Managing Your Time for Incoming Calls
Do you ever feel like phone calls consume your day? Every time you pick up the phone to speak with a client, a colleague, or an insurance company, it soaks up a good chunk of time. It feels like it affects your productivity and keeps you away from important tasks.
If you get anxious every time the phone rings, then you need to learn how to effectively, manage the time you spend answering phone calls, so they don't end up taking over your day.
Provide Your Email Address as an Alternative Communication Option
Have you socialized your email address enough among your clients and customers? If not, it is time to do it. If they have your email address, it is more likely they will contact you via email instead of picking up the phone every time they need to get in touch with you. Your clients and customers will appreciate you making an effort to improve communication.
Prioritize Your Calls
If you're getting quick calls about simple questions like your office hours or location, provide this information proactively so you can cut down on these inquiries. Make sure you share that information on your voice message, website, and social media so that you can minimize those occurrences. Other calls that are more time-consuming will require prioritization. First, understand what the caller needs and based on that, offer to call them back at a more convenient time, so you don't have to drop what you're doing.
Don't Allow Your Calls to Get Off Track
Business calls are meant to stay on topic; otherwise, they will end up taking up way more time than they should. If you're on the phone with someone that might be a little too chatty, and you can't afford for that call to run long, try to get back on track by summarizing what you were saying before. Something like, "So, like I was saying..." or "So, what I got so far is that..." <insert a summary of conversation>. That will let them know you need to focus on the current topic and make it harder to chat.
Keep a Notepad Handy by the Phone
There's always valuable information that comes from important calls. Having a notepad handy is the best way to ensure you can take notes of all those important details. This way, you prevent forgetting information, which would end up triggering another phone call. Also, be sure to write down any action items so that you can keep things on track.
Taking phone calls sounds simple, but when you're busy running your own business, that is certainly time that would be better spent doing other important business tasks. Managing your time for incoming calls will help you achieve a healthy balance and minimize stress.