When PizzaCloud began offering Internet Phone Service to pizza restaurants we included cellular backup internet to protect the phones when the Internet service fails, but now protecting credit card processing and web orders is just as critical.
Luckily, one backup service can protect them all.

In a nutshell, an additional router is installed between the Internet modem and the firewall for your POS system. When the primary Internet fails the cellular data backup takes over within seconds, keeping your business running.

As restaurants move to the new "chip" card terminals this is even more critical, as many card processors will no longer let merchants go into "offline mode" when their Internet fails.

This situation has become so serious that many POS companies have reached out to companies like ours to provide the cellular backup as a stand-alone service. And some restaurant owners are adding cellular backup service on their own.
Ask yourself a simple question: "How much revenue do I lose every year due to Internet outages?".    Every time a large cable Internet provider has an outage on Friday afternoon our phones light up with customers calling to get our phone service and cellular backup Internet.  In some cases they are calling us because they lost $5,000 or more in one outage for one store!  Then to make matters worse, if you have five or six restaurants all on the same cable Internet provider in one city they may ALL go down at the same time. 
Think of cellular backup Internet as insurance.  You have to have it, but hope to not use it.
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Here are a few notes about choosing a cellular backup provider, or setting one up yourself:

• Be sure that the provider knows that they have to separate critical services (IP phones, credit cards, web order flow) from things like IP cameras and public Wi-Fi. The backup router MUST be set to only allow the critical services to go out over cellular data in order to avoid high data usage.
• The Cellular backup provider needs to understand the needs of your POS system/vendor. If the new router is not set up properly you will have problems with remote access, receiving web orders etc. PizzaCloud works directly with the tech support people at your POS vendor to ensure that everything works properly on both primary Internet and backup.  In fact, many POS vendors recommend PizzaCloud to their customers when they inquire about cellular backup, because they know that we work and play well with the POS system.
• The cellular backup router should be "cloud managed" so that the provider can completely manage the router remotely. This should include running diagnostics, switching the unit from primary to cellular and all other management needs, as well as sending notifications when it is on backup.
• The unit should not be just a cellular "dongle" with a one inch antenna, but should be a larger unit with dual "MIMO" antennas.  Ideally also able to remove the antennas and use cables to connect a larger/outside antenna if you have poor reception.  Obviously, cellular backup is only as good as the cellular signal.
• For the same reason, being able to switch carriers is important.  Some cellular data modems have a different physical model for each carrier, so if you purchased one for Verizon, but need to switch to AT&T to get a good signal that unit has to be swapped out.  
  This is another reason that PizzaCoud uses Pepwave routers - they are carrier agnostic.  The one device can use Verizon, AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile and others.

PizzaCloud includes cellular backup Internet with our IP phone service, and now also offers cellular backup as a stand-alone service. Please contact us if you would like more information.
We use the Pepwave MAX-BR-1 "mobile Internet router" for most customers.  Although designed for use in police cars, it is ideal for this purpose.  Easy to mount, in a rugged steel case.  Grease proof, moisture resistant...in general it is the perfect device for this environment!

Please feel free to call us to discuss cellular backup.  

Some customers have had real success by shifting the phone calls from the stores to a central call center. But there are several thing to consider.

• You have to have a fair amount of traffic to make a call center make sense. If you only have two to four stores, it is probably not a good idea to do a call center if the only reason is efficiency.  At five stores staffing gets easier. Eight or nine stores is where it really makes sense from the perspective of lowering labor hours needed.  
• On the other hand, if your stores are in a high cost state, opening a call center in a low labor cost state can have a real impact, even with fewer stores.
• It is not a good idea to move ALL the calls from the store to the call center. Doing so changes from one staffing problem to a different one. The issue is how "peaky" the traffic is for carryout/delivery restaurants. A call center handling ten stores may get only a few calls between 10 and 11, but need 15 agents between 5 and 8 PM. A hybrid solution is most efficient. Calls some in and the system "looks" at the call center. "Is there an agent logged in and available to take this call RIGHT NOW?" If so, they get the call. if not, send it to the store the customer called. This allows you to control the percentage of calls handled in the call center simply by increasing or decreasing staff through the day, The goal is virtually 100% labor efficiency in the call center, and take say 80% to 90% of the calls off the stores. But by letting them overflow back to the stores you do not have to staff for peak.
• Call center agents can handle calls faster and better. Wearing headsets, with both hands on the keyboard. No customers in front of them. Totally focused on the caller they are handling, they can get through the calls faster and ask for the upsell. Average ticket from the call center tends to be a few Dollars higher than in the stores. That adds up!
• You must have proper POS system support! If your POS system does not have a "call center" option, then don't do a call center! The system has to be able to pop the agent to the correct store and bring up the caller just as it would in the store. If the agent has to jump through hoops to link to the right store to take the order it can be a real hassle.  
• Try to have the call center and store phone systems well integrated. In an ideal world, calls can flow seamlessly back and forth, getting the caller to someone who can assist them as quickly as possible.   When PizzaCloud is providing the phone service at both the stores and the call center, it is smooth and easy.  

