Best Automatic Call Distribution Software
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PRODUCTS
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BUYER'S GUIDE
Buyer's Guide
By Anjali Gupta, Market Analyst at SelectHub
Imagine you own a call center where you plan to have a customer-centric strategy in place. But, to provide a positive experience, you need the right team that can handle customer services and facilitate repeat business and long-term customer relationships. That's where automatic call distribution software comes to the rescue.
Automatic call distribution, commonly known as ACD, is a tool of a call center software that enables agents to distribute or divert phone calls from customers to other agents or persons effectively through some predefined logic and rules. This feature makes it one of the main components of an organization's call management strategy. This system works best with interactive voice response (IVR) and computer telephony integration (CTI).
This guide to ACD solutions is a crash course in selecting the perfect system for your inbound calling processes. Starting from a rundown ACD software, it’ll cover different benefits and why implementing this solution is the best bet for your business. In this way, you can compare many providers and make an empowered software decision.
Executive Summary
- ACD connects customers to suitable agents in the minimum time possible.
- ACD always means Inbound Call center. This system distributes incoming calls from the customers intelligently to the agents. The Automatic Calling mechanism for outgoing calls is called Predictive Dialing.
- This solution diverts incoming calls to agents in order. If the first sales representative is busy, the call gets routed to the second. If the second is engaged, it goes to the third agent and so on. The primary purpose is to ensure that customers don’t get the busy tone and connect to the correct caller as soon as possible.
What Is Automatic Call Distribution Software?
Automatic call distribution software is a telecommunications technology that answers incoming calls and routes them to the most appropriate agents or departments within an inbound call center. It streamlines communication by ensuring that customers don’t wind up in a queue or loop and preventing call system overloading.
Companies that exclusively offer ACD solutions provide innumerable services such as call forwarding facilities, making outbound traffic allowing customers to record messages and assembling service satisfaction statistics and data usage. This system works in conjunction with various computer-telephony operatives such as Interactive Voice Response (IVR) and Computer Telephony Integration (CTI), ensuring a higher efficiency and accuracy.
Primary Benefits
- Auto Attendant Systems
- Business Phone Service Providers
- Business Phone
- Call Center Scripting
- Call Center
- Call Monitoring
- Call Tracking
- Cloud PBX
- Computer Telephony Integration
- Conference Call Services
- Conference Calling
- IVR Systems
- PBX Phone
- Predictive Dialer
- SIP Trunk Providers
- Small Business Phone
- UCAAS Providers
- Video Conferencing
- VoIP Phone Systems
- VoIP Softphones
- Ring All Simultaneously: Whenever an incoming call comes, ACD rings all the sales representatives simultaneously so that anyone free can pick up without wasting time.
- Time-Based Routing: Calls land in the office only during operating hours. After that, they’re diverted to mobile numbers, voicemail or get answered with an IVR.
- Skill-Based Routing: The CRM or an ACD system keeps a map of agent skills and progress along with caller requirements. This way, essential and premium customers are diverted to the most experienced and skilled agents. ACD identifies the numbers from the Caller ID and gets more details about the caller from the CRM to route the calls accordingly.
- Custom Routing: All the above rules can be modified and customized by integrating ACD with CRM. For instance, with the help of an IVR, customers may be asked a few questions to determine which agent is most suitable to handle the call.
- Improved Customer Retention: All the above rules can be modified and customized by integrating ACD with CRM. For instance, with the help of an IVR, customers may be asked a few questions to determine which agent is most suitable to handle the call.
- Personalized Greetings/Hold Music: Helps establish the company's image among clients with customizable greetings and hold music. You can select songs from a vast collection or upload a customized message that speaks to your brand from a user-friendly online studio.
