By Chad Brooks
Most small businesses don't have the
luxury of hiring employees whose sole responsibility is to answer phones all
day.
Whether it's to route calls to the
proper person or department or answer simple questions, handling customer calls
can be a large undertaking for a business. To help keep employees focused on
their own work — and not talking on the phone all day — many small businesses
are turning to interactive voice response (IVR) systems.
By automating the call process, IVR
systems allow customers to serve themselves. IVR technology uses touch-tone or
speech-recognition programs to answer customer questions, handle their requests
or point them in the right direction. This is all done without the need for the
customer to speak directly with an employee.
While these systems were previously
used only by large corporations fielding hundreds or thousands of calls a day,
many small businesses are now seeing the benefit of employing IVR systems in
their own operations. If you're looking for an IVR for your small business,
here are 14 solutions to consider.
Genesys
Genesys offers both inbound and
outbound IVR solutions. With Genesys' inbound IVR, you can automate routine transactions
and capture and analyze customer data. Genesys' outbound IVR solution allows
businesses to send customers appointment reminders, shipment notifications,
account activations, surveys, refills and reorders, and closing announcements.
Both of Genesys' inbound and outbound solutions deliver a personalized customer
interaction by integrating with Web-based customer relationship management
(CRM) systems like Salesforce. www.genesys.com
inContact
inContact's IVR software lets
customers choose the type of help they want, such as self-service or speaking
with an agent. The software supports both automated speech recognition and
text-to-speech, and features automatic callback for customers who can't wait to
speak with a representative. inContact's IVR solution also integrates with
popular CRM software and can pull data from popular CRMs
like Salesforce, Microsoft Dynamics CRM and Oracle RightNow. In addition, the
software is easy to update. Businesses with multiple locations can also serve
each one with just one IVR application. www.incontact.com
SmartAction
SmartAction combines traditional IVR
services with artificial intelligence. SmartAction says its Intelligent Voice
Automation (IVA) recognizes speech, understands callers' meaning and intent,
and remembers the evolving context of each conversation. SmartAction's IVA
responds with personalized, context-relevant and accurate answers, according to
the company. While most speech IVR solutions use application-specific programs
or scripts, only IVA uses an "AGI Brain" that reasons and learns from
experience, the company says. SmartAction's IVA integrates with any customer
database, website, PBX phone system or call agent support software. When
SmartAction's IVA can't complete a complicated conversation, it captures and
provides all relevant call information to live agents. The IVA is also PCI-certified, so businesses can accept payments
over the phone. www.smartaction.com
Plum Voice
Plum Group's Plum Voice offers both
hosted IVR and on-site IVR. In hosted IVR, the IVR system resides in the cloud,
and the responsibility for the maintenance and management of telecommunications
and servers falls on the vendor. On-site IVR, on the other hand, integrates
with a business's existing telephone systems. Plum Voice offers both inbound
and outbound IVR options. The company's outbound IVR allows businesses to
target their messages to each type of call. Plum Voice offers a 100 percent
uptime guarantee. www.plumvoice.com
Agile Networks
Agile Networks offers a suite of
unified communications applications, including IVR systems. The company
provides both inbound and outbound IVR systems. Agile Networks' inbound IVR
technology allows businesses to create menu trees by phone for activities such
as banking, getting an account status, checking on a bill, getting the location
of a store or offering a directory of employees and departments. The company's
outbound IVR systems can call customers with appointment reminders or
notifications, provide order statuses, notify customers when a payment is
overdue and conduct telemarketing campaigns. www.agile-networks.com
Five9
Five9's IVR systems are cloud based,
so businesses don't need any additional hardware to use it. Features include a
visual script designer with drag-and-drop visual tools that enables businesses
to create automated call-processing scripts from start to finish;
speech-recognition technology that analyzes calls to create a more natural customer
experience; recorded prompts from a library of audio recordings that allows
businesses to play messages or instructional voice prompts; and a
text-to-speech builder with a variety of voice characters to provide customers
with information such as account balances. Five9's IVR also includes call
variable reporting, which allows businesses to view the IVR path for each call
to see how their system can be improved. www.five9.com
Telzio
Telzio offers a voice over Internet
protocol (VoIP) phone system, including IVR functionality, for small
businesses. Telzio's IVR menus provide automated greetings with menu options.
