In late June Interactions Inc. issued this press release to report the results of a survey that it sponsored to discover general attitudes toward interactive voice response systems deployed in modern contact centers. The survey process was overseen by Liel Leibovitz, an Assistant Professor of Communications at New York University and was conducted in two waves. First, 408 respondents completed an 11-question survey about general attitudes towards IVRs and other service options. Then, an additional 21 respondents were interviewed in person in order to get more detailed responses and insights regarding various channels for customer support.

The survey results represent the most recent, but by no means the harshest, criticism of IVRs as platforms for customer care. As summarized in the press release, “On an ease-of-use scale, IVR systems scored lower than any of the other service options and was the only option perceived as difficult to use.” Perhaps as a result, only 15% of respondents chose IVRs as their preferred service option, making it the least preferred of all candidates.

The survey has led to substantive discussion of the quality of care across multiple channels and at various points in an individuals journey of discovery to support their efforts to find the companies they want to carry out business with and the products and services that deserve their loyalty. Another way to interpret the survey results is that IVRs, such as they are, are only suitable in about 15% of the instances where an individual seeks specific results. They may want a simple readout of an account balance, the status of a claim or details of a trip itinerary, or (ironically) they may want an organic way to discover and get routed to the right agent or assistant in a large business organization.

Dr. Christian Dugast, a veteran speech consultant with design experience at Philips, Nuance and VoiceObjects, pointed out in this very thoughtful blog post that the relative decline in popularity for IVR (and perhaps voice conversations in general) coincides with the rise of text and written input. He points out the obvious differences between voice-based and written communications but, more importantly, he notes that individuals have at least two “modes” of communications to carry out. In their primary mode, they want to impart emotion, be able to interrupt others and get a message across. It is more suitable to voice (but not necessarily IVR). In the secondary mode, they want to get results and reach an intended goal with the least friction. This is where support of written input counts, but so does the use of speech-enabled IVRs for intelligent routing of a call to the proper person or other resource in a company.

Voice or IVR may be preferred in only 15% of interactions between individuals and the companies with whom they carry out business. Yet, when you take into account the entire journey from search, through discovery, to consultation, to selection and finally to transaction completion and support, a (voice) phone call is involved in more than 85% of those relationships. Not surprisingly, these calls take place when the caller needs to vent, express emotion or conduct the sort of social engineering exercises that have worked in the past. If they have had a bad experience with IVRs (even speech enabled ones) at a time of high-stress and high-emotion, it is bound to be played out again, unless the system is tuned to recognize an issue quickly and move to resolve it either through automated resources or rapid delivery to an live agent with authority to resolve the problem.

The problem is seldom, if ever, one of technology, alone. As Dimension Data’s annual benchmark study revealed this year, top management has come to realize that providing a better user experience trumps “saving money” in the contact center – “60% of organizations said they placed more importance on the customer experience than cost reduction, with 41% reporting they recognized the value of providing customer choice via multiple self-service channels.”

The benchmarking study also reveals why the incidence of voice based communications has declined as a percentage of interactions. Contact centers have become “customer management centers” – a scary thought in the world of conversational commerce – “with 71% already handling Internet-based interactions, 14% managing SMS interactions, and 36% offering web chat.”

Chances in mix and frequency of interaction types are fundamental and irreversible. As voice-based interactions lose share to Web visits, text-messages and IM, it is more important than ever that the “voice channel” provide a pleasing (and successful) experience to results-oriented callers, irrespective of whether those interactions involve automated speech recognition, voice response or a simple pass-through to a live agent.

Categories: Articles

Tags: IVR, Contact Centers, Automated Speech, Benchmarks