It might seem unlikely to you now, but we’re professionals, we know what we’re talking about. 800 numbers and toll free numbers will end up being this year’s Tickle Me Elmo. Think about it, a vanity toll free number makes a great gift for any occassion.

At the time of writing this, there were countless toll free phone numbers available that ended in “funk”. Who wouldn’t want that? Unfortunately, a toll free 867-5309 was not available (I would have taken it).

Birthdays:

What does a loved one get the entrepreneur who seems to have it all figured out? The answer isn’t new slippers. Don’t be disappointed with your birthday present. Make sure when you blow out the candles, you’re getting ready to blow away your customers with a toll free number and professional auto attendant greeting.

Weddings and Anniversaries:

Time to party? An evermore popular way to accept RSVPs for your big day is to set up a lovely greeting on a toll free number (especially good if inviting guests from out of town) with two designated extensions for attending and not attending. You could get really fancy and set up extensions for dinner choices, but you probably don’t want to show off. Add voicemail transcription and you don’t even need to listen to the messages; have them sent to you as text on your mobile phone. Update your guest list without ever listening to a message!

Babies:

9 months have passed since the wedding (what a wedding!), and it’s time to welcome the newest member of the family. To go along with your baby book, create a virtual phone system for friends and family to call and leave messages welcoming your newborn to the world. All of your recordings are saved as audio files that can easily be saved to your computer and put on audio CDs to cherish forever.

Upgrade Your Business:

Does your home phone line double as your business line? Many small businesses and entrepreneurs work from home and don’t feel the need to invest a lot of money in another hard line just for their business, and why should they? A FreedomVoice virtual phone system will forward your new business line calls to any phone you desire, give you the option to take the call or send directly to voicemail, and even let you know what “department” the caller is looking for (e.g. sales, technical support, billing). All this while ensuring that you keep your professional and personal calls separate.

Sweepstakes Fanaticism:

Do you have a second email address just for entering contests online? Many people do, and they expect to get nothing but spam and junk mail and maybe an occasional prize. They don’t want their personal or business email assaulted with spam. A virtual phone system could serve the same purpose for contests that require a phone number. The problem with this is you can get just as much spam in the form of  telemarketing calls. Unfortunately, spam filters haven’t made it to voicemail yet, but a virtual phone system can effectively screen calls and keep your sweepstake obsession from overwhelming your personal and business lives.

(Legal) Pranks:

If you haven’t dialed 719-266-2837 yet, do it. Now. If you pull off something similar, please let us know!

Grab an 800 number while they’re hot, and check out our available toll free numbers, vanity numbers and local numbers while you’re there.

What are some other creative (family friendly) ways to use toll free numbers?

So I thought I’d do my best to turn these tips on their head, and in the process leave you some practical tips about securing a great vanity toll free number for your business.

Bad Tip #1:  Avoid Number Hybrids

This tip points out that numbers like 888-444-BIKE aren’t as valuable as, say, 888-FIX-BIKE for a bicycle repair shop. And they have a point – the latter definitely is more valuable. The problem with this argument, though, is that there’s only one 888-FIX-BIKE. That vanity spelling translates directly to 888-349-2453, exactly one phone number out of millions of toll free numbers. Care to take a guess whether or not it’s reserved already or in use? You’re trying to find a needle in a haystack with a pair of tweezers.

Meanwhile, a vanity search for 888-***-BIKE has hundreds of numbers that will match any 3 digits into those wildcard *’s. So you might end up with 888-444-BIKE or 888-345-BIKE, which isn’t exactly the same but is still wildly effective. To minimize any drawback of using matched numbers and letters, try to find repeating or sequential digits like in these two examples (444 & 345).

Bad Tip #2: Don’t Limit Yourself to 7 Digits

This proposed tip is really just an extension of the previous, but going beyond 7 letter vanity spellings with the addition of overdial. Overdial is the practice of using a vanity spelling that extends beyond the end of the actual phone number in order to complete the spelling. Like 888-MATTRESS. Really this number is 888-628-8737, and the extra ‘S’ is just a disposable digit.

