Repetitive services can be a pain for your contact center agents and your customers alike. But what if it didn’t have to be that way? That’s where contact center IVR can help.

Contact center Interactive Voice Response (IVR) is a telephony system that interacts with callers through a series of menus and questions to facilitate a service or route the caller to the right agent or representative.

At a basic level: IVR takes input, processes that input and returns a result that meets the needs of the caller.

Integrated with the rest of your core contact center technology, IVR can be a valuable addition that enhances your CX process, simply because not every customer needs to (or wants to) speak to one of your agents. Self-service IVR can empower your customers to handle routine services in a quick and easy way, and it comes with many benefits for your contact center.

Top 5 Benefits of Contact Center IVRPeople using IVR

IVR is a simple and effective solution to any routine service your company provides. It’s also an essential feature for your contact center technology stack. Here are some benefits a well-oiled contact center IVR system can bring to your business.

#1. Greater Efficiency

The bottom-line on IVR is that it makes things more efficient for both the contact center and the customer.

How does it do that?

IVR allows your contact center to automate repetitive service tasks. By sending customers through an automated series of menu prompts or voice responses, IVR helps customers navigate through services on their own, getting quick and easy resolutions.

And if the IVR system can’t handle their service issue, then it can route the customer to the right agent.

This efficiency frees up your agents to take on those escalated calls. They can take more time to problem solve for your customers, growing their expertise of your products and services and enabling them to take on more complex service issues. Plus, they’ll be happier and more helpful without feeling bogged down or burnt out by repetitive tasks.

Self-service IVR also allows your contact center to prioritize calls more effectively, so you can handle more calls and service requests. Which leads us to the next benefit…

#2. Greater ROI

When you’re able to handle more calls more efficiently, your revenue goes up. Think of IVR as an investment in your contact center. After the initial integration and installation costs, it practically pays for itself by reducing operational costs and allowing you to fully streamline your contact center operations.

Increasing revenue. Reducing costs. The two surefire paths to business growth.

#3. Greater Customer Satisfaction

Gratification is instant these days. People are used to a lot of automation in their lives, simplifying everyday processes and getting what they want quicker than ever before.

In today’s world, waiting on hold can be a huge source of stress and dissatisfaction. With contact center IVR, you can avoid a lot of instances of putting your customers on hold by enabling them to actively get the service that they need when they need them. This leads to quicker resolutions and overall improved satisfaction.

And when customers are satisfied, they become repeat customers and brand evangelists. IVR is great for your company’s image. Especially if you’re a small company. When it works well, it comes across as a premium feature that can set your customer service experience apart, helping you appear more competent and more professional.

#4. Flexibility

One of the best things about today’s contact IVR systems is it’s easy to set up with your existing telephony software. It’s also an endlessly customizable service solution. You can make IVR processes align with your business needs.

A lot of industry contact centers use IVR. Banking and finance companies use it for tasks like checking account balances. Contract research organizations use IVR to conduct clinical trials. Shipping and logistics companies use it to give order status updates.

These are just some of the ways that IVR can be applied, and your business use case will vary. The important takeaway is that contact center IVR can fit your exact business needs.

#5. Reporting & Call Recording

Contact center IVR systems log call details and customer inputs, so you can use that data to improve your processes.

For example, at the end of an IVR service call, your system can ask the caller their satisfaction with the service. The customer can answer yes or no or push either button 1 or 2.

IVR can also track customer flow through the menu prompts, allowing you to shore up any deficiencies in your protocols.

Data points like there are valuable information, and when taken in with all your other data collection efforts, your contact center gets a more complete picture where your business can improve.

Conclusion

Adding IVR to your telephony system and your contact center tech stack further enhances your abilities to meet the needs of your customers in a quick and efficient manner.

So how do you get it? As a piece of telephony software, contact center IVR can be added to your stack with CTI—a type of technology that brings together the entire tech stack, including CRMs, internal and external communication tools and telephony software like IVR.

With CTI, adding new features is a breeze. That’s why you should look for a CTI solution provider that:

  • Requires no custom code.
  • Uses a per-seat, subscription pricing model instead of a huge up-front expenditure.
  • Combines a robust core engine with prebuilt connectors for leading CRMs, telephony systems and other critical customer service tools.

CDC’s CTI solution connects over 70 leading contact center systems. These powerful integrations allow you to enjoy all the contact center software features like self-service IVR.

Whatever your contact center technology stack looks like, CDC Software makes it work together better. Find out more by contacting our team.