According to DMG Consulting, the IVR market continues to grow overall but the trend is favoring a hosted/managed IVR solution rather than the traditional on-premise offering.
Self-service systems are now so ingrained into the corporate customer service portfolio that IVR implementations are no longer an “if” question but “when” and “how much?” In today’s down economy, the strategy is to get more bang for the buck. That usually means rethinking the IVR architecture and solution to use a hosting vendor instead of paying for the hardware to house IVRs on-premise.
And it’s not just the IVRs, either. Hosted CRM solutions following the SaaS (software-as-a-service) model such as RightNow are gaining momentum as well. This is even evident in what major software companies like IBM, Microsoft, and Google are advocating, except they usually refer it as “cloud computing.”
Besides dollar-value benefits, hosted/managed/SaaS solutions allow for greater flexibility and scalability. For example, a company can regularly adjust the number of IVR ports according to call volume projections. Or purchase additional software licenses as needed.
We’re glad to see a focus on IVRs and self-service systems in recent mainstream news outlets. After all, no matter how the economy is doing, every company has a goal of offering the best customer service possible.
Eugene
