In an ideal world, you can use both to improve the caller experience. If you have to pick one, though, ACD is the clear winner for customer retention.
While IVR systems are inexpensive and can help free up your agents, it requires callers to take the initiative. Plus, no one likes to get stuck in a phone tree.
Six (more) reasons why ACD is the better choice.
Apart from higher customer retention rates, there are several other reasons why ACD has the edge over IVR for call centers.
1. You will answer more questions and solve more problems.
When was the last time you called a business with a problem and had an automated menu answer your question? I’m assuming never. Or maybe almost never if you’re lucky.
Even with recent Call Center IVR Upgradethey still have a long way to go.
Customers aren’t calling to find your address and they know they can pay their bills online. The only reason they picked up the phone and dialed your number is because they want to talk to someone who can actually help them.
ACDs do so. On the other hand, IVRs can frustrate your customers, and they answer questions they don’t even ask.
2. Improved call center KPIs
ACD systems are faster and more efficient for call centers. It can help improve a lot. Key Call Center Metrics You are tracking to measure success, including:
- First Response Time (FRT).
- First Call Resolution (FCR).
- Average Handling Time (AHT).
- Net Promoter Score (NPS).
- Customer Satisfaction Score (CSAT).
- Average abandonment rate.
- Average time in queue.
An IVR can negatively impact just about every metric unless you do everything right. Even when done well, things like first call resolution, customer satisfaction, and average time in queue can still suffer.
3. Increases brand loyalty.
If your customers are calling you, they have some kind of problem. Forcing them to navigate through long phone menus can make matters worse, making them wait longer, and increasing frustration when they do speak to someone.
Providing phone support from a live agent goes a long way, especially in an era where many businesses fail to deliver.
Connecting callers to a qualified agent immediately proves that you actually care. If your customers feel that you care about them, you will not only retain them, but it is also easier to convert them into loyal customers with high lifetime value.
Plus, they’re more likely to talk about their five-star experience, recommend you to friends and family, and even Pay more for your services..
4. Limits repetitive self-service.
Self-service is not always a good thing. For many call centers, it doesn’t make sense, even if it sounds good on paper.
Most people can solve common problems themselves through your website, Google, or even forums. But if they’re calling you, chances are they have a more complex problem to solve—one that likely requires skilled agents.
Many callers have likely tried various other solutions and the last thing they want to hear is a self-service voice menu telling them to try things they’ve already done. .
What about the callers who would actually benefit from self-service? At worst, they talk to an agent for a few minutes and get excellent care along the way. Best case, they’re able to get all their questions answered within minutes and feel like you’ve exceeded expectations.
5. Easy to prioritize incoming calls.
If your call center software is integrated with your CRM, you can use customer data to prioritize your most important calls. This ensures that callers with the highest sales potential or those paying for faster service are routed to a live agent faster than others.
See: Learn. How to Test Call Center Integration before you buy.
You probably don’t want an enterprise client paying $20,000 per year sitting behind a solo consumer paying $20 per month.
6. Connects callers to the correct agent on the first try.
IVR systems fail when they don’t help callers help themselves. As we’ve already discussed, most callers want to speak to a real person rather than navigating a complicated and long-winded phone menu.
If the caller presses the wrong button or doesn’t understand your options, chances are they’ll end up talking to the wrong person.
You can contact a general operator after your IVR to call the appropriate department directly. But this leads to long hold times, and your callers have yet to connect with someone who can help them.
ACD systems eliminate these problems by automatically routing inbound calls to the most qualified agent on the first try.
Customers receive care faster because a representative answering the phone can provide assistance without having to transfer to someone else.
ACD features to look for
As you compare different tools and call center software, these are the features you should look out for. If you attend live demos, be sure to ask about them so you know how they work and the capabilities of each system.
Call distribution methods
Because Call routing affects your company image.it is one of the most important pieces of running a successful call center. Do it well and callers will appreciate it whether they realize it or not. Get it wrong and they’ll leave especially frustrated.
