Let Us Send You This

How To Make Super Affiliate Commissions

  • How To Create a Sales Funnel 300% More Powerful
  • How to Get Paid 000's monthly for leads
  • 4 Sources of Free Online Traffic For Your Biz
  • 28 Page Booklet Bursting At the Seams
Name
Email

Facebook

Do you know your zip ?

Tired of Paying 4 Traffic ? Get Free Traffic Every Day

Posts Tagged ‘ivr survey’
IVR As A Service: How To Select An IVR Vendor
Written by Barnard Crespi
Wednesday, 05 August 2009 07:30
No Comments
by Barnard Crespi

Selecting a vendor is no easy task, especially if you want to get it right the first time. The more information you have, the better your chances of success.

The following outline is an introduction to IVR vendor selection from a down-to-earth business perspective. It will help you identify the outsourcing model that is best for your business.

In todays IVR marketplace, IVR service providers deliver their services in different ways; from a complete self service model where you need to do all the legwork to a white glove service model where your projects are planned, developed, and implemented for you. Which one is best for your business will depend on how much energy, effort, and time you can afford to divert from your core business, to your IVR project. The good news is that theres a model out there for almost every business.

Whether your project involves a survey, payment system, sales lead generation, order and fulfillment, credit card transactions, or field employee reporting, there is a vendor model thats right for you.

It is important to understand three key factors which will help you make the right decision. The three (3) main reasons why an organization might decide to outsource its IVR operations versus taking it on in-house are as follows:

(a) Lower Cost (b) Flexible Technology (c) Higher Levels of Expertise

(a) – Cost: An outsourced IVR application can be far less expensive to implement than IVR done in-house. An IVR System will probably take less time to implement if you choose the hosted model and you will typically only pay for what you use or commit to using. Service providers usually adjust to your requirements, rather than you having to plan for growth.

(b) – Flexible Technology: In todays environment of rapidly changing business demands, technology must be flexible enough to adjust quickly and cost effectively. The outsourced IVR approach protects you from having to continuously adapt to these changes, as the responsibility is shifted to the service provider, protecting you from technological obsolescence.

(c) – Higher Levels of Expertise: If you dont have the time and /or resources to keep your IVR application running current and glitch-free, a provider who offers Managed IVR outsourcing is worth looking into. There are various levels of IVR services available ” some provide higher levels of expertise and support than others. Hosted service providers have an expertise that is difficult or almost impossible to maintain in-house, that is, having the experience of deploying 100s, if not 1000s, of applications, and knowing what works, what doesnt work, and what works best.

Which IVR Service model is best for your business? You will probably agree that the best model for any business, regardless of size, industry, budget, or application, is the model that will get the closest to guaranteeing a successful execution. Lets face it, IT projects are seldom completed on time, and most often exceed budget. However it doesnt need to be that way.

You have some decisions to make: Do-it-yourself, or delegate the responsibility to an expert?

* If you feel confident that you have the expertise and resources to plan, develop, maintain, manage, support, and refine an IVR strategy on your own, you may want to look at Self-Service SaaS models.

* If you want to focus on your business and leave the IVR solution to the experts (those who have done it repeatedly – hundreds, if not thousands of times), and want to ensure that your applications are hosted, monitored, maintained, and supported to ensure the best performance, then you want to look at a Full Service Managed SaaS model.

The model you choose depends on the level of expertise and support you would like to shift to your IVR service provider.

About the Author:
To makean IVR vendor selection , make sure to review this free report on IVR and IVR Survey vendor evaluation .
 
IVR As A Service: What Should You Know Before Making an IVR Vendor Selection-Part I
Written by Barnard Crespi
Saturday, 25 July 2009 10:31
No Comments
by Barnard Crespi

Making a vendor selection is no easy task, especially if you want to get it right the first time. So the more information you have, the better your chances of success.

The following outline is an introduction to IVR vendor selection from a down-to-earth business perspective. It will help you identify the outsourcing model that is best for your business.

In todays IVR marketplace, IVR vendors deliver their services in different ways; from a complete self service model where you need to do all the legwork to a white glove service model where your projects are planned, developed, and implemented for you. Which one is best for your business will depend on how much energy, effort, and time you can afford to divert from your core business, to your IVR project. The good news is that theres a model out there for almost every business.

Whether your project involves a survey, account inquiry system, sales lead generation, call center self-service, product order and fulfillment, credit card transactions, or field employee reporting, there is a vendor model thats right for you.

It is important to understand three key factors which will help you make the right decision. The three (3) main reasons why an organization might decide to outsource its IVR operations versus taking it on in-house are as follows:

(a) Lower Cost (b) Flexible Technology (c) Higher Levels of Expertise

(a) – Cost: An outsourced IVR application can be far less expensive to implement than IVR done in-house. An IVR System will probably take less time to implement if you choose the hosted model and you will typically only pay for what you use or commit to using. Service providers usually adjust to your requirements, rather than you having to plan for growth.

(b) – Flexible Technology: In todays environment of rapidly changing business demands, technology must be flexible enough to adjust quickly and cost effectively. The outsourced IVR approach protects you from having to continuously adapt to these changes, as the responsibility is shifted to the service provider, protecting you from technological obsolescence.

