What is IVR (Interactive Voice Response)?

After reading this article you will get to know IVR technology that is primarily used by customer service systems. IVR can come really handy when you need to handle a great number of calls efficiently. In the sections below, you can see a picture, representing the types of IVR, how they work, where they are used and what the advantages of IVR are.

IVR is an interactive menu system that you can use through a telephone keypad or voice recognition (Figure 1). Once you are in the menu system you can navigate among the menu items simply by pushing buttons on your phone or using your voice.

what is ivr
Figure 1 - What is IVR?

If you want to call a customer service centre you are directed to an interactive menu where the system answers you with a pre-recorded message that helps you to navigate in the menu. When there is a general customer problem, thy system gives you a pre-recorded message, but if the problem needs to be solved by a human, you will be directed to a customer service agent.

There Are Two Kinds of IVR

  • DTMF (Dual-tone multi-frequency) menu navigation: you can navigate among menu items with the help of a telephone with a traditional keypad.
  • Voice control navigation: the caller uses his/her voice to navigate in the menu.

Fields of Use

The IVR system is primarily used by call centres these days, however, other kinds of businesses adopt IVR too. The main reason for using this system is that it can handle the mass of the incoming calls.

IVR is applied in many areas of communication. It is used in television game shows, data obtaining, banking, travelling (e.g. booking), market surveys etc.

Advantages of IVR

  • For those who apply IVR

    • advanced and modern technology
    • increase capacity
    • access to live agents
    • save time with navigation

  • For Customers

    • 24 hour self-service access
    • real time interaction

The Ozeki Phone System can be expanded with the interactive menu system. For this, you need to create a virtual extension in the system. Since the Ozeki Phone System telephone system is based on Ozeki VoIP SIP SDK it is suitable for setting up an interactive menu system that is controlled by a keyboard or voice.

For further information on IVR related topics read the following pages:

If you became interested in this topic, please watch our video:

What is IVR? (Video tutorial)

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