Thus, you should have the ability to customize the way your ACD routes call agents.
Popular options include:
- Skill-based – Each agent is tagged based on specific skills, languages spoken, or their skill level. For example, if a customer calls from Mexico, a skill-based ACD will route the call to a Spanish-speaking agent.
- Round Robin – It distributes each call evenly in a continuous loop so that each agent gets an equal chance. The first call is sent to the first agent, the second agent answers the next call, and so on.
- Simultaneous ring – Every incoming call is sent simultaneously to every available agent, and the first agent that answers the call.
- Least Occupied Agent – Calls are automatically routed to agents with the most idle time. If one agent is idle for 30 seconds and another agent is idle for two minutes, the other agent will take the call.
- Based on availability — The system automatically routes callers to agents based on their work schedules. This is common for remote contact centers that span multiple time zones.
- Fixed order – Each agent is ranked in whatever order you choose. Whenever a call comes in, ACD will route that caller to the first agent on your list. If they are not available, the call will go to the next agent, and so on until no one answers.
There are many different ways to configure your ACD, but each provider offers different capabilities at different levels, so it’s important to understand what you need and make sure the one you choose is right for you. Software may support this.
Ring or call groups.
Call groups can be helpful for different types of inbound calls. Because they let you assign agents to specific departments.
When ACD routes a call to a particular department, everyone in that ring group hears it ring.
From there, you can customize the distribution method for each color group based on what makes sense for the department. You may want to use round robin for your sales calls, simultaneous rings for billing, and skill-based call distribution for tech support.
Automated callbacks
With this feature, callers can request a callback when it’s their turn instead of waiting on hold. You can set it to trigger the callback option if the hold time exceeds a specified time, if there are too many people in the queue, or by default.
Say you set the minimum wait time to two minutes. If the caller waits only a minute and a half, he will not get the option to request a callback.
After the two-minute mark, they’ll hear an automated message and instructions on what to do.
See: Discover. Why Customers (and Agents) Appreciate Queue Callbacks.
Virtual Voicemail
If no one answers, you can set up rules to route voicemail messages to different departments or agents. You can customize your pre-recorded voicemail message based on what type of information each department needs to help them with, when they can expect a response, and information to the caller. Other related pieces may need to be known.
Some ACDs provide visual voicemail services that automatically transcribe messages — so agents can read voicemails even when they’re away from their desks or in loud environments.
Call queue
Call queue management is an easy way to manage callers who are waiting on hold.
The ACD system can automatically add inbound calls to a queue or possibly to a route if there are already too many callers on the line.
You can customize your call queues based on what’s most important to your call center. You want the call to be sent to a live agent as soon as possible. You might want to let the caller wait a few extra minutes to make sure they speak to the right person instead. Either way, it should be entirely up to you.
See: Discover us. Top tips for managing call queues for peak hours.
Call monitoring
Managers and supervisors can. Monitor calls live or post call. Both methods can provide valuable information about the quality and performance of your ACD.
If you find that agents are regularly transferring calls or struggling to provide support, you can adjust your settings to ensure that calls go to the right person. Over time, you’ll have a lot of data that you can use to make faster and better decisions.
You can too. Use ChatGPT to analyze customer sentiment. If you want a quick and easy way to understand what’s happening in calls.
Integration
Most call centers want to integrate ACDs with third-party tools—CRM software is the most common and helpful integration. Done well, it will automatically collect important information about the caller so the system can route them according to your rules.
The more information the system has, the better chance it has of getting it right.
In addition to routing, CRM integration allows agents to view caller information without having to search your CRM.
In many cases, all their details are displayed on their screen for them to review before responding.
ACD with IVR: Use them together for best results.
The best way to Improve the contact center experience IVR and ACD are to be used together. You can set them up with two different phone numbers (ie IVR for general customer support and ACD for technical support) or a very simple IVR system to collect enough information for your ACD to route the call. can use
ACD is only as good as what it has going on. If it doesn’t have much, Setting up a straightforward IVR call flow can help you get the most out of it.