10 Reasons Why You Need an IVR

Do you think IVRs are a waste of money, not necessary for your SMB or are super cheesy? Do you think that customers don’t like interacting with an IVR, or will be turned away from your business if they are greeted by an IVR? Do you think they are too hard to setup, require sophisticated telephony or hardware or software to install? If you answered yes, indulge us for one blog post.

Interactive Voice Response (IVR) is a telephony menu system that enables identification, segmentation and routing of callers to the most appropriate agent within your team.

Below are 10 reasons why you should use an IVR:

1. Easy to setup

With more progressive IVR technologies, all that is required is an internet connection and a browser. Your IVR will take a few minutes to setup you can use pre-recorded messages to expedite the setup process.

2. Customer friendly

Customers are used to interacting with an IVR. When you limit the number of prompts, they will be immediately directed to an agent who is most qualified to address their issues or concerns.

3. Allow you to automate customer support

IVRs provide your customers with the option of helping themselves. They can use the IVR to solve their own problems and obtain relevant information without speaking with an agent.

4. Give your customers a personalized experience

With IVRs you can record customized greetings, messages and prompts. You can record as many greetings as you would like so customers have a unique and personalized experience each time they call.

5. Reduce transfer errors

IVRs transfer calls to the most appropriate agent or department, without fail. Thus, the probability that the caller is transferred to the wrong agent or department significantly decreases.

6. Allow you to prioritize calls based value

IVRs will route VIP customers directly to your team member who is most qualified to meet their needs.

7. Improve your professionalism

You can use an IVR system to improve the professionalism of your company. The IVR will greet your customers professionally and you can use it to make it seem that your company has more departments and employees than you actually have.

8. Increase customer service, agent and company efficiency

IVRs allow agents to be more proficient at meeting the specific needs of the callers that are routed to them. With IVRs, your agents will be less likely to place calls on hold, call a manager for help or transfer the call to another agent with more experience. This results in a significant increase in customer service, agent and company efficiency.

9. Affordable

IVRs are not just for enterprise companies. With cloud-based technology, there are no costly setups or maintenance costs, no expensive hardware or software to install and are affordable. Any company can afford one, no matter what their budget.

10. Increase revenue

When customer service increases and agent efficiency increases, the results are simple. More customers who are more satisfied will be more likely to buy your product or service.

Any company can clearly benefit from using an IVR and also can afford one. IVRs are therefore a smart investment with the potential to generate a huge ROI. If you don’t have an IVR or would like to migrate to a more effective or cost-sensitive cloud contact center software platform, get in touch with us today!