Overdial itself isn’t really the problem. Going over a digit or two (preferably just 1, though) isn’t the worst thing in the world, such as locking in a number like 888-***-HOUS(E). It really goes back to the fact that finding an 8 digit vanity number is effectively finding a 7 digit vanity number, which again has you looking for exactly one number on every search. There’s only one 888-MATTRES(S). But hey, maybe you’ll get lucky?

Bad Tip #3: 800 vs. 866, 877, and 888

In this misleading tip, the author says you should aim for 800 over 888, 877, or 866. It’s true that 800 is a more easily recognized prefix, but 888 isn’t far behind. 888 numbers, after all, have been around for over fourteen years. By now, most people get it.

Also, this tip fails to mention the fact that SMS/800, the governing body over toll free numbers, has largely disabled the ability for vanity search tools to query the national database for available vanity numbers with an 800 prefix. Why? Because 800 numbers are so increasingly scarce that 99.99% of vanity searches would return no results and simply waste resources. Stick with 888, only going to 877 and 866 if you can get better vanity spelling availability out of those prefixes.

Bad Tip #4: Vanity Name Choice

Here we have some advice to be selective in what you say with your vanity spelling. Pick words that relate to your business, avoiding ambiguity where possible. Sounds great, with the exception that they again focus on whole number and overdial spellings like 888-LAWNCARE. No chance.

Vanity toll free numbers have been around long enough for a large percentage of the more popular spellings to be taken. To find a vanity number that fits your business, you’ll need to get a little creative and shorten up your vanity spelling to 4 or 5 letters at the most to give yourself a better chance to find some results. You still want to draw some kind of mental connection between your number and your business, like my 888-444-BIKE example above, but not at the cost of setting unreasonable expectations and not finding any numbers with which you’re happy.

Bad Tip #5: Avoid Q & Z

This one may be my favorite. Three years ago next month, the patent for an international standard for phone key pads went on the books. This is what you’ve likely come to think of as common on desk phones, home phones, and cell phones, with the 7 key representing “PQRS” instead of just “PRS” and the 9 key representing “WXYZ” instead of just “WXY”. Despite this change being over three years old, and the fact that it has become a widely-accepted international standard for new phones with English characters, you still see people advising to avoid vanity spellings with these digits.

The simple truth is, you shouldn’t go out of your way to avoid these letters if you feel they’re necessary to get the vanity toll free number spelling that you want. And just to be on the extra-safe side, if you feel so inclined, get in the habit of spelling out the digits of your vanity number anywhere that you display it. This is a good general practice already, something like “888-444-QUAD  (888-444-7823)”.

Bad Tip #6 Good Tip #1: Put Your Vanity Number Everywhere!

Finally, a tip that has some meat on it. Once you’ve actually found a vanity toll free number, it’s time to plaster it everywhere you can. Get it on your business cards, your website, your company vehicles, your letterhead, your tv spots, your radio commercials, your billboards, your office door, etc. Anywhere that you would reasonably place your company logo or slogan, pop your vanity toll free number there also. The value of your vanity spelling only gets better with repetition.

Looking to get vanity toll free number service for your business? Check out our free vanity search tool.

But beyond your napping “sleeping” habits and your personal preference to shower/shave/get dressed, the technology you deploy also plays a big role in whether your operation gets off the ground. Here are five of the top reasons you should consider using an 800 number virtual phone system for your home-based business, instead of just relying on your personal home or cell phone numbers…

1. Look & Sound Professional

Giving potential clients and customers your home or cell phone number is the easiest way to betray the size of your home-based business. Even if you’re borderline superhero when it comes to your entrepreneurial powers, you’re still going to lose opportunities if companies are afraid you don’t have the resources to take care of their needs.

