As an HVAC company, the work rarely stops. Time is valuable, and is best spent doing what you excel in — installing, repairing or servicing heating, ventilation, air conditioning and refrigeration systems. Problems can arise for your clients at any time of day or night. When they call you looking for help, you want to be able to give them the best service on the first ring. If they can’t reach you, they’ll likely turn to a competitor instead.
In these situations and more, learn how using an answering service like Towne Answering Service can help benefit and grow your HVAC business.
Benefits of an HVAC Answering Service
An answering service can make your HVAC business look more prominent and sound more professional than competitors. An answering service resonates with customers, who recognize the personal touch of speaking with an individual instead of listening to your voicemail. The benefits of using an HVAC answering service can range from saving money to providing 24/7/365 service to potential customers. There are many ways to take advantage of an answering service, including the following:
1. Never Miss a Call
Think about how many calls your company gets that go unanswered. HVAC emergencies happen around the clock, and potential customers will call your business when it’s convenient for them — even if that’s after hours for you. Every call you miss could represent a missed potential client.
When you partner with an HVAC answering service, you’ll never miss another call because the answering service is constantly answering on your behalf. The trained operators give your company the chance to convert more calls into sales opportunities and retain more potential customers without missing a beat.
2. Offer 24/7 Service
Heating and cooling problems can arise at any moment, and providing consistent customer service can be hard to balance with a personal life. Luckily, an HVAC answering service offers a solution to that problem. An answering service like Towne Answering Service enables your company to be available to customers 24/7, so you can enjoy a night without the phone ringing.
Your customers will also appreciate being able to have access to your services and company even when you’re out of the office. By accommodating differing schedules, you allow more customers to find you and gain opportunities for new clients.
3. Spend More Time Running Your Business
If your phone is constantly ringing, it may be an interruption that makes it difficult for you to get any work done. Get back to what really matters with an HVAC phone answering service. Without the responsibility of answering all business calls yourself, you’ll have more uninterrupted work time to focus on completing jobs and running your business.
4. Provide a Personalized Touch That Voicemail Can’t Offer
Some companies use voicemail to catch missed calls. Relying on customers to leave a voicemail is risky and often doesn’t pay off — 80% of callers will hang up before leaving a voicemail. In addition, most voicemails may go unlistened to for at least eight hours. Give your callers the instant gratification they’re looking for by using an HVAC answering service. Customers will feel heard and valued when they are able to speak with someone instead of wondering if their call got lost or if the company will return their call.
5. Save Money Without Having to Hire a Receptionist
Hiring a receptionist can be costly, especially after you factor in the cost of training, payroll taxes and bonuses. While you could schedule one of your other employees to answer the phone on certain days, you’d be missing extra hands out in the field. Save money by letting your employees do the job they were hired for while an answering service handles your phone calls.
In addition to saving you money, an answering service can also be more reliable than a receptionist. Receptionists can’t be at their desk 24/7 and may need to use sick days, which you’d have to cover for. With an answering service, these worries disappear.
6. Make Your Business Sound More Established and Professional
Whether you’re still in the early stages of growing your business or you already have a loyal client list, using an answering service for your HVAC business can make you sound established and professional.
Suppose you have to answer the phone in the middle of a tricky installation. In that case, your focus may not be on professionalism or customer service, and this could come across during the phone call, potentially turning away a client. At Towne Answering Service, we understand the importance of professionalism, so you can be sure your clients will be impressed with the service they receive.
7. Reduce Waiting Time for Callers
An HVAC answering service can reduce waiting times for customers in a couple of ways. First, calls will be answered promptly, reducing the time spent waiting for the call to be answered. Well-trained operators can provide answers to queries or direct the call to someone who can, which will quickly get the caller the answers they’re looking for. Lastly, an answering service eliminates the need for callers to leave messages, so they won’t be waiting around for their call to be returned.
How to Grow Your HVAC Business With Answering Services
Another benefit of using HVAC answering services is that they can be used to help grow your business. Being able to turn phone calls you might have previously missed into returning clients is one of the biggest ways answering services can help grow your HVAC company. When you use advancing technologies, increase focus on customers and make a good first impression, you’ll be on track to grow your business in no time:
1. Use Technology Efficiently
Technology is always advancing, and while this can be overwhelming for some, it can be helpful when growing your business. Many businesses are finding technological solutions to make daily operations run more smoothly. One of the easiest ways you can use technology to grow your business is through an answering service.