(c) – Higher Levels of Expertise: If you dont have the time and /or resources to keep your IVR application running current and glitch-free, a provider who offers Managed IVR outsourcing is worth looking into. There are various levels of IVR services available ” some provide higher levels of expertise and support than others. Hosted service providers have an expertise that is difficult or almost impossible to maintain in-house, that is, having the experience of deploying 100s, if not 1000s, of applications, and knowing what works, what doesnt work, and what works best.

Which IVR Service model is best for your business? You will probably agree that the best model for any business, regardless of size, industry, budget, or application, is the model that will get the closest to guaranteeing a successful execution. Lets face it, IT projects are seldom completed on time, and most often exceed budget. However it doesnt need to be that way.

You have some decisions to make: Do-it-yourself, or delegate the responsibility to an expert?

* If you feel confident that you have the expertise and resources to plan, develop, maintain, manage, support, and refine an IVR strategy on your own, you may want to look at Self-Service SaaS models.

* If you want to focus on your business and leave the IVR solution to the experts (those who have done it repeatedly – hundreds, if not thousands of times), and want to ensure that your applications are hosted, monitored, maintained, and supported to ensure the best performance, then you want to look at a Full Service Managed SaaS model.

The model you choose depends on the level of expertise and support you would like to shift to your IVR service provider.

About the Author:
Before making an IVR service provider selection , make sure to review this free report on IVR and IVR Survey vendor evaluation .
 
IVR Surveys – The secret to Increasing response Rates
Written by Barnard Crespi
Friday, 19 June 2009 01:55
No Comments
by Barnard Crespi

I recently launched an ask the expert campaign on IVR Surveys, inviting anyone who wanted to participate to submit their questions regarding IVR Surveys. Not surprisingly the most popular question was, How can I increase my survey response rates when using IVR?

I would like share a client story with you that will help answer this question.

I was recently working with a healthcare benefits group, we develop and host about a dozen IVR surveys per year for them. They were experiencing a 10% response rate on a particular project, when the average for projects of this scope is about 30%. They chose IVR specifically because of the demographics they were targeting, and where access to the internet was limited.

The IVR survey invitation was part of a benefits package information kit sent out to 15,000 employees and the package contained about 50 pages. If you have worked in a large organization, or your employer offers you benefits I ’m sure you are familiar with this type of package. Included in the package there was an invitation to participate in an employee survey. The client thought they had this under control. The organization was relying on the results of this survey to tailor changes to the benefits package to the realities faced by employees, and the client wanted to obtain a significant enough sample to make the changes that reflect the needs and wants of the employees.

Needless to say, the 10% response was not what they expected, and certainly was not representative of their employee base; therefore it was of little use in planning their benefits strategy change. They were very disappointed, I would be.

The first reaction, by the clients project team, was “Our employees don’t use IVR”, and this is why so few responded. Our client called us immediately to ask for our opinion, and what could be done. Of course, as soon I heard where the invitation was inserted; basic marketing 101 told me where the problem was.

Since the client had already invested in developing the survey, and had pre-paid for some transactional services, I suggested that they conduct a small pilot, a mailing to 200 employees. This was a simple post-card invitation, with the survey toll-free number, and access code, plus a compelling reason to call , “We are making changes to your benefits plan, and your opinion is important to us.”

Printing and mailing were cost-effective and the response rate jumped to 65%. Needless to say the client was ecstatic, and the next week, they mailed all 15,000 postcards, achieving a 62% response rate. Applying basic marketing principals to promoting surveys, became part of our clients practice, and escalated the average survey participation rate for employee surveys from 30% to over 50% where IVR access was provided.

The survey invitation was part of a benefits package information kit sent out to 15,000 employees and the package contained about 50 pages. If you have worked in a large organization, or your employer offers you benefits I ’m sure you are familiar with this type of package. Included in the package there was an invitation to participate in an employee survey. The client thought they had this under control. The organization was relying on the results of this survey to tailor changes to the benefits package to the realities faced by employees, and the client wanted to obtain a significant enough sample to make the changes that reflect the needs and wants of the employees.

Needless to say, the 10% response was not what they expected, and certainly was not representative of their employee base; therefore it was of little use in planning their benefits strategy change. They were very disappointed, I would be.

The first reaction, by the clients project team, was “Our employees don ’t use IVR ”, and this is why so few responded. Our client called us immediately to ask for our opinion, and what could be done. Of course, as soon I heard where the invitation was inserted; basic marketing 101 told me where the problem was.

Since the client had already invested in developing the survey, and had pre-paid for some transactional services, I suggested that they conduct a small pilot, a mailing to 200 employees. This was a simple post-card invitation, with the survey toll-free number, and access code, plus a compelling reason to call , “We are making changes to your benefits plan, and your opinion is important to us’

Printing and mailing were cost-effective and the response rate jumped to 65%. Needless to say the client was ecstatic, and the next week, they mailed all 15,000 postcards, achieving a 62% participation rate. Applying basic marketing principals to promoting surveys, became part of our clients practice, and escalated the average survey participation rate for employee surveys from 30% to over 50% where IVR access was provided.

About the Author:
Get copy to a free guide on IVR Surveysand IVR