Automatic Call Distribution and what it can do for your business

Inside sales operations spend a most of their time calling people, at least that’s what they should be doing. These outbound calls are often what receive the single greatest amount of a sales representative’s time. Inbound calls are usually more valuable than the individual outbound calls because they can represent existing clients or those contacts who are actively seeking out a company’s product or service.

There are telephony software solutions that increase the efficiency of receiving these inbound calls regardless of whether an inside sales business uses in-house agents or if those agents work remotely. One of these solutions is ACD, or Automatic Call Distribution. The purpose of this telephony tool is not only to allow sales agents to receive inbound calls, but also to route those calls to the right personnel automatically.

ACD call routing works well in combination with toll free phone numbers. Managers of the system can establish which toll free numbers should be answered by which sales representatives. This can be determined by which geographic location the toll free number is advertised in, by which department that toll free number is associated with, or any other delineation. By automatically routing calls based on which sales agents can best responds instantly improves customer relations. In the event that there are no designated sales reps that call is not dropped. Instead, the Automatic Call Distribution system can be directed to route that incoming call to a fail–over number. This fail-over number could be anything from the general office line to voice messaging systems. ACD could even route the call through to one of the agents’ personal cell phones. There is no need for any inbound call to be unanswered or dropped when using ACD call routing.

This telephony solution often offers many quality control features. Usually this includes the option to record calls being completed. These recordings can be stored along with every other bit of data associated with a particular caller. These calls can be retrieved and played back if ever the need arises.

All of this makes it faster and easier to connect incoming calls to the right people. By decreasing customer wait time ACD raises customer satisfaction. When this is linked to an outbound dialer all agents that receive inbound calls can also be actively making outbound calls. ACD removes the slow, down times that can occur in a business day, generating the greatest amount of calls made and sales closed.