Implementing this technology requires relatively little time investment, giving you more time to take on more clients. Keeping up with the trends and actively implementing solutions like an answering service for your HVAC company can be a key component of your company’s growth.
2. Increase the Amount of Focus You Put on Customers
Putting the customer first is a common business practice — especially as an HVAC company, where your goal is to make your customers’ lives more comfortable. Using an answering service for your HVAC company can help increase your customer focus. Since it’s all about the customer and their needs, consider your customers who work odd hours and wouldn’t be able to reach you during your typical workday. Answering services allow clients to reach your business at all times of day, which means you can meet more customer needs.
3. Create a Good First Impression
The first impression you have on your customers will define your relationship with them in the future, and often whether or not they do business with you. First impressions can be made in many ways, and for HVAC companies, they are often made by the first phone call a customer makes to your business.
With an answering service on your side, you can be sure each call will be prioritized and each customer is taken care of. When you impress your callers from the first conversation, they’ll have a good experience with your company and be more likely to use you again in the future or refer you to friends and family. It all starts with the first phone call, and you can ensure it’s of the highest quality when you use an HVAC answering service.
HVAC Business Tips
Knowing what you can do to set yourself apart from the competition can make all the difference in retaining current customers and landing new ones. At Towne Answering Service, we’re invested in your business. We want it to be a success in general, so we’ve created a list of a few additional tips to help you grow your HVAC business:
- Keep learning HVAC skills: Learn new skills to keep your abilities sharp even after receiving your HVAC certification. Staying up to date on new practices and trends is a good way to stay relevant and keep an edge over competitors. Use online materials like HVAC School for refreshers and continuous learning, and encourage your HVAC contractors to take advantage of these resources so your whole team is on the same page. Making sure your skills and knowledge of the HVAC industry are strong will be beneficial for you and your clients.
- Make yourself the point of contact for your customers: Focus on your specific business instead of branding for a manufacturer. Brand yourself and your company as a trusted point of contact for your customers. When your clients have access to you instead of needing to jump through hoops, they’ll trust you and your business to get the job done.
- Offer a referral program: Word-of-mouth advertising can be powerful. So how can you encourage customers to advocate for your brand? Offer past and current clients credit or a discount on their next HVAC service when they refer someone and they become a new client. You can make it more enticing by offering the discount to the referred first-time customer as well. This can positively resonate with your clients and they may be more likely to use and refer you.
- Forge partnerships: Most of the time, people don’t realize they need HVAC services until it’s too late. Consider partnering with realtors, contractors or rental property owners who won’t anticipate an HVAC problem, but will need your services in a time crunch. Establishing relationships with people in these professions can be beneficial because they’ll value your services and immediately look to you when they need help.
About Our HVAC Answering Services
With Towne Answering Service, your customers have access to live operators who are based out of the United States. Our professional operators can be trained to know the ins and outs of your HVAC company to give your clients seamless customer service. At Towne Answering Service, our standard answering services include:
- Call overflow: When you’re deeply focused on a job or with another client, our operators will pick up after a call rings a certain number of times. With this service, you can keep working with the reassurance that your calls will still get processed.
- Dispatch: A popular service among HVAC companies is our dispatch, where operators process incoming calls and can transfer them to the appropriate on-call technician.
- Customized scripts: We’ll work together to write scripts for your company and brand so your callers get a consistent message with every call. We know your callers may be looking for different things at different times, so we can change scripts based on the time of day, week or season of the year to ensure they find what they’re looking for.
- Customized greetings: Similarly, we can customize telephone greetings to convey a message to your callers. This could include general business information or additional direction for your callers.
- Call screening: Weed out spam calls and telemarketers with a company-specific announcement after the first ring. This can prompt callers to dial a number to speak with someone or inform them of closures.
- Business day and after-hours: Business day operators serve as a front desk or switchboard for your remote workers. They are there during your workday to provide customer service where necessary. Our after-hours operators stick around to handle any calls that come in after you’ve called it a day.
- Virtual receptionist: Hiring a receptionist is an extra expense you can avoid with answering services. Our operators can field incoming calls, take messages, provide customer service and transfer calls as if you had a receptionist in the office.
Get Started Today With Towne Answering Service
Keep up with your busy workday by trusting Towne Answering Service with your HVAC company. Our industry-tailored services ensure the operator processing your calls knows what they’re talking about and can provide reliable customer service to your customers and clients.
Take advantage of the benefits of an answering service and grow your HVAC business when you customize solutions with Towne Answering Service. Contact us to learn more about our custom services today.