For anyone who has ever had to deal with an IVR when they call into a customer service line – there may be some frustrating similarities in the experience you’ve had interacting with that IVR. From never ending menu trees, to not being able to get to a live person, or even having to repeat information multiple times – it can seem like finding a company with an intuitive and user-friendly IVR is few and far between.
Part of this can be attributed to that fact that businesses are using these IVRs to lower costs and keep customers happy – but finding the right balance can prove difficult if the right tools and strategies are not in place.
Angel.com (News - Alert) is an on-demand SaaS-based company that makes it possible for customers to build, manage and deploy IVR solutions that are hosted and require no investment in support, hardware or on-going maintenance.
The company has coined a ‘Caller Bill of Rights’ to offer a chance for businesses to gain caller trust by offering applications that “do the right thing” and actually help callers.
First, companies must understand that all callers will use automation when it works and makes sense to their needs. When trying to gain caller trust, it is important to allow them to feel like they are in control and create automation that feels different and isn’t like every other IVR system out there.
“We want to ask customers targeted and specialized questions when they call into the IVR and surprise them and win them over,” said Mike Ahnemann, creative director, User Experience at Angel during the “Caller Bill of Rights - Best Practices That Put Your Callers First” webinar.
As a refresher, Anhemann listed the 10 ‘Caller Bill of Rights’ established previously by the company:
· The right to have their expectations set clearly
· Be honest about live help
· Keep Callers in control of the interaction
· Create a consistent experience
· Remember me
· Treat me like a Human being
· Don’t make me repeat myself
· Get me to the right place
· Respect my time
· Listen to me
Offering up tips and best practices on how to put callers first, Anhemann told Webinar participants it can be very difficult to get to the point where an application does all of these things. But the hopes are that the guidelines have helped business to understand that not following these guidelines can make customers not trust their IVR.
“A lot of times IVRs fail because we don’t do our homework upfront – callers sometimes aren’t willing to use automation for certain things because it’s not as upfront as a company thought.”“We have to make sure we are doing the steps needed to solve this problem,” Ahnneman said.
For more, check out the archived version of the Webinar HERE
Edited by Amanda Ciccatelli