An 800 number gets your foot in the door. With a professional-sounding auto attendant, voicemail service, and call forwarding to your home or cell phone, you get a professional image that reduces customer anxiety while still fitting your lifestyle. It’s not about tricking your customers — it’s about making a good first impression to earn the opportunity to show off what you can really do.

2. Nationwide Reach

Many entrepreneurs that work from home reach a nationwide audience via the Internet. To get anywhere with this kind of online business, you need to appear accessible. If you are advertising your contact phone number as a local number in Florida, you might have a tough time convincing customers in California that you’re the right business to take care of their needs. The problem is more than the customer having to dial long distance. If you seem far away, your potential customers might not feel secure giving you their business. Since 800 numbers are non-geographic, they immediately alleviate this problem and give you the appeal of a nationwide, fully-accessible business.

3. Maintain Your Privacy, Sanity

Just because you work out of your home, doesn’t mean you need to turn your personal life inside out and give up your private information to everyone with whom you do business. Having an 800 number that forwards to your other phone lines lets you keep your business life separate by maintaining the privacy of your home phone and cell phone numbers. Best of all, you can avoid 24/7 burnout by setting your 800 number call forwarding hours and days to draw a line as to when you’re “in the office” to take calls and when you need to be done for the day.

4. Prevent Missed Opportunities

As I mentioned before, one of the challenges of working from home is managing your professional and personal lives. On a micro scale, this can mean little interruptions in the middle of the day, like needing to leave home to pick up children from school or running time-sensitive errands. If you can’t avoid these tasks, you need to at least mitigate their impact on running your business.

With an 800 number, you get two quick benefits that keep you connected on the go. The first is Follow-Me-Live call forwarding that can track you down at multiple phone numbers to make a connection, such as your home office, cell phone, or personal home phone numbers. And if a missed call does reach your voicemail, it’s not the end of the world. With voicemail-to-email, your messages are delivered as audio file attachments to your email address, and you can even be alerted of these messages via text message. This gives you the ability to quickly return missed calls before they turn into missed opportunities.

5. Online Management Tools

Virtual phone systems are all about efficiency, getting more done with fewer resources and in less time. To keep you ahead of the curve, FreedomVoice 800 numbers are kept easy-to-manage with the WebLink Internet Control Panel. This secure, online back-office gives you total access to check your messages, change your settings, update your account information, run reports, and much more — from anywhere you have Internet access! With intuitive controls, you’re in control of your virtual phone system 24/7.

What are you waiting for? Get an 800 number for your home business today!

Getting an 800 number isn’t like setting up traditional phone service through your local phone company. Here are a few differences that make it easy to get started with a virtual toll free number…

1. No Equipment to Buy

That’s right – virtual toll free numbers are an equipment-free business phone solution. There’s no expensive call switching equipment that will swallow your budget, since all of the features and functionality are hosted from remote by your toll free number service provider. You get a professional auto attendant, multiple voicemail extensions, and can forward calls to your existing phones without any on-site installation or maintenance.

2. No Software to Install

With FreedomVoice, not only is there no equipment to buy, there’s no confusing software to download and install. Your toll free number service is controlled 100% from remote, and you can change your settings and check your messages at any time online through your secure WebLink interface.

3. Instant Number Activation

The best part of getting a toll free number from FreedomVoice? It’s activated instantly! Choose your own 800 toll free number and it will be ready for you to configure and use as soon as you place your order. We’ll help you walk through setting up your service and in a few quick steps you’ll be good to go!

So what are you waiting for? Choose your own 800 number today!

Note: As an exception to the above, vanity toll free number reservations require 1-3 business days to activate from the SMS/800 National Database.

But recently, some counties in Alabama have begun reporting their residents aren’t receiving their census forms and are worried about losing out on funding. So what does the Census Bureau turn to in their time of need to reach out to residents and collect their information? Why, a toll free number, of course.

