Virtual phone number

If the past few years have taught us anything it’s that businesses, particularly those in the communication field, can’t afford to be rigid. What employees expect from a job has changed dramatically and many business models have adapted to remote or hybrid working arrangements.

If you need a phone number for your business or for your home-based staff, getting a number with local telecom companies isn’t guaranteed—nor may it even be worthwhile anymore.

You can make sure your AU/NZ business stays ahead of the curve with a virtual phone number, ensuring you can be remote, yet still accessible to your customers and prospects. You can even get a local area code to boot.

Securing a virtual phone number in Australia and New Zealand is easy with Dialpad’s unified communications platform and you can also benefit from numerous other features.

What is a virtual phone number?

A virtual phone number is a number linked to an online account with a provider, as opposed to a specific location. It’s sometimes called a softphone or a virtual landline.

Old school telephony systems tend to use an analog setup with desk phones, and numbers are linked to local PBX exchanges/phone lines.

On the other hand, you can get virtual business phone numbers from a VoIP provider (Voice over Internet Protocol, which is essentially a technology that lets you make virtual phone calls over your data or Wi-Fi—basically any kind of Internet connection) and use those VoIP numbers to make and receive calls.

People calling you on a virtual or online phone number won’t be able to tell the difference—to them, it’ll be as if they’re just calling a regular telephone number.

You can also get these virtual phone numbers on your desk phone or mobile, which makes them very flexible and ideal for employees (like salespeople) who need to make a lot of business calls from their personal mobile phones while on the go.

How to get a virtual phone number for your AU/NZ business in 2 easy steps

1. Sign up for a free 14-day trial at dialpad.com/signup. (Fun fact: Dialpad was built by the people behind Google Voice.) It takes just a few minutes and you can sign up with your Google or Microsoft 365 account to speed things up even more.t.

2. That’s pretty much it. You can pick a virtual business phone number in step 2. Signing up for Dialpad also gives you a virtual phone system—definitely take it for a spin over your 14-day trial and try it out. If it’s not for you, you can close your account at the end of the trial.

Benefits of a virtual phone number for your business

Dialpad’s Connect plan starts at just $15 per user per month, but even the least expensive version comes with:

• A virtual phone number

• Unlimited calling in the US and Canada

• Unified communications features that lets you have video meetings and send instant + SMS/MMS messages

• Unlimited call recordings

• Other business essentials like custom voicemail greetings, an auto-attendant, call forwarding service, custom outside-of-business-hours call routing, and more

Better call pickup rates for your outbound efforts

One of the major benefits of a virtual number is that it can give your business a local presence—without the need for having a physical one. You’ll be able to register a local number on third-party company directory websites like Google My Business, even if you don’t technically have an office in the area that relates to the local area code.

If your business makes a fair amount of outbound business calls to prospects, you or your reps usually have a much better chance of people picking up your call if the caller ID shows a local phone number.

You can use it across different devices

With traditional phone numbers, you usually have one number per physical phone. With virtual phone numbers and more modern business phone systems (like Dialpad), you can make and receive calls on a digital phone number using your mobile phone, desk phone, or even computer.

No more being stuck to your desk to have phone calls. Need to run errands in the middle of the workday or pick up your kids? Dialpad’s app lets you make sure that anyone dialing your virtual business number will ring your mobile phone.

You don’t need two phones anymore

With the mobile (or “softphone”) app, what that also means is you can get a virtual phone number on your personal mobile phone. For example, if you run a plumbing or home services business, you can get a virtual phone number on your personal mobile phone so that your clients can reach you throughout the day—without having to carry two phones, and without customers calling your personal number.

It’s cheaper

Physical landlines require an initial fee for all of your equipment because you’re basically building a mini telephone exchange in your office. You’ll also likely have to pay rental fees, maintenance fees, and fees for extra lines when your business is ready to expand. Ouch.

By getting online phone numbers through a provider like Dialpad, you don’t have to pay any of these fees, and there aren’t really any costs beyond the price of your monthly or annual plan. If you need to add more (or remove) users, you can easily do that in your online account, which means you’re only paying for what you need.

How much does getting a virtual phone number with Dialpad cost?