Key Features & Functionality
Round Robin | Distributes the load equally between the agents by “the first call to the first agent, the second to the second” method. It is easy to configure and distribute calls equally. |
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Quick Response to VIP Clients | An ACD identifies, reacts and engages with specific customers at a faster rate through VIP clients. It distinguishes criteria, including tags, business tools and integrated data systems. |
Creating Database | Automatic Call Distribution software encourages the creation of data usage facilities essential for research and analysis purposes. This data includes the amount of time spent by an agent on a call, volume of inbound traffic, total number of inbound and outbound calls and the amount of time before the call was engaged. |
Automatic Call Back | Offers the option of getting a call back from agents when customers don’t wish to wait in a queue. |
Record Messages | While dealing with high call traffic and call waiting and queues are functioning on extremes, ACD automatically switches to voicemail and message recording facilities without compromising quality and customer satisfaction levels. |
CRM Integration | A CRM helps in efficient call distribution and gives agents more data on the customer before and while talking to them. |
Call Monitoring | Managers can barge or whisper into the calls to help against while dealing with complex customers or train new employees during live conversations. They can also silently spy and listen to customer-agent conversation to analyze performance and sentiments of the call. |
Software Comparison Strategy
There is no automatic call distribution software list with the best and worst in the industry. Each business is different and has unique requirements, which is why we recommend our customers begin their search by talking to colleagues and industry contacts about what app they use. You can also get recommendations from clients following your social media channels by asking them to give feedback on your prospective selections. Moreover, customers can also analyze the benefits of the solution and research new features that make them unique to pick the right choices.
Before you compare, we recommend that you start by defining your requirements using the above features as a starting point and ask your selection team to prioritize what you need most.
Cost & Pricing Considerations
How you deploy the ACD software will significantly impact the total cost you pay upfront or over the long term. The most significant difference is the base cost of using the platform. With a cloud-based deployment, you may have to pay an ongoing subscription fee based on the number of users. On the other hand, on-premise software involves a one-time or recurring license purchase, depending on the vendor. Beyond that, you must also consider the total cost of ownership - every cost associated with operating the ACD system. Some expected additional prices include version upgrades, training, particularly for powerful and complex software, add-on capabilities, maintenance and implementation support.
The Most Popular Automatic Call Distribution Software
Navigating the inundated market of call center software can be overwhelming. To help you choose the best option, we’ve listed five top performers that deliver the most important requirements.
Aspect
Aspect is a contact center solution designed to support all inbound and outbound calls around the globe across email, SMS, voice and other channels. This contact management solution enhances operational efficiency and ensures that the agents deliver world-class customer experiences with features including inbound and outbound voice support, omnichannel agents and digital self-service.
A preview of dashboard.
Five9
Five9 is a world-class call center software that facilitates customer engagement from all over the world. It helps agents to boost revenue by enhancing their productivity and delivering premium class customer experience. aDDITIONALLY, It facilitates simplification of the complexities of a call center by reducing on-premises maintenance expenditures. ItsSome of its primary main features include speech-enabled IVR, historical dashboards, web callback, pre-built CRM integrations and agent scripting.
How call is distributed automatically to agents.
Bitrix 24
Bitrix24 is a contact center solution that provides efficient tools and strategies for sales, customer services and more marketing, including market automation, marketing automation, campaign management and call center support. The product is most suitable for enterprises with up to 50,000 employees.
A view of campaign tool.
Questions to Ask
Some of the questions you must ask yourself before taking a final pick are:
- Is this software flexible enough to meet your organization’s goals?
- Is it scalable? Do you need it to be?
- Will an out-of-the-box software do, or will you need a custom product?
- What is the long-term viability of the vendor you’re considering?
- Are your requirements industry-specific?
- Is on-premise or cloud-based deployment better for your organization?
Use these questions as a starting point for conversations with vendors:
About the Software
- How often are enhancements and updates offered?
- Do the updates occur automatically and how will they impact the software's accessibility?
- How well can the ACD software integrate with other software present in the company?
- What features will cost extra?
- What’s the learning curve? Is there any training provided to support user adoption?
- What level of customization is available? Does it cost extra?
- How long will implementation and onboarding take?
- How many contacts can it store?
About the Provider
- Does customer support come at an extra charge?
- Does this vendor specialize in all types of businesses?
- Is customer relationship management this provider's main priority?
- Do they offer any migration and setup services?
- Does this vendor offer an industry-specific ACD platform?
- Does this company have a proven track record of customer success?
In Conclusion
Now it’s time to get down to business and choose an ACD provider. To start, you must conduct a case analysis to determine which product best fits your requirements. Some companies concentrate on the total cost of ownership, while others focus on how well the system will improve sales ROI. Once you assess all the features and requirements and define which are most suitable to your organization, choose the vendor who offers everything you need for world-class customer support.
Products found for Automatic Call Distribution Software
Aspect
Aspect is a contact management solution that supports global inbound and outbound communications across voice, email, SMS and other methods. It improves operational efficiency, ensures compliance and delivers satisfactory customer experiences. Other offerings include inbound and outbound voice support, omnichannel agent, digital self-service and more.
