Improving your IVR can improve the overall flow of your call center, which is incredibly important. The more smoothly your call center runs, the more happy your callers will be and the less stressed out your agents will be in general. There are a lot of ways that you can set up your IVR to optimize your customers’ experience, and today we’re going to be looking at five of the best ways you can go about it. No matter the size of your call center or the scale of your operation, you can improve your workflow by following some of these tips.
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1. Make Sure the Language Option Menu is as Early as Possible in the Call
This might seem like a no-brainer to some, but that doesn’t make it any less important. Putting your language selection menu early on in the call will make callers that don’t speak English feel appreciated, especially if you have agents that are fluent in their mother tongue. It might be a small thing to give your callers, but it will never go unnoticed or unappreciated and can make your callers have a better opinion about your company.
2. Make Sure There’s Always an Option to Speak to an Agent
When someone needs to speak with someone, they probably want to be sure that they can do so as quickly as possible. Providing an option to speak to an agent means that people that are in a rush will never get stuck trying to mess around with your menus. This is an especially helpful thing for people that are tech-illiterate and as such might get lost in your menus trying to get it figured out. You don’t necessarily need to have the option to speak to the agent listed, especially if you use the 0 button to connect to an agent because most people know that one, but it can still be helpful if you want to be sure you’re being clear with your callers.
3. Don’t Use a Robot Voice for Your Menus
It may be tempting to just set up your IVR with the standard robot voice. After all, it’s easy enough to just set up the menu and let a robot voice read off all of the prompts. Unfortunately, even though it is incredibly easy to do it this way, it’s not the best way to do it. Robot voices can come off as cold and uncaring, which can change your customers’ opinion of your company. Taking the time to record one of your agents’ voices for your IVR adds a nice little touch to the menu, and it gives your company more of a generally warm and caring vibe. This can also provide one of your agents a fun little break from their usual workflow which is great for morale and can help them provide better service to your customers.
4. Give Clear, Concise Instructions
Some people are very easily confused for any number of reasons. That’s why it’s important to give your callers clear and concise instructions for how to proceed through your IVR menus. Without good instructions, your callers could end up confused and irritated while trying to get through their call. The better the instructions you give, the better experience your callers will have with their call. No one wants confused and frustrated callers because that can lower your conversion rate significantly, and it can also make the call a lot more difficult for your agents.
5. Consider Using Vocal Recognition Software
Vocal recognition software is one of the greatest advancements for IVR technology. It can help people that have a hard time with phone menus by allowing them to just say their response to get to where they need to be in your phone tree. It can take a little bit of trial and error to be sure that it runs in the best way possible, but your callers will appreciate the extra effort. Vocal recognition software has come a long way, and with the right software, it will be able to understand people no matter how much they mumble or what kind of an accent they might have.
Make Sure Your IVR is Set Up Effectively
One of the biggest mistakes that call centers make is not setting up their IVR the right way. An ineffective IVR can lead to a loss in sales, more frustrated callers, and also more stressed-out agents. A properly set-up IVR can make everything in your operation run a little more smoothly, and that can impact your wallet in a big, positive way. It doesn’t matter if you have a small operation with only a handful of agents, or you have a large operation with thousands of agents all over the country. The care that you put into your IVR reflects on your company, so make sure you’re taking good care of it.