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Intelliverse Wants to 'Loosen the Tie on Your IVR'

By Rich Steeves, TMCnet Managing Editor

For more than 25 years, Intelliverse (News - Alert) has been a player in the call center space. During those two-and-a-half decades, the company has seen many changes in the industry, as technology evolved and businesses became more and more comfortable in the cloud. But as the market has changed, Intelliverse has adapted right along with it and seeks to continue providing call center services for decades to come.

At Call Center Week in Las Vegas, I sat down with Frank Paterno (News - Alert), vice president of marketing at Intelliverse. Paterno stressed that the company has sought to carve a niche for itself in what he refers to as the “self-service” area of the call center market. There was a time when this sector was referred to as “automated” but, similar to how “used car” dealerships became “previously owned,” he prefers to use the term “self service.”

The company’s solutions range from hosted IVR to hosted ACD to hosted VoIP. It serves many verticals, including retail, manufacturing, travel agencies, utility companies and other various call centers. One of the largest areas of growth for Intelliverse’s solutions is in the pre-paid market, such as pre-paid mobile phones or debit cards. These industries require quite a bit of automation, which customers prefer in many cases, choosing to let a computer tell them their balance rather than speaking to an agent about it.

The trick, says Paterno, is to use the automation to add to the customer service experience. With a smile, he stated how important it was to “loosen the tie on your IVR.” In the early days of the technology, it was important for IVR systems to seem more authoritative and robotic but now Paterno suggests taking things in another direction. Keeping your company’s brand and audience in mind, it might be a good idea to give your IVR a little personality. It can tell jokes, offer trivia, or even just speak with the lingo of the average customer. In that way maybe, just maybe, the “self-service” providers can wipe away that stigma of the word “automation.” And maybe my IVR can provide the etymology of that word!

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