Nextiva
Nextiva allows users to combine customer service and internal business with VoIP phones, analytics and AI all located in a single platform creating a user-friendly, simplified experience. Accessible from anywhere, at any time, it includes video chat, email and message modules for communicating within the business and with customers. It’s equally suitable for small, medium and large companies.Analytics track sales pipelines, allowing for in-depth insights on how customers interact with the business and what they want and need. Keep customers satisfied with automated switching to direct them to the correct person to help with any questions they may have.
Five9
Five9 is a cloud contact center solution to facilitate customer engagement globally. It helps enhance agent and supervisor productivity, increase revenue, and improve the customer experience. Along with simplifying the complexities of a contact center, it also reduces the cost of on-premises maintenance. Other offerings include historical dashboards, agent scripting, web callback, speech-enabled IVR, pre-built CRM integrations and more.
Bitrix24
Bitrix24 facilitates the execution of the customer journey. It supplies organizations with tools for marketing, sales and customer service activities such as lead generation, marketing automation, campaign management and call center support.It comes with a free edition for companies with less advanced needs or a smaller budget. Deployment is available in the cloud and on-premise. It’s suitable for smaller businesses as well as enterprises with up to 50,000 employees.
Gong
Gong is a revenue intelligence solution that helps capture customer interactions across web, calls, emails and other communication methods. It facilitates better decision-making for revenue strategy by offering real-time insights and analytics based on sales conversions. Its other major attributes include deal intelligence, integrations, people intelligence, field sales and market intelligence.
Avaya
Avaya is a cloud-based business communication solution to digitize business interactions and enable better team collaboration. Users can access it across channels on the go and ensure an improved customer experience. It offers unified communications, anticipates inquiries and enables self-service to answer frequent questions. Its other major offerings include omnichannel connectivity with a single desktop, meetings and conferencing, AI support and more.
Tenfold
Tenfold improves customer interactions for contact centers by providing sales reps with real-time data in a centralized location. This improvement increases conversion rates and streamlines workflows. It offers seamless integration with CRM and other technology, manages agent status and availability and provides natural language processing.
TalkDesk
Talkdesk is an AI and cloud-based call center software that helps businesses build stronger customer relationships. Empower agents with a 360-degree customer view, more personalized conversations and improved conversion and first-contact resolution rates. Its capabilities include integration with over 20 business tools such as Zendesk, Salseforce, Desk.com, Slack and more. Other capabilities include automated workflows, skill-based routing and live reporting.
CXone
CXone (formerly called inContact) provides contact center and workforce optimization solutions to enterprises. Customers can connect to call agents through more than 30 interaction options including chat, messaging, email, voice calling and social media like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Whatsapp. Businesses can monitor contact center and employee performance through a live dashboard that provides basic reporting. Customers are connected to the best skilled resources through automatic call distribution (ACD) based on analytics and artificial intelligence. IVR call flows integrate with analytics to ensure efficient data-directed routing for quicker resolution of customer queries. Workforce intelligence automatically triggers alerts and actions based on historical interactions and scheduling patterns to free up resources. Its no-pause predictive dialer helps call agents get through call lists faster.Call center analytics include metrics on agent-customer interaction, productivity data, reports and performance management aids. Businesses can get feedback on customer experience through surveys, identify discrepancies and boost productivity. It provides out-of-the-box integrations with Salesforce, Microsoft 365, GSuite, Microsoft Teams, Oracle, Zendesk and RingCentral.
Amazon Connect
Amazon Connect is a cloud contact center platform that offers customer service over voice, tasks and chat at a comparatively lower cost. The product uses the Amazon Simple Storage Service (Amazon S3) to record and store exported reports and conversations. From there, it creates default buckets for storage requirements. Its self-service graphical interface helps non-technical users to manage agents, design contact flows and track performance metrics easily without specialized skills. Sales representatives build natural language contact flows with the Amazon Lex with a natural language understanding (NLU) and automatic speech recognition (ASR) technology powering Amazon Alexa.
Aircall
Aircall is a cloud-based professional phone system that streamlines customer support and sales engagement. It integrates with CRM and helpdesks. It offers a power dialer, call routing, ring groups, call queuing and live feeds. The software is best suited for modern small and medium-sized businesses, especially those that have call centers.e dashboard to control team activity, coach agents and listen to live calls. Create inbound and outbound call centers. It can integrate with Zendesk, Salesforce and Hubspot.
