What is a DID number?

The name is a leftover from office phone systems, where a DID let an outside caller reach one desk directly instead of going through reception.

On modern systems a DID is simply a number you can buy and point wherever you like. Local, toll-free, or in another city.

That cheapness is what makes separate numbers useful. A number on an advert and a number on an invoice bring completely different callers.

Say a roofing company buys two extra numbers at a few dollars a month each and points all three at the same place. The original number stays on the trucks and the website. One new number goes on the Google Business Profile, and the other on the door hangers the crew leaves around every job site.

After a month the call log shows 94 calls on the main line, 61 on the Google number and 7 on the door hangers. That alone is useful, since the hangers cost $400 to print. The better finding comes from reading what those callers wanted. Most of the Google calls were new leak repairs. Nearly all the main-line calls were existing customers and suppliers. Five of the seven door-hanger calls turned into full roof estimates, the most valuable call type the company gets, so the channel with the fewest calls may be paying for itself best.

A phone number belongs to whoever's name is on the account at the carrier that holds it. That sounds obvious until a marketing agency sets up your tracking numbers under its own account. Or you discover a former employee registered the main line on a personal plan back in 2016.

It matters the day you want to leave. Moving a number to a new provider is called porting, and the new carrier will ask for a signed letter of authorization from the account holder plus a recent bill. If that holder is an agency you've just fired, you're negotiating for your own phone number.

So check now, while everyone's friendly. Ask each provider to confirm the account holder's name for every number printed on anything. For numbers an agency manages, get it in the contract that they'll be released to you on request. A number that's been on your trucks for ten years is worth more than the trucks' paint job.

GreetKeeper can handle more than one number, and each can have its own greeting and its own routing.

A separate number for new inquiries is the setup that earns its keep most reliably, because it keeps sales calls and existing-customer calls apart without asking anyone to choose from a menu.

You do not have to move any of them. Forwarding points an existing number at the assistant and leaves everything else alone.