 
If you are considering a call center solution, please do give us a call to discuss, even if you are not considering PizzaCloud. Our founder, John Scully spent years in the call center industry. Building and operating more than 30 call centers ranging from 10 to over 1,000 seats. The largest of these call centers handled over 200,000 calls per day. So, whether you are interested in our phone service or not, feel free to call to discuss call center options in general.

Customers with regular business phone lines from "legacy" carriers may still be paying as much as $90 per line, while businesses getting their phone lines from their cable TV provider may be paying as little as $20 per line.
Because of this, Internet phone companies may or may not be able to actually lower the cost for phone service.
This is why PizzaCloud has focused on two other aspects: Eliminating loss of business when your Internet goes down and increasing revenue through the use of advanced phone system features.
Here are a few ways a new hosted IP phone system can increase revenue:

• Eliminating busy signals. Do your customers complain about busy signals? Do you only have two or three lines and see them all in use during busy hours? Then you are losing at least SOME business. If a customer frequently gets a busy signal when trying to reach you they may go order online...or they may call someone else! And of course that may cost you not just this order, but all future business from that customer. If busy signals cost you just one regular customer each month, over time that can add up to thousands of Dollars per year lost to competitors.
• More efficient call handling. During busy hours does your staff have to put the person to whom they are speaking on hold in order to pick up ringing lines, say "ThankYouForCallingPleaseHold" and go back to the first caller? If so, that is both inefficient and rude to the people who keep getting interrupted. Far better to let the phone system apologize and put the caller on hold for you. In other words, if the call is not answered in say three rings the system can answer, play a message like "Sorry for the delay - we are busy making great pizza! Please stay on the line and we will be right with you", then play hold music or music/hold message loop. The phones are still ringing in the store, but from the callers viewpoint they have been answered. Callers will start hanging up after 50 to 60 seconds of ringing, but will wait for several minutes if hearing music or music/messages.
• Start of call "upsell" messages. Properly implemented, upsell messages can generate quite large increases in requests for add-on items, without annoying the callers. There are some key rules that need to be followed:
  • The messages must be short - just 5 or 6 seconds. A greeting/locator message and mention of ONE add-on item. i.e. "Thank you for calling Super Pizza Dudes of Cincinatti. Have you tried our Cinnamon bread sticks yet?"
  • Messages should not be your low cost special, but an add-on item. Goal is to drive the average ticket up a bit. The customer already called you, so no need to lead with a low cost special.
  • Rotate multiple messages. Ideally, have four or more messages and the phone system randomly picks one for each caller. Since you have so many repeat customers, over time this will lead to multiple add-on items. Caller hears salad one time, wings next time, maybe a dessert item next time.
  • Alternately, when you ARE running a big special, or plan to have an event based special around something like the Superbowl, get the word out ahead of time.
  • This is also a great way to get the word out about catering, party rooms, new items - anything that you want your customers to know about.
• Put together a good music/message hold loop. This is where you put longer messages, talk about multiple add-on items, specials etc. Again, a few common sense rules:
  • Do not be too cute or cliche. A customer who ends up on hold for four or five minutes will hear this loop multiple times...If it is annoying you are going to lose that call.
  • Choose background music without vocals, and something calm. Be sure the volume level of the music drops during the messages.
  • Set the general volume level fairly low. If you call it and find yourself holding the receiver away from your ear, so will your customers.
  • Have it professionally done for you. PizzaCloud does this at no charge for our customers because we know it has a huge impact.
• Proper caller ID integration with the POS system. Some VoIP providers cannot integrate with the POS systems to deliver callerid.  Using the Vertex callerid box from Callerid.com, Pizzacloud can integrate with any POS system that can integrate with the legacy "Whooze Calling" analog units.  But we also can integrate directly with a number pf POS systems without using any hardware.
• After hours messages. Instead of just getting no answer before and after hours, play a message that gives your hours and reminds callers that they can order online 24 hours a day and schedule for later delivery. This can help capture early morning calls from businesses wanting to place large catering orders for lunch time.

The majority of our customers see the largest benefit from the start of call upsell messages, followed by eliminating busy signals. Putting it all together, our average customers reports an increase in revenue of between $500 and $1,000 per month. Until a few months ago that was $350 to $750. Then we added the ability for our phone system to play a random selection from a set of upsell messages. We immediately started getting reports of even larger increases. Of course, your results may vary, but virtually every customers sees some reasonable increase.