PhoneBurner
PhoneBurner is a sales dialer solution that helps improve profitability with enhanced outreach through calls, live connections, closed deals and appointments. Its customizability allows users to reach customers right after deployment and include new users with minimal extra setup. It reduces VoIP related audio issues and simplifies the remote sales process. It also offers workflow automation, lead distribution, remote dialing, collaborative onboarding and more.
Qualfon
Qualfon provides comprehensive contact center, BPO (business process outsourcing) and back-office processing solutions. Its offerings include customer service, integrated marketing, big data analytics and back-office processing. It provides outsourcing services through offices in India, Philippines, United States, Mexico, Guyana and other areasQualfon supports multi-channel customer service through phone, email, live chat, text and social media. Integrated marketing and campaign management tools are geared towards optimizing campaigns and improving lead generation. Advanced data mining, customer segmentation, data analytics and predictive modeling tools help forecast customer behavior to provide superior customer experiences.
CallTools
CallTools, a cloud-based contact center solution, helps increase conversion rates and sales revenue by delivering satisfactory customer interactions. Users can monitor teams on the fly, connect with customers and access real-time analytics based on call records. Its main offerings are CallTools Predictive and CallTools Preview, each with its own set of attributes.
Sharpen
Sharpen is a cloud-based contact center platform allowing agents to interact with customers more efficiently and deliver better user experiences. The resources ensure agents are effectively trained and well-prepared to handle customer interactions. Other offerings include platform architecture, inbound routing, reporting and analytics, remote work support and more. .
ReadyMode
ReadyMode (formerly branded as Xencall) is a browser-based contact center solution with a predictive dialer for CRM and VoIP. It enables users to close more deals and maximize sales. Built-in CRM and third-party integrations as well as analytical performance reports help automate and streamline administrative tasks, improving productivity. Its other major offerings include conference calling, custom agent statuses, do-not-call lists, firewall security and more.
Salesforce Service Cloud
Salesforce Service Cloud offers omnichannel customer support ranging from emails and live chat to voice complaints. It automates procedures and keeps a check on the budget for customer support. With a 360-degree view of customers, it helps improve efficiency. Integrations with MailChimp, Dropbox, GetFeedback and others are available. Its other offerings include drag-and-drop customization of workflows, creation of a public Q A, chatbots and more.
Plivo
Plivo is a cloud-based communication platform to digitize and modernize business communications. It allows users to automatically interact using text messages in over 190 countries. It’s possible to manage communication workflows visually using PHLO. Other attributes include number lookup, call tracking, appointment reminders, SMS reminders, call forwarding and more.
VanillaSoft
VanillaSoft is a cloud-based sales engagement solution that helps businesses improve their sales processes and increase revenue-per-rep by securing more leads, driving higher interaction rates and utilizing sales cadence automation to close deals faster. Combining features for lead management, telemarketing and contact management, it streamlines sales operations to manage, route, market and sell efficiently.
Kixie
Kixie is a cloud-based voice call solution that automates sales processes and helps increase productivity. It connects agents with prospects and gives valuable insights into conversations. Enables sales teams to close deals at a faster rate.It offers call history, call coaching, voicemail drop, reporting, call recording, a sales leaderboard and call queues. It’s easy to set up, reliable and integrates with third-party modules. Users can start making calls within three minutes of setting up without any hardware. It also provides a free trial.
Toky
Toky is a cloud-based phone system that consolidates data, personalizing customer service by automatically synching interactions to customer records. It also provides virtual phone numbers in multiple countries, and integrates well with CRM and other tools. Its other attributes include IVR phone trees, bulk SMS, reporting and analytics, speech-to-text, fax-to-email, call monitoring, a power dialer and more.
CallHippo
CallHippo is an easy-to-use cloud-based business phone system. It’s suitable especially for startups and small businesses. The service provides 24/7 support and is accessible via both mobile and desktop apps. It offers robust features, including a power dialer, automatic call distribution, call tracking and more. Users can purchase virtual numbers in over 50 countries. Organizations can enhance team collaboration and communication while keeping costs low.
UJET
UJET is a cloud-based, AI-powered platform that consolidates and optimizes customer support for sales and marketing. Its major offerings include predictive, contextual communications routing, a conversational AI-based virtual agent, specialized bots and smooth integrations with CRM, WFM and QM.