To help preserve the accuracy of the census and facilitate easier response, the Census Bureau has released a toll free number that Alabama residents can call to request a census form or even compete the 10-response questionnaire with a representative over the phone.

The toll free number is 1-866-872-6868.

For additional contact toll free numbers, including those for other languages, visit the Census Bureau’s contact page here:

http://2010.census.gov/2010census/contact

Roll Tide!

When you secure a toll free number through a service provider, you have certain protections afforded to you by the FCC that help you keep that number in the event you change service providers, or even change businesses. Today we’ll cover that protection, some pitfalls to watch out for, and how to go about changing providers should the need arise.

Your Protection, A Brief History

Set the WABAC Machine to May 1st, 1993. This is the cutoff date set in 1991 by the FCC for 800 numbers (the only toll free number prefix at the time) to be made “portable,” such that customers can change carriers / service providers without changing their toll free number. The portability of numbers serves two purposes. First, it breaks the grip companies like AT&T had on 800 numbers in the decades prior and encourages greater competition. This inspires service providers to provide only the best service to earn their customers’ loyalty. Second, toll free number portability protects the investment a business makes in promoting and advertising their number as part of their brand.

Transfers take place by changing a toll free number’s “Responsible Organization”, or RespOrg. When you’re ready to transfer a number to a new service provider, simply contact that new provider and they’ll provide you with a form that you can fill out to start the transfer process. It’s usually a good idea to contact your old service provider to double-check your account information when filling out the form and make sure your account is in good standing, so that there’s nothing to stop your transfer from going through. You don’t need to mention that you’re transferring the number away. In fact, I recommend not. Less reputable toll free number service providers have been known to go out of their way to impede transfers if they have advanced warning.

Why to Avoid “Shared Use”

One of the more notorious pitfalls that can cause you to lose the time and effort you’ve spent promoting your toll free number is unwittingly using a “shared use” number.

Time and again, we at FreedomVoice hear horror stories from businesses that turn to us after being put through the ringer by “shared use” toll free number service providers. A shared use line is exactly what you might think – there are multiple businesses dividing up (often geographically) a single toll free number. The purpose is typically to get access to some kind of rare, attractive vanity toll free number spelling. The problem is, when the time comes for you to change service providers or to grow to a nationwide reach, you don’t own the toll free number and can’t take it with you. Everything you’ve built with that number is now lost, and you have to start all over again.

Our advice? Stay away from shared use. Find a toll free number you love for your business, and own it.

Safeguarding Your Toll Free Number

It’s always important to read the fine print when signing on with a new service provider / carrier to make sure you’re not getting into a toll free number black hole. If there’s any doubt about whether you’ll keep your number should you choose to leave, don’t be afraid to ask. And watch out for extensive “transfer away” fees. Some providers charge prohibitive costs as penalties to move a number away from their service.

While your rights to keep your number are in most cases secure, certain actions on your part might give even an honest toll free number service provider leverage to deny your transfer request. For example, if you have a sizeable unpaid balance, transferring your number away isn’t a means of dodging your bill. A service provider can, and likely will, refuse your transfer if your account is not in “good standing” at the time of the transfer.

Also, should you choose to transfer your number away from a service provider, don’t cancel your service with them prematurely. Wait until the transfer is complete, or you run the risk of having your transfer request rejected.

While vanity toll free numbers of that caliber are hard to come by, there are still ways that your small business can get more out of an 800 number when it comes to making a name for yourself. Today I outline three straightforward steps to leading with your toll free number and building your brand.

Step 1: Get a Good Great Vanity Number

This is the hardest part of this process. The key here is to find a vanity toll free number about which you can get really excited. You want brain stickiness. When customers see your vanity number, it’s going to set up camp in the back of their mind. When they have need for your type of business in the future, they’re going to remember you first and not your competitors.

