Successful customer care organizations leverage call center solutions to ensure agents can actively engage with customers to resolve issues, close transactions and keep customers satisfied. One popular solution is interactive voice response (IVR), a segment of the market expected to enjoy strong growth over the next five years.

This recent Destination CRM piece reported on the latest findings from Global Industry Analytics (GIA). The firm’s latest research shows the global market for IVR systems will reach $2.78 billion by 2017. Growth for these call center solutions is expected to be the greatest in the U.S., primarily driven by the prominence of outbound IVR, innovative pricing strategies, increasing opportunities in the SMB sector, advancements in technology and the development of open standards.

The U.S. continues to dominate as the largest and one of the fastest growing of the regional markets offering promise for IVR systems. Such call center solutions will grow at a compound average growth rate of roughly 10.32 percent per year through 2017. Domestic financial services firms are driving the demand for IVR as part of their restructuring strategies. And, while the large enterprise segment has long dominated the push toward IVR ports, future growth is expected to stem from SMBs.

Recession-induced cut-backs led to slowed growth in 2009 for call center solutions. Companies of all sizes were cutting back on technology investments and spending. To combat this challenge, the IVR market launched an aggressive comeback in 2010 as companies were seeking call center solutions to enable a focus on new customer acquisition, customer retention, and higher customer satisfaction ratings.

Outbound IVR is now being seen as a cost-effective method for delivering important notifications, expediting collections and providing a proactive and personalized approach to customer service. Hosted IVR is also getting more attention as companies that previously shied away are now investing in call center solutions. As the demand for hosted IVR grows, expect to see a rush of new providers, which will heighten availability and cost competition, creating a great environment for those seeking call center solutions.

Quality monitoring and recording call center solutions are also contributing to the growth of IVR as companies seek to boost productivity. Such call center solutions are now available through hosted models or Software-as-a-Service instead of on-premise deployments that required licensing, hardware, implementation and support. With the hosted deployment model, call centers today can implement new call center solutions without the significant capital investments that once hindered their competitive edge.