Business Voicemail Systems

Selecting the Best Business Voicemail System

When your company outgrows standard voicemail from your phone carrier or the local electronics store’s cheap system, it’s time for you to get an advanced business voicemail system. iTelNet can recommend the perfect system based on your needs, and we’ll get in completely installed for you, in 24-48 hours if need be. Features on our business voicemail systems include the following:
- auto attendant
- call routing
- unified messaging
- enhanced voicemail
- follow-me anywhere
- Call Forwarding
- Call Screening
- Dial by Name Directory
- Internet Fax
- Message Alerts
- Call Transferring
- Follow Me/Find Me (where a series of phones are called until the CPU finds the user) and
- Voicemail to email.
- And much more!

Business Voicemail System

Call iTelNet today at 1-800-677-0836 (or email us by clicking here) and we will set your company up with your ideal voicemail system at a fair price. As an authorized agent of the finest telecom equipment for over 15 years, we sell a wide array of business voicemail systems from Allworx, Nortel Call Pilots, Vertical Starplus STS, 3Com, and of course a wide array of Voice Over IP phone systems. We of course sell new systems, but also refurbished business voicemail systems if you’re on a tighter budget. All of our systems are of course warranted. Call us today and speak with a highly trained telecom representative for more details on our business voicemail systems, our expandable phone systems, and our other telecom equipment and services.

picture of operator on business voicemail system

An Overview of Business Voicemail Systems

Two years after Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone, Thomas Edison envisioned how the phonograph - his invention - could improve upon it. He suggested connecting the phonograph to the telephone to “take that instrument an auxiliary in the transmission of permanent and invaluable records, instead of being the recipient of momentary and fleeting communication” Translation: recording phone calls would be a good thing. The perfect business voicemail greeting was only be a matter of time!
For businesses large and small, finding ways to leave messages for unanswered phone calls has long been a necessity. But the days of operator-manned switchboards and answering services have given way to digital voicemail systems that improve productivity, increase reliability, promote services and save money. We’ve all called companies and rather than getting a competent executive, we are greeted by business voicemail greetings that allow companies to filter calls and callers.

A History of The Business Voicemail System

Voicemail is a digital answering service that is able to record, save, replay and store phone messages. The technology was invented in 1979 by Gordon Matthews after a particularly frustrating business trip during which he played telephone tag with his client and was unable to reach his own home office. How much a system in which he could leave a business voicemail greeting would have helped! So he formed a company called VXM and subsequently designed a computer that allowed people to leave and pick up messages.
But voicemail was not an immediate success. The VMX system was proprietary and very expensive. Only large companies with deep pockets could afford it. The technology was made more affordable with the development of PC-based voice processing boards - Dialogic Corp. is the industry leader in manufacturing voice boards - and voicemail software that worked on personal computers. This reduced the cost and enabled small companies to utilize business voicemail systems of all types.
Today’s voicemail - also referred to as VMS and v-mail - saves companies money because it supports multiple services including fax, voice to text, and teleconferencing. It also has the capability to send messages simultaneously to more than one recipient.

Types of Business Voicemail Systems

A standard voicemail allow users to retrieve, save, forward and erase messages. Extended voicemail offers everything a standard type does plus additional mailboxes. Voice on-demand is a one-way, greeting only function used for making announcements or giving instructions. A Q&A voice mailbox can be programmed to ask a series of questions to callers, essentially to facilitate order taking. Unified Messaging, or UM, integrates different messaging media such as voicemail, SMS, and fax into a single interface accessible from multiple devices. The most advance business voicemail system is Virtual PBX, also called Hosted PBX, a digital version of the old operator-run switchboards, but with a lot more functionality. It is made possible by Voice Over Internet Protocol, or Voice Over IP, or VOIP, which is the transmission of voice data over IP-based computer networks.

How does a Virtual PBX Business Voicemail System work?

Voicemail converts spoken messages into an electronic format that responds to voice or tone activated prompts. Whether your customer is next door, or it’s a long distance business phone service situation, the process is the same.
A voicemail system is comprised of a central processor, which is the brain; software which determines the look of the voicemail program and provides the prompts so users can interact with the system; a hard disk controller which allows the CPU to talk to the hard drive; disk drives to store messages; system disks which hold the user data; and a telephone interface system which allows for multiple lines. It’s the same type of system that a single computer in a group of networking computers uses.

advanced voicemail system phone

The incoming call is routed to the requested extension. If there is no answer the PBX forwards the call to the business voicemail system. At the same time, the PBX informs the voicemail system, via a data link, what extension the call was intended for so it knows pre-recorded greetings to use. The caller’s message is digitized by the telephone interface system, sent to the disk controller then stored on a memory disk drive. The location of the message is stored on the CPU.
To retrieve the business voicemail greeting that was left for you, a specified extension is dialed. The telephone interface again tells the CPU there is an incoming call. Information is transmitted through the data link indicating the call is to retrieve messages. The CPU signals the telephone interface to answer the call. The CPU retrieves that user’s password and directs the hard disk controller to play the prompt instructing the user to enter their password. The CPU checks it for accuracy and if verified, presents the next set of touch-tone enabled prompts, or options, for retrieving the new message or listening to old saved ones. The CPU interprets the touch-tones and responds accordingly.
If the prompt to hear the message is chosen, the CPU retrieves the new message from the system disk the signals the hard disk controller, which locates the message on the disk drives. That data is sent to the telephone interface, which converts it to sound and plays it to the user. The telephone interface then converts the data stream to sound and plays it. Three of the leading providers of Virtual PBX are RingCentral, Vocalocity and VoiceNation.

Business Voicemail Greetings

In many cases, your business voicemail greeting will be a customer’s first impression of your company. So having a professional and ideal business voicemail greeting is smart business. Most voicemail providers give clients the option of using pre-recorded greetings or the ability to record their own. Greetings can be changed either on the phone or through an online account. However, programming in your business voicemail greeting can be a complicated process with most voicemail systems, particularly those that have a tree (where callers can navigate through various options). However, iTelNet has technicians that can help program or update your greeting.

business voicemail greetings
Let your business voicemail system greet your customers even while you sleep!

The Best Business Voicemail Greeting

Here’s a few ideas, some advice on recording the perfect business voicemail greeting:
1) State the name of your company as soon as possible
2) State a quick tagline about your company to brand your business, but don’t babble on for more than a short sentence.
3) Give customs options. Some will want to leave a message. Others will want to call back when you’re available. Others are willing to navigate through options. And still others will want to get a person as quickly as possible. If you don’t give them options, you’ll lose some of them.
4) And a final piece of advice for the best business voicemail greeting is to choose a speaker that has a great voice for your industry, or for the perception you want your company to have. An annoying voice or odd accent can turn off potential customers callers, and lead to a bad business voicemail greeting that costs you money!

What type of business would benefit from a voicemail system?

All businesses! Voicemail is about facilitating communication so any business that needs to interact regularly with the public or corporate clients will benefit. Small companies benefit because voicemail presents a professional first impression, maximizes financial efficiency by taking the place of expensive answering services, and provides a way to keep in constant contact with customers.
Voicemail also offers solutions for large companies by providing economy of scale in large companies and a communication solution for both inter office messages and outside calls. Business voicemail systems ensure messages are relayed accurately and can boost customer satisfaction.

If your company needs a telephone system, call iTelNet today at 1-800-677-0836 and we’ll get you set up with the perfect business voicemail system at the lowest possible price, and install it for you! We can also set you up with a T1 for phone and internet service, or a fiber ring if you have a large office and need a massive amount of bandwidth.