VICIdial
VICIdial is an open-source, cloud-based contact center solution that consolidates phone calls, emails and web chats. It allows agents to perform inbound and outbound actions, while skill-based routing helps assign customer calls, emails and messages to the most suitable agents. Other functions include lead previews, call recording, automated forwarding for dropped calls and more.
Genesys Cloud
Genesys Cloud is a consolidated, cloud-based contact center solution. It allows employees to field inbound and outbound communications, predict potential customer issues and collaborate efficiently using chat, voice, video and search functions.
Intradiem
Intradiem helps customer service teams automate and streamline their daily operations based on real-time data and service requirements. Users can leverage AI-powered technology to process large volumes of data and take instant actions according to defined rules. Along with better employee engagement, it improves productivity and efficiency, leading to quality customer experiences. Its main attributes include staffing, call handling, analytics, process automation and more.
Zingtree
Zingtree is suitable for a wide variety of organizations and departments. Users can create interactive decision trees to assist agents through repetitive customer interactions. Other attributes include customized agent scripting, tracking and analysis of customers who use support, interactive troubleshooters and actionable click-through insights.
Zendesk Talk
Zendesk Talk is a VoIP contact center calling system that integrates with Zendesk Support Suite. It operates within the same interface that connects customers with agents across multiple communication methods. Call centers can incorporate the technology into an existing platform or rely on it solely for voice calls. Workers can connect via smartphone, mobile app or softphone in a preferred web browser or business desk phone. All capabilities reduce the call abandonment rates and allow employees to answer more calls in less time.
AVOXI
Avoxi is a cloud-based communication platform that simplifies customer interactions with a fully integrated communication experience. Users can manage agents, phone numbers, call routing protocols and customer service data on the go. It offers remote team management, inbound call routing, monitoring and reporting, outbound dialing and more.
Cisco Contact Center
Cisco is a call center solution offering a vast portfolio of products, including calling, contact center, team collaboration, meetings and devices. It delivers call treatment, omnichannel contact management, contact routing and network-to-desktop CTI over an IP infrastructure. Moreover, it combines IP telephony with automatic call distributor (ACD) functionality to rapidly deploy a distributed call center infrastructure. Its flexible cloud architecture offers integration and customization along with user experience management.
Bright Pattern
Bright Pattern is a cloud-based omnichannel solution that offers a wide range of features to improve customer experiences. It allows effortless switching between multiple channels, like text, email, social media, video and web chat, with minimal downtime. Its major offerings include interactive voice response, bots and AI support, a predictive dialer and CRM.
Ameyo
Ameyo is a suite offering an extensive range of call center and helpdesk solutions. It helps minimize wait time, take more calls and increase sales by managing inbound and outbound operations. It offers smooth integration with in-house and third-party APIs along with a personalized customer service experience. Other attributes include skill-based routing, reporting and analytics, a smart dialer for improved coverage, and more.
Genesys PureConnect
Genesys PureConnect is an omnichannel communications solution. It simplifies communication through business-specific customization and the integration of external data, guaranteeing consistent customer experiences. Some of its notable features are automated routing, automatic call distribution, inbound contact center, outbound call center and customer self-service.
RingCentral Contact Center
RingCentral is a cloud-based unified communications and collaboration suite. It allows teams to connect on the go with conferencing, messaging and more. Users can customize workflows and integrate with third-party APIs for better efficiency. Other offerings include skill-based routing, real-time insights, self-service and supervisor modules.
Vonage Contact Center
Vonage is a cloud-based phone system that boosts agent experiences by delivering Salesforce integration into reporting, routing and user experience for a service and sales cloud. This connects with customer service management to provide an all-in-one unified stage to businesses relying on customized agent, employee and customer workflows. It provides relevant and contextual data and workflows to salespeople allowing them to collaborate across organizations and deliver results using CRM insights and skill-based routing.
Dialpad Contact Center
Dialpad Contact Center is a cloud-based, inbound customer support product that enhances agent efficiency and unlocks communication insights in a user-friendly interface. It works across all personal devices and provides video, voice, group messaging, MMS, SMS, conferencing, document sharing and screening services. This system comes with tools to unify business communications in the cloud, including custom IVR, company mainline, social profiles and Google Apps integration.
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