Most entrepreneurs start off their business with a personal number, and this is very understandable because it seems like the easiest thing to do. However, when you look at it from a business and long term perspective, you are only setting yourself up for conflict and inefficiency. Personal and business are very different fields that require mutually exclusive approaches.
Why You Should Never Use A Personal Number For Your Business
You can’t differentiate between personal and business calls
Calls come in, and you don’t know how to answer because it just might be a business call…or is it a personal call?
You have no control over your life
Work-life balance is really important to maintain sanity. When your business and personal phone numbers are the same, it’s impossible to turn one off without turning off the other. So, even though you are closed for business, you most likely still want to be available for friends and family. What will you do? Late-night calls and texts from clients can make it impossible to stop thinking about work.
You can’t share work responsibility: When you are unavailable, or your call volume gets too much, I bet it would be nice to forward those calls to team members and employees. Too bad you can’t do that with a personal number.
You’ll lack professionalism
It takes just 7 seconds to create an impression, whether good or bad. When your first point of contact with a customer is through the phone, that first impression comes down to your phone greeting. Imagine if you had a greeting like this:
“Hello, thanks for calling XYZ Catering, we are pleased to be of service to you. A representative will be with you shortly. You can also leave a message and we’ll get back to you as soon as possible.”
Also, if you’re serving customers across the country, having a business number is a great way to make your business look big and more accessible.
You’ll regret it soon enough
Think of all the places where you have listed your personal phone number—your website, social media, email signature, invoices, online profiles, etc. Switching to a business phone is a lot more difficult when you have already given out your personal number to a lot of people and have used it in different places. At that point, your personal phone number is no longer personal.
Why You Need A Business Number
Customers keep asking for payment on delivery
Do not blame customers asking for pay on delivery, especially if they do not know you. If they reached out to you via a phone call, then that point of contact should naturally sell them the credibility of your business. Your business call should never feel like a regular call.
Customers keep pricing you down: Your customers keep pricing you like a meat seller because there is no difference between how you do business and how market people do business.Why should they not price your market? Do you ever ask for “last price” in supermarkets? No, because of branding and packaging. But we can price at roadside stands right? A business number gives you the leverage a supermarket has, where customers take your price because they see you as a proper and credible business.
You can be flexible with your working hours: Feel free to get on with other business activities like bookkeeping, operations, HR, meetings, etc. You can also share your business number with colleagues and employees and either forward calls to them or voicemail.
Have a personal and work phone number on the same phone: You can have both your personal and business phone number on the same device and eliminate the need to carry multiple devices everywhere you go. With a reliable business number app like PressOne, your personal calls are easily segregated from your business calls, so that there is no mix up and invasion of personal space and time.
TAKEAWAY
Without a business phone number, your clients will doubt your level of professionalism. This affects your business image, regardless of the quality of your goods or services.
