Smith.ai vs. Back Office Betties: Live Answering Service Comparison

Many business owners consider getting help from live answering services to run a more efficient operation. However, it can be difficult to find the right one to fit your needs. Do you need lead qualification? New client intake? Outbound calls? Discover the differences in features and benefits between Smith.ai and Back Office Betties virtual receptionists.

Setup Fees, Contracts, & Trials

Smith.ai

• No setup or cancellation fees
• No contract
• Free consultation
• 14-day money-back guarantee
  

Back Office Betties

• $89 Setup fee 
• No contract
• 7-day/100-minute free trial (whichever comes first)
  

Discussion: With Smith.ai, you never have to pay a setup fee. At Back Office Betties, however, the setup is $89.

Back Office Betties offers a 7-day free trial period (or up to 100 minutes, whichever comes first) compared to Smith.ai's 14-day money-back guarantee. When it comes down to it, you have twice as long to try out the service without risk at Smith.ai.

Monthly Plans

Here are the monthly plans offered by Smith.ai and Back Office Betties:

Smith.ai

• $285 for 30 live receptionist calls and 1 live transfer number
• $765 for 90 live receptionist calls and 2 live transfer numbers
• $1,950 for 300 live receptionist calls and 10 live transfer numbers
• Custom plans available
• 10% annual discount when paid upfront
  

Back Office Betties

• $349 for 100 minutes
• $628 for 200 minutes
• $1,196 for 400 minutes
• $1,345 for 500 minutes
• $1,799 for unlimited talk time
  

Discussion: Back Office Betties promotes having a team of 5 max receptionists that are dedicated to your business. However, remember that if your call volume increases due to a marketing campaign, only those same 5 individuals will be able to answer your calls (and are dedicated receptionists for other companies as well). This doesn't give you much flexibility. An answering service should be able to move fluidly with your business and scale up with no delay as your call volume increases. Having dedicated receptionists means new receptionists must be trained before your higher call volume can be addressed. The result is either missed calls or calls that go to voicemail or having to remember to coordinate with your receptionist service every time you add or change a marketing channel. It's yet another thing to keep track of and manage.

With Smith.ai, every receptionist is available to take your calls. Our receptionists use our proprietary software, which presents them with your greetings, custom messaging, and business FAQ, so that they can respond to your callers just as an in-house receptionist would, but without needing individual training. If your call volume suddenly increases due to a marketing campaign or growth, more of our receptionists will answer your calls. It's as simple as that.

Beyond offering better answering capacity, Smith.ai provides much more affordable plans than Back Office Betties. Consider for a moment that an average business call is about six minutes, according to GetVoip. Back Office Betties charges a little over $3 per minute on average, resulting in an over $18 six-minute call. For that same six-minute call at Smith.ai, you’d be paying much less.

It's easier to see how many calls answered by your receptionists resulted in new business, so you can estimate the total cost of acquiring new clients. If you have multiple business numbers for your various marketing channels, you can even see which channels provided the best leads and the total new-client cost per channel. With per-minute pricing, you'll have to wrestle with the added variable of talk time.

Overage Costs

Smith.ai

• $10.50/call on the $285/month plan
• $9.50/call on the $765/month plan
• $7.50/call on the $1,950/month plan
  

Back Office Betties

• $3.79/minute on the $349/month plan
• $3.14/minute on the $628/month plan
• $2.99/minute on the $1,196/month plan
• $2.69/minute on the $1,345/month plan
  

Features

Smith.ai and Back Office Betties both offer the following features:

• 24/7 live call and webchat answering
• Custom script building
• Outgoing calls
• Live call transfers
• Lead qualification
• New client intake
• Payment collection
• Bilingual service available
• CRM integrations with Clio, Clio Grow, Slack, and Lexicata

Smith.ai has the following additional features:

• Integration with all major calendaring and scheduling software programs
• One free CRM integration
• Integration with helpdesk ticketing software programs
• Ability to map client history to the incoming number so clients receive personalized attention
• Messages texted to you
• Recommended business referral
• After-hours and overflow answering
• Facebook and SMS answering
• Custom greetings
• Daily call summary reports
• No charge for spam calls or wrong numbers
• Call recording and transcription
• SMS & email follow-up

Back Office Betties offers the following additional features:

• No charge for calls under 15 seconds
  

Discussion: Smith.ai and Back Office Betties offer many similar services, and both companies go beyond the standard answering service features, with outbound calls, lead qualification, and new client intake services. However, some of Back Office Betties’ features, like appointment scheduling and payment processing, are only available on the more expensive plans. At Smith.ai, we give you the experience of an in-house receptionist no matter the size of your business. Our primary concern is helping you run a more efficient and profitable operation, even if you're a team of one. Add-on services are available for an extra fee (see our pricing page for details), but unlike Back Office Betties, they can be added to any plan. 

You can also text status updates to your Smith.ai number if you want to temporarily change your call handling procedures. For example, if you're headed into a meeting for an hour, just text "Away 1h" to your Smith.ai number and we won't attempt any live transfers for the next hour. With Back Office Betties, you'd need to login to your client portal to change your settings.

Summary

Back Office Betties offers virtual receptionist services, but they focus their service on law firms. Thus, they do not have the flexibility — or capability — to serve other industries. At Smith.ai, however, our team is fully capable to handle calls for a range of different businesses, though we do serve many attorneys, as well. Our receptionists have backgrounds in various fields, including customer service, hospitality, and helpdesk support. Both Smith.ai and Back Office Betties put new receptionists through a rigorous two-week on-boarding program before they're approved as new receptionists and able to handle calls on their own.

With free setup and affordable monthly plans, Smith.ai is an excellent value and comprehensive service that easily grows with your business, no matter the size or industry.

Smith.ai Client Testimonial

Smith.ai offers superior live answering services for law offices and more:

“I've used their services since 2015 and don't know how I could live without them now. A live person answers each call with the greeting I select, hands the call over to me with an introduction, and prepares a summary of each call sent by email… I have an IP boutique practice, so my new leads call with pretty much patent, trademark, or copyright needs. The Smith receptionists are better at classifying some lead's IP needs than the lead themselves. Smith.ai also screens out solicitors or anyone else I don't want to take calls from. It's all so customized that it feels as if I have a dedicated receptionist. The prices are super affordable, too. Highly recommended!”

- Scott Nyman, Nyman IP

Learn More About Smith.ai

We’d love to show you how Smith.ai can help your small business.  Learn more by signing up for a free consultation with our team or get started risk-free with our 14-day money-back guarantee!