Hi Tracey

> We are starting a new webdesign service and specifically
> targetting a group of people that keep irregular hours. We have
> kids and while they have a regular routine, things can come up.
> We do the actual work on our business at night when they are in
> bed.

> So our question is, how do we answer the phone? We thought
> people could text us and we could ring them back at a time that
> suits them - we might be able to manage that.
> But what are other people and their home businesses doing?

> Our direct competition has no phone contact at all, so
> naturally we want to make sure ours is great. Any ideas
> please?!

A DVD we use in business training is a guy's dying message to business owners. He started hustlingat home - then in a back street - and when we was diagnosed at 48 with terminal cancer, he had a business that traded around the world. Very powerful. But the first thing thing that he learned was answering the phone. That started him on the path that led to continuous improvement.

I said that to reinforce the importance of answering the phone correctly - yet can be quite difficult. It's OK for staff at phone centres - but for the rest of us need to work at it.

Certainly you calling them at a required time is one option - but if you are late calling them, that will create a negative impression. I'm not saying don't do it - just do it well.

And of course it's not the only option. For example, the fact you're working on their websites suggests they probably have computers - so e-mail can be useful to set up times. Also why not use Skype? But if you're using video you might want to tidy up what they can see so that it gives a professional image.

Of course phone calls are still important. You might want to look at a second number so you can separate business calls from personal ones more easily. And of course leave a different message for business calls from private ones.

Without going through the separate video we have just on answering the phone, you would benefit from having a script to answer the phone. It needs to be well thought out to get across important information, lead to callers giving you info (like their name and why they're calling), and still be short.

We've also found that call diversion can be good - depending on what's happening. Sometimes out calls go straight to us via cell-phone. Unfortunately we haven't figured out what we should do with cell phone answer messages if we're busy.

Hopefully others will give you more ideas, but those are some key ones we have.

Best wishes

Phil Astley
www.businessacademy.co.nz

One of the concepts we have been throwing around is that of a community office, a central location operating with one office manager to serve numerous entrepreneurs and small businesses, offering not only a phone service but a business premises address further administrative functions particularly relevant to the trade services sole trader kind of set ups, but I am thinking that might be something that could also assist in a situation such as yours and I am just interested to know if its something you would have considered had the option been avaliable?

I have an office set up at home, as I could not justify a separate phone line, Telecom set me up with a new number on the home line but with a different ring tone, it only cost a couple of dollars. I normally get a few calls outside normal working hours from clients, this way I know the ring and do not miss calls, the family have been instructed in how to answer and it seems to work for us. Most important though is getting the correct message on the answer phone re business.
Hope this helps a bit.
JD