One out of five written messages are either lost, temporarily misplaced or written incorrectly. Recorded messages are very reliably delivered and provide better factual and qualitative information than written messages. That's because they're left in the caller's own voice and words, which better reflect both their emotional and rational state of mind. The key benefit of voicemail is that it improves productivity. Less time is spent on the phone by your staff and the persons calling in.
Shorter calls mean reduced costs for local and long distance phone services.
It also means that your staff has more time to be more productive since they're not returning so many calls. Better, more reliably delivered messages means better customer service, which is the foundation for long-term business success. The benefits of voicemail offer the greatest potential of any existing communications technology to pay for itself, and ultimately provide a significant return on the initial investment. Some systems can ask callers to state their name, then call your extension, state who the call is from, and ask you if you want to take the call. If yes, the call is transferred to you.