An answering service doesn’t just fax and email messages anymore; there are many new ways to process messages now. Having messages sent to a pager is an older, yet still relevant way to receive messages. The people that carry pagers usually work in places where there is no cell reception, where cell phones are restricted or when they have to “share” a pager device.

Text-to-cell is one of the most reliable methods of message delivery. Even if you not looking at your cell phone the time your message comes in, it is stored on your cell phone until you remove it. Unlike a pager, you will still receive text messages even when out of cell phone range. Once you step back in-range, your messages will appear. This is a huge benefit for folks that are on the road or must turn their cell phones on and off throughout the day.

Of course, the two other preferred delivery methods are still email and fax. Email is very flexible because messages can easily be directed to one or more people by making simple changes on an exchange account. Receiving messages by fax tends to restrict your message delivery destination to the fax machine itself because it is tied to a land line. However, virtual faxing services are making faxing as flexible as email. If you use faxing, be sure to maximize your inbound line capacity because faxes take a long time to process and can have the highest fail rates of any of the above described methods.