Certain vanity spellings can be very hard to find or simply aren’t available any more, and the national database doesn’t allow for searches on the “800″ prefix any longer. This makes it easy to settle on the first result you find or give up if you can’t quickly find something you like. Instead, get creative and brainstorm alternative ways that a vanity spelling can describe your business. Shorten up your vanity words – go for something that is only 4 or 5 letters, and then find a match that has a couple repeating digits leading into it (e.g. 8**-555-BIKE for a bicycle repair shop).

Alternatively, go for something that’s easy to memorize by way of repeating digits or ease of dialing. Remember 1-800-CALL-ATT? Dial down the middle! All of the vanity digits were located in the center of the dialing pad to make it easy to remember. Our own number is another example, 1-800-477-1477. Strong repeating digits, and all of the digits after 1-800 are dialed down the left side of a phone keypad.

So go ahead, start searching. I’ll wait. If you’re already a FreedomVoice customer, call us at 800-477-1477 ext. 2 and we can help you search and add numbers to your account.

Step 2: Put Your Toll Free Number Everywhere

Start with the obvious places – get your new vanity toll free number up on your website, on your business cards, and on your direct response advertisements. Then go further. Do you participate in social media like Twitter, Facebook, or putting videos up on YouTube? Get your toll free number onto these channels, both in your account profiles and in your outward communication.

Move to more niche spaces. Do you get new business through Yelp or Google Local? Make sure your toll free number is updated there. Add it to the end of your email signatures for yourself and any employees. Does your business have a street-facing sign or window? Delivery or service trucks? Yep, there too. Any possible place your business can be seen, whether online, billboard, radio, tv, or print, include your toll free number. Make it an integral part of your brand, as necessary as even the name of your business or your website.

Step 3: Provide an Amazing Caller Experience

Finding a great number may be the hardest part of this process, but the award for most important goes to making your vanity toll free number something your existing and potential customers enjoy calling. It doesn’t matter how attractive and memorable your number is if you’re frustrating those who do call with an unhelpful auto attendant, long hold times, rude representatives, or voicemails that don’t get returned.

Consider having your auto attendant professionally scripted and recorded. Keep your call forwarding and call queue hold times managable. Record calls to your customer support or other departments and review them online to make sure you’re providing only the best and most helpful service. And use features like voicemail-to-text to quickly follow-up on any missed calls.

You want to enlist your customers in your advertising army. You want them to spread positive reviews of your brand and drive people to your toll free number by word-of-mouth. The only way that’s going to happen is if you provide them with a happy experience when they contact you.

Have any ideas / experience with toll free numbers and branding? Comment below!

You’ve formulated your message like a scientist in a lab. You’ve built your website. You’re on Twitter, Facebook, and every other conceivable social media site. You’ve gathered email contacts and taken a crack at a newsletter. You’ve even lovingly-crafted business cards, fliers, postcards, brochures – the works. And still, nobody’s calling.

Don’t worry, the solution may be as simple as upgrading the phone number you’re asking them to call. Today we look at the attractive and inviting features of a toll free number that can help you get your phones to ring.

1. Lure Them In with a Professional Appearance

A toll free number immediately tells your audience that you are an established business, putting you in the same category as your larger competitors that use toll free numbers. A local number, by contrast, is indistinguishable from your cell phone number. While this might seem more personal, it can make you appear small and unreliable. Help callers understand that you’re a true professional by swapping out your contact numbers on business cards, your website, etc., with a strong toll free number.

2. Stick to Their Brains with Memorable Number

All the advertising in the world won’t get your phones ringing unless your audience can remember your phone number. This makes getting a memorable toll free number a critical part of your marketing effort. The simplest choice is getting an 800 number so that customers don’t accidentally misdial the toll free prefix. But the best way to lock in a memorable number is to pick up a vanity toll free number that has repeating digits or spells out a word that describes your business, like “8**-234-BIKE” for a bicycle repair shop.

