After a horrible divorce, I had no choice but to hit reset in 1994. My focus was on my three pre-teen children. After remarrying, with the support of my new wife and kids, I made a courageous decision. I started Active Telephone & Data. I have long thought that we should not be so critical of others until we have the solution and are willing to do something with our great ideas. So now it was my time to put up or shut up.
I discovered very quickly that to be successful in the world of business, I needed to be more than just excellent at my trade. I need to understand accounting, business acumen, payroll, employee management, business cycles of my trade as well as everything there is to know in the world of telephones. It’s very humbling when you realize the need to depend on others. I needed to find people in these fields that I could trust so they could teach me how much and what I didn’t know.
After about a year I had found the 90% of the work was demanding quick service but taking 90 days to pay. I was now determined to become the salesman I thought I was and begin developing the empire! My sales plan was not to sell but to simply inform the prospects of what’s available in the marketplace. This proved to be fairly successful as I seemed to have ‘the gift of gab’ and was able to combine that gift with my knowledge of the telephone industry. Often, I would ramble and lose my prospects’ interest, but I eventually learned to keep my mouth shut at the proper times.
Fast forward to 2012 when we decided to enter the ‘Voice Over Internet Protocol’ arena. We learned plenty through trial and error from hosting our own service from our office in Mt Prospect with a back-up generator and multiple carriers to utilizing a couple third party vendors before we landed with CQ Simple out of Michigan to be our primary provider.
We learned that as the local guys in the industry, we need to differentiate ourselves from the big box stores who are after the largest percentage of the marketplace. We’re the small guys with personalized attention to the customer. We’re the small guys who can respond to the customer’s unique requests quickly. We don’t aim to be the biggest, but rather the guys with the best customers. We are different from the others we care!
The world of telephones has changed dramatically over the years. There is so much more that can be accomplished these days with a simple telephone system. Call me today if you have any questions or ideas regarding how we can customize a telephone for your business that will maximize your talents and your employee’s talents. If you give us a budget to work with we’ll try to stay at or under that number.
Active Telephone & Data will be sending you a newsletter like this every month as we try to keep you up to date with what you should know regarding communications in the present and future. This month we start with the 5 Must Watch Trends in Enterprise VOIP. Next month look for answers to why a firewall is so important.