HOUSTON, TEXAS — A Better Answer Call Centers™ held the official Grand Opening ceremony for its new Houston regional office location on Wednesday, June 29, complete with a ribbon cutting, banner signing and champagne toast.

We’re pleased to announce that A Better Answer has been honored with the exclusive ATSI 2016 Award of Excellence for the 18th consecutive year! The Association of TeleServices International (ATSI) presented the award to ABA at its 2016 Annual Convention in Tampa, Florida, on Monday, June 27.

Thanks to modern technology, we have unprecedented access to everyone and everything. This can either help or harm your business, especially when it involves social networking. If you try to avoid social media—or worse, don't run your social media platforms correctly—it could harm your business as consumers flock to your more social media-savvy competitors.

A Better Answer recently moved its Houston Regional office to a new location and is hosting a grand opening ceremony on Wednesday, June 29. If you’re a local business owner, we’d love to see you there!

Floods, tornadoes and hurricanes, oh my! Natural disasters are a big problem for businesses that communicate regularly with customers—especially if you’re in a disaster-prone area like Tornado Alley or near the coast. Sometimes it seems like a new natural disaster season is always around the corner. So what happens to your business when there’s a natural disaster? If you’re not prepared, you could lose your communication abilities, leading to lost revenue and customers.

There’s a difference between cost and value. Cost is the actual price for something. Value is how much it’s worth to you. If you’re a business owner considering a call center, this is an important thing to keep in mind. Just because one call center may offer the cheapest price, it doesn’t necessarily mean they provide the best value for your business.

Big corporations enjoy many benefits from outsourcing their customer service processes to third-party providers. But did you know small businesses have the ability do the same thing?

It’s a question any business with inbound calls must ask itself: live answer or interactive phone menus? While it’s true that businesses with interactive phone menus and automated systems can handle a higher volume of inbound calls, a recent report from the CFI Group — a company specializing in improving customer satisfaction — clearly shows that reaching a live representative instead of an automated phone menu makes a significant difference in customer satisfaction.

This month’s hero maintained a positive attitude and provided excellent customer service while escalating a particularly complicated call.

Many call centers and phone answering services offer a wide range of services. From basic call handling and after-hours support to web applications and order entry, there are a lot of options out there for businesses that receive inbound calls.

The only question is, which ones are most popular? Which ones do businesses request the most? To answer both of these, here is a list of the top five most popular services from an answering service (as well as the other names they go by).