If you’re looking for a virtual business phone number, you can get that with any of the three pricing plans for Dialpad Connect (Dialpad’s business communications product):

Virtual phone numbers for inbound and outbound contact centers

When your team handles higher call volumes, virtual numbers become the entry point to your contact center. Dialpad Support for contact centers adds the tools inbound teams use to staff, coach, and measure performance. Dialpad Sell adds outbound capabilities for sales teams. The features in this section are available with those plans.

Use virtual numbers and WFM scheduling to staff smarter

Forecast and staff with confidence

Dialpad virtual phone numbers give you visibility into call traffic across teams and regions. Combine that data with Workforce Management forecasting tools to predict call volume by time, channel, or campaign, so you can staff where and when you need coverage.

Automate scheduling and reduce guesswork

Once you know the demand, WFM scheduling helps create optimized shift plans automatically. Connect your virtual numbers to agent profiles and route calls based on skill, language, or queue load, so calls reach the agent best suited to answer them.

Stay agile in real time

If call volumes spike, live dashboards tied to your virtual numbers show real-time activity, adherence, and performance metrics. Managers can adjust schedules quickly and keep service levels on track without manual coordination.

Improve forecasting with virtual number insights

Turn calls into data you can plan with

Dialpad virtual numbers capture analytics like call volume, duration, resolution time, and topic trends. Those insights feed into forecasting tools to help you understand seasonality, marketing impact, and customer demand.

Plan ahead for peak periods

Use historical data from your virtual numbers to model future workloads. Whether you're scaling for holiday rushes or new product launches, you can make staffing and resource decisions based on real contact trends.

Guide agents during live calls

Real-time guidance on the call

When customers reach you through a virtual number, AI Live Coach Cards surface speaking points, recommended workflows, and best practices while agents are still on the call.

Unified knowledge for faster resolutions

AI Live Coach pulls answers from your knowledge bases during conversations, so agents can find policies, workflows, and product information without switching tabs or putting customers on hold.

Improve performance with data-driven coaching

After calls, AI Coaching Hub brings AI Scorecards, AI CSAT, and playbook adherence together in one supervisor dashboard. Coaches can spot trends, identify who needs support, and give targeted feedback.

Coach and guide in real time with call monitoring

Dialpad's call monitoring tools give supervisors real-time visibility during live calls. You can listen in, whisper feedback to agents without the customer hearing, or barge in when escalation is needed, with support from Dialpad AI's live transcription and sentiment analysis. Monitored calls become opportunities for coaching and quality assurance, with recordings and insights feeding into analytics and workforce management.

Get the complete picture with virtual numbers, AI, and WFM

When you combine virtual phone numbers with Dialpad's workforce management scheduling, forecasting, and analytics, you get a data-driven view of your whole contact center operation.

Dialpad's live dashboard brings together call volume, handle time, queue health, sentiment, and abandonment rates across teams and channels. Heat maps show when and where spikes occur, so you can forecast demand and schedule agents before peak times hit.

Live transcription and sentiment analysis let supervisors see how conversations are unfolding, identify at-risk calls, and step in when an agent needs support. Keyword tracking with Custom Moments helps surface the topics and trends coming up across calls.

IVR and routing analytics show which menu options callers use, so you can refine self-service paths and reduce unnecessary transfers. With BI-style custom reporting, you can combine real-time data with historical trends to track KPIs such as average handle time or first-call resolution and connect them to your WFM forecasts.

Beyond operations, contact center analytics can reveal training needs, coaching moments, and service-to-sales opportunities inside customer conversations.

Virtual numbers for outbound sales teams

For outbound teams, Dialpad Sell builds on your virtual numbers with tools designed for high-volume calling:

• Local Presence: Automatically matches your caller ID to a local area code when reps call prospects in the US, which may help more calls get answered. Return calls route back to the rep who placed the original call. Local Presence is included in Dialpad Sell Advanced and Premium plans and is available as an add-on for other plans.

• Voicemail drop: Reps can leave a pre-recorded message and move on to the next call.

• Dialpad Dialer: Available on Sell Premium, Dialpad Dialer runs outbound campaigns through imported lead lists or lists built from integrations like Salesforce.

Virtual phone number with area codes for local presence

Here are the area codes you can get a number for with Dialpad:

Western US

Midwestern US

Northeastern US

Southern US