3. Don’t Make Them Think About Long Distance

When a potential customer comes across your ads, you run the unnecessary risk of losing their business if the contact number is long distance from their landline. Asking a caller to be nickel-and-dime’d by their phone company just to try to reach you is going to get a lot of people to ignore you and move on to your competitors. With a toll free number, long distance is a non-issue. Callers can dial your toll free number anywhere in the United States, Canada, Puerto Rico, and the US Virgin Islands without paying a penny.

4. Be Available to Take Calls 24/7

Sound a bit extreme? Well, it’s not – at least not with a virtual phone system and auto attendant backing up your toll free number. With a local number, callers might be hesitant to try and reach you outside of standard business hours. They may be afraid to disturb you or simply pessimistic about their chances of getting an answer for their call.

But with a virtual phone system working for you 24/7, callers can dial your toll free number and get connected with your pre-recorded information. You can use this greeting to answer a lot of common questions – business hours, driving directions, etc. At the very least, callers that reach you outside of your call forwarding times can leave you a voicemail message that you can return the next chance you get.

By setting up your toll free number to skip your auto attendant greeting and immediately forward calls to your cell phone, you’re effectively adding another line to your mobile service. This line you can exclusively advertise to your business contacts, and gain several immediate benefits to both your work and home life…

1. Look More Professional

While there is a more personal element to advertising your cell phone number on things like business cards, doing so immediately betrays that you’re a small business or one-man-shop. If this isn’t the appeal you’re going for, using a toll free number to mask your cell phone number helps you appear more established and gives your business contacts greater confidence.

2. Screen Business Calls with Call Announcements

Call forwarding through your FreedomVoice toll free number includes the option to create a call announcement – a brief pre-recorded message you create that lets you know the incoming call is a business call when you answer. This way, when you answer your cell phone, you’ll know immediately whether it’s a business call or not and can greet the caller appropriately. You can also have the caller prompted to speak their name and have this played back to you before you decide whether you want to take the call or redirect it to voicemail instead.

3. Stop Calls Outside “Business Hours”

Even the busiest of entrepreneurs needs to disconnect every once in a while and keep their home life separate from their work life. With a toll free number and immediate call forwarding, you can simply temporarily disable your call forwarding number and have all of your business calls instead go to your voicemail. Your personal contacts still call your cell phone number directly, so you’re only shutting off your business line.

If you really can’t stand to be out of contact in case of a critical call, you can still enable text messaging call alerts and even transcribe voicemails, so you can quickly scan any voicemail messages callers are leaving and return any calls you absolutely have to.

Get Your Toll Free Number Today!

Hand-pick your own toll free number starting at under $10 a month. That’s a small price to pay for your privacy and some peace of mind. You can also upgrade to an 800 number or vanity number for a low one-time cost. Remember – immediate call forwarding is just one way to use your toll free number. As your business grows and you find you need features like an auto-attendant, they’ll be available to you at no extra charge.

800 numbers have grown increasingly scarce for a while – and for that reason every toll free number service provider values them with some kind of one-time premium. Frankly, the upgrade is worth it if the price is right – it’s sure to pay for itself. To say nothing bad about an 866, 877, or 888 prefix toll free number, for my money I’d go for the original, the true value. We think you should to, and to help you get there we’ve dropped our 800 number price to just $10.

That’s right – for the cost of a couple lattes, you get the added value of kicking your virtual phone system into overdrive with an 800 prefix number that’s going to be a rock-solid cornerstone for your advertising. That “8-0-0″ gives your company an instant lift in trust level, a more professional appearance, and virtually eliminates customer misdials. It’s rare in the business world that you find something that costs so little and provides so much in return.

So if you’re looking to get a toll free number for your business, be sure not to miss this golden opportunity. Go get your own 800 number for the low cost of $10 – and that’s after you get a chance to try FreedomVoice service free for 15 days. If you’re already a FreedomVoice customer and want to take this opportunity to switch to an 800 number or add some more numbers to your service, give us a call at 1-800-477-1477 ext. 2 or email us at support@freedomvoice.com and we’ll get you set up.