Hack53.Set Up a Toll-Free Number for SkypeIn

Hack 53. Set Up a Toll-Free Number for SkypeIn

Set up a toll-free number for your customers and have calls automatically redirected to your SkypeIn number.

Works with: all versions of Skype.

Even in these days of ubiquitous email, many customers expect a business to provide a toll-free number for ordering or support. Sure, you can also put a Skype nameSalesAtMegaXYZCorp, or whateveron your web site for people to call, but you cannot expect non-Skype users to download and install Skype just to talk with you, can you?

Toll-free numbers are free to the caller, but are not free to you, the recipient. Even so, consider the advantages of providing your U.S. customers with a toll-free number:

Consumers like toll-free numbers

Because toll-free numbers are free to call, customers are more likely to call you if you provide a toll-free number.

Toll-free numbers are portable

Changing your SkypeIn number doesn't mean you have to give up your toll-free number.

You can create the right image for your company

A toll-free number makes your company look professional and, if you're a non-U.S. company, extends your reach globally.

You can widen your markets

A toll-free number lets you serve customers by having a national presence in the U.S.

You can pay as you go

Many toll-free plans charge only for what you use, so your bills grow only in proportion to your business!

You can do the vanity thing

A vanity toll-free number is a number that spells something meaningful in relation to your company or business. 1-800-GO-FEDEX is an example of a well-known vanity number.

Well, thankfully, you can provide your customers with a toll-free number that you can link with your SkypeIn number so that calls made to the toll-free number are redirected automatically to your SkypeIn number. In fact, you can have any number of toll-free numbers redirected to the same SkypeIn number.

This also means that if you're a non-U.S. company, you can have a toll-free number in the U.S. (that is, a number with the prefix 800, 888, 877, or 866 which is linked to a U.S. SkypeIn number), but have those calls redirected to wherever you are located around the globe. Now, how's that for convenience for your U.S. customers! Plus, it says volumes for the global reach of your company!

First, you must get a U.S. SkypeIn number. This number will look like any regular Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN) number to a toll-free service provider. If asked whether you have a Plain Old Telephone System (POTS) or PSTN number (see Chapter 1), you can simply answer yes and give your SkypeIn number.

Next, you need to find a toll-free service provider to give you a toll-free number and have calls to that number redirected to your SkypeIn number. Google on "" and you'll find yourself spoiled with choices. However, beware that some toll-free plans require a contract, perhaps also an up-front fee, and a recurring monthly maintenance fee; other plans are such that you pay only for what you use (or rather, what your customers use, to be precise). So shop around to get the best deal based on your needs; you should find, without effort, a plan that costs less than 5 cents per minute. To get you started, here are a handful of toll-free plans to look at:

• http://www.officedepot.telecomsvc.com/tollfree/index.asp?nav=home

• http://www.smart800now.com/

• http://www.kall8.com/

• http://www.teliax.com/

• http://www.get1800.com/

None of these companies comes with any recommendation or endorsement from the author or publisher; they're just to be used as a rough guide to the sorts of toll-free plans available.

All of this should take a few days, at most, to set up and begin working. Extending your global reach to your customers has never been so easy.