My RingCentral Review
My RingCentral review is based on evaluating several different products, as well as having chosen RingCentral as the option of choice for my company. First, let me say that RingCentral has been around for at least five years, if not more, and is one of the best reviewed virtual PBXs on the market. Some of the accolades about RingCentral come from PC Editor’s Choice, Forbes Magazine, The Wall Street Journal, and many more. The best thing about RingCentral is that they give you a trial period before you buy it.
What are some of the first things that I look for when reviewing virtual PBX’s? I looked at several factors before settling on RingCentral. Let’s dissect each one of them. COST: Obviously, cost is a big factor when I was completing my RingCentral review. Each service has their way of charging you either per minute or with an unlimited model. This is a very important consideration because each time a call is received at, made from, transferred to or forwarded from RingCentral, you will incur a per minute “charge.” In my early years of using these types of services, I was ignorant of this fact and it ended costing me a fair amount of money. RingCentral has both a limited and unlimited minute plan. The limited plans start at $9.99 per month with the unlimited plan at only $49.99 per month. If you’re worried about running out of minutes, go with the unlimited plan. It’s great for a small business.
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800 AND LOCAL NUMBER: One of the cool things about technology these days is the ability for a small business to look like a BIG company. Clearly, many of the services out there give you the option to select an 800 number. But, through my RingCentral review, I also learned that you can have both an 800 number AND a local number. In this way, individuals also feel that they are dealing with a local company, not just a national one. Now, the option really is in your court to decide the need for local number. In my case, I did not choose that option, since it was not important to me. FAX TO EMAIL: No more sitting around the fax machine waiting for the fax to arrive. Go to the beach, pop your email and voila, your emails are collected right within your email client. The reverse is true, as well. You can send a fax right from your email client to any fax machine in the world. The trick is to append “@ringcentral.com” to the fax number to which you are sending. For example: 9175551212@ringcentral.com. What a terrific way to make sure you don’t miss any faxes AND to stay as paperless as possible. Many of the other services which I reviewed either did not offer this service OR charged extra for it.
EXTENSIONS: Depending on the service plan that you choose, you get bundled either 5 or 10 extensions. However, you can literally add as many as you need. I’ve spoken with a number of small businesses about extensions. Some companies of one or two employees can’t imagine why they would need extensions. Here’s a tip. Even though you only have one employee, maybe two, you can use the other extensions to make your company look bigger than it is. Set up an extension for “sales” or “customer support.” Different extensions can be “answered” by the same person. MUSIC ON HOLD: In my RingCentral review I really looked at music on hold as kind of the holy marketing grail. What better way to advertise / market to people when they are a captive audience? Here’s another great tip. When someone is waiting to have their call picked up, either because they’ve been transferred to another extension or the call is being forwarded, why not take that opportunity to market your company? Who says that the “music on hold” has to be music? RingCentral gives you so many options to leverage this oftentimes underutilized tool. My RingCentral review is just the tip of the iceberg on how best to use leverage this type of technology. It is so powerful and flexible that some individuals initially feel intimated by it. But, the best thing about this company is their 24x7 support AND the ability for it to grow with your needs. In fact, the technical support team is outstanding. They will answer ANY question you have about setting up the service, as well as using it. Once again, with the free trial offer, how can you go wrong?
David Chan is a small business owner who is passionate about leveraging great technology to create truly virtual offices. He believes that these solutions save small businesses money and provide tremendous value. David reveals tips and tools on RingCentral, a very competitive virtual PBX. Grow your business and save money!