions or would you like to configure your telephone system to be even smarter? Please contact support on 050-7009920 and we will be happy to help you.