Businesses can set up custom IVR menus to direct callers to the right place and
record custom greetings to provide important information — like business hours,
company directories and any other instructions — to their callers. In addition,
businesses can automatically forward a call to an operator if a caller doesn't
respond to the IVR prompts, as well as repeat instructions up to 10 times if
callers need time to make a selection. www.telzio.com
Synclio
With Synclio's small business IVR,
you can program your phone system to answer routine questions, as well as route
calls to the appropriate person or department. Businesses can provide callers
with basic information, such as business hours or driving directions, or
establish prerecorded prompts that callers can select from by using their
telephone keypads or through spoken commands. Additionally, businesses can
program their IVR to provide detailed account information. www.synclio.com
IVR Lab
IVR Lab's IVR system can provide
callers with information extracted from local or remote databases, such as
account information, telephone banking or bill pay. The company's systems also
have the functionality to transfer calls to a live agent or other extension.
IVR Lab's IVR systems work with a wide variety of database systems, including
MSSQL, MySQL, Access, Foxpro, Oracle and CSV. Overall, the company's systems
are fully customizable to each client's particular needs. The IVR Lab systems
work with both dedicated telephone lines and VoIP. IVR Lab also provides
outbound IVR services. www.ivr-lab.com
XO Communications
XO Communications' IVR system is
cloud based and builds upon a business's existing infrastructure. The company's
inbound and outbound systems allow businesses to complete transactions over the
phone, notify customers of relevant changes in services or programs, gather
feedback and gauge performance via customer satisfaction surveys, update
customers in business interruption situations, and ensure accurate information
for product and service warranties by verifying purchase details and
information. The company's IVR services can also transfer, record and monitor
calls. XO Communications' systems can be managed via its Web-based platform. www.xo.com
Cisco
Cisco's Unified IP IVR system is
designed to facilitate self-service options by processing caller commands
through touch-tone input or speech-recognition technologies. It also allows
customers to retrieve the information they need through voice commands without
ever speaking with an agent, or to quickly navigate to the correct department
or agent who can help them. Cisco's services have automated-speech-recognition
and text-to-speech capabilities, and can deliver notifications to callers
through email, fax, pager and text message. www.cisco.com
CenturyLink
CenturyLink offers a hosted and
network-based IVR service. The company's network-based system, EZ Route,
provides contact-center functionality that lets businesses answer calls,
provide messages and announcements, and support call routing to live agents or
other IVR applications through a menu-based interface. The system allows you to
develop a voice menu and routing scheme via a Web-based interface. The
interface also lets you record your own announcements over the phone or upload
professionally recorded audio files. When using CenturyLink's hosted IVR
service, calls are answered via a touch-tone or speech-recognition menu. The
information request is then routed via a secure network to the appropriate Web
application server for a response. CenturyLink's ready-to-use applications
include store locators, financial status, account updates and PIN resets. The
system, which supports text-to-speech applications, can also route callers to a
live agent if the system can't handle the customer's request. www.centurylink.com
NewVoiceMedia
NewVoiceMedia's IVR is a cloud-based
and self-service solution. The system allows businesses to change their IVR
menus to reflect the ever-changing behavior of their customers without the need
for IT assistance. NewVoiceMedia's inbound IVR services can give caller
information related to specific events or stores based on a keypad input. A
number of different options can be used to answer the most common queries, such
as opening times, ticket prices, location details and latest news. In addition,
NewVoiceMedia's IVR solutions are all Level 1 PCI-DSS compliant, offering high
levels of security to organizations collecting information or taking card
payments over the telephone. www.newvoicemedia.com
Interactive Intelligence
Among the tasks Interactive
Intelligence's IVR can perform include banking by phone, prescription refills
by phone, feedback surveys, outbound notifications, appointment reminders and
catalog purchases. The company's services support multilingual options,
including Spanish and other languages. Interactive Intelligence's system also
provides internal services for employees, such as benefits enrollment, time and
attendance reports, shift scheduling and work-order assignments. www.inin.com
Originally published on Business News Daily
By Chad Brooks, Business News Daily
Senior Writer
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