Call Flow Builder

Efficient call management is crucial for improving customer service, enhancing internal communications, or boosting sales conversions. The ability to manage incoming calls efficiently can make all the difference in building strong customer relationships and driving business growth. That’s where the call flow designer comes in; harness the power of this tool to:

• Streamline and automate call handling processes
• Optimize agent productivity
• Deliver seamless customer experiences
• Connect local and distributed teams within the same business phone system

Improve Call Handling with our Call Flow Builder

A call flow builder is a dynamic tool that helps you create personalized call flows for your business phone lines. This empowers your business to route incoming calls strategically, improving efficiency and connectivity. It grants you control over call handling aspects like initial greeting, the subsequent steps in the call flow, routing callers to the right personnel, and managing calls during off-hours or when agents are unavailable.

This feature is also referred to as a call flow designer, IVR editor/manager, or call flow editor.

Optimizing Your Call Flows

A call flow builder is typically used to enhance, streamline, and optimize incoming call flows.

A call flow is a visual outline of how incoming calls navigate through your business phone system—from entry to resolution. With a builder, you can direct the way calls flow within your communication infrastructure. For example, which destinations or people will a certain route to? and so on.

By understanding your call flow, you can map out simple and complex customer interactions and create superior customer experiences and service.

Call flow models may vary, given the unique nature of every business. You can adopt existing models or devise your own based on current call movement within your system. Alternatively, seek recommendations from your phone service provider.

Benefits of Using a Call Flow Builder?

A call flow builder helps you develop call flows that prioritize customer satisfaction. These well-structured call flows ensure smooth navigation and prompt assistance from the right agent or department. Consider these call flow management use cases:

1. Personalized Assistance: The call flow builder allows for personalized routing based on the caller’s history or preference. Say you identify a high-value customer is on the call through your CRM. Then, your agents can transfer the call to the team equipped to handle inquiries from high-value customers, providing personalized assistance tailored to the customer’s needs.

2. Diverse Departments: For businesses with varied customer-facing departments—like sales, customer support, and billing—integrating an IVR menu can streamline call routing. With an IVR user menu, callers can easily select their required department, enhancing operational efficiency. For example, they can press a corresponding number or state their preference, and their call will route accordingly.

3. Time-Sensitive Inquiries: In case of urgent or time-sensitive inquiries, you can utilize simultaneous ringing—a call routing strategy. When a call comes in, it rings simultaneously on multiple phones and lines within an agent group or pool. This way all team members have an increased chance to promptly respond, ensuring efficient resolution of urgent matters.

4. Global Teams: If your teams operate across different time zones, implementing geo-routing or location-based routing in your call flow can direct calls from specific regions to the nearest service team and time zone, optimizing response times.

Key Components of a Call Flow Designer

To construct effective call flows, there are certain essential features required. Here are the key components of a call flow builder:

1. Triggers, Actions, and User Interactions

Triggers initiate the call flow based on certain conditions or events, such as an incoming call, a specific time of day, or a caller’s input.

Actions are the steps or tasks performed within the call flow, such as playing a greeting message, routing to a specific department or agent, transferring to voicemail, etc. Here are some typical actions available with a call flow designer:

Common actions —

• Set an announcement
• Route calls to alternate lines (another phone line, extension, group, device, location)
• Send calls to voicemail or fax
• Create a user menu (IVR menu options)
• Add user input abilities

Advanced actions —

• Time-based routing
• Location-based routing or caller ID routing

Different cloud phone service providers will offer an array of triggers, actions, and caller interactions to improve your call flow. With these diverse elements, you can create a system that seamlessly integrates your teams and business applications.

2. Multi-Line Integration Capability

An important aspect of a call flow builder is its capacity to include numerous phone numbers, lines, and email addresses within each call flow. This proves beneficial when directing calls and voicemail to entire departments or distributed teams.

For example, you can integrate phone numbers and lines for different departments, such as sales, customer support, and technical assistance. Then, you can automatically route calls and emails meant for these departments to the respective team members, ensuring prompt and efficient handling of inquiries.

Easily add or remove users or reassign team members as required to create a communication structure that seamlessly caters to your business requirements. This flexibility allows you to create a communication structure that seamlessly caters to your business’s evolving needs.

3. Dynamic Call Flow Management

With these triggers, actions, and multi-line integrations, you have the ability to create personalized call flows for your business-customer interactions. Map out individual call flows for different customer needs and profiles as well as service departments. For example, a user-friendly call flow builder will let you add in multiple options for your different departments, ring groups, distributed teams, or locations. And you can customize this for each phone line within our system. Paired with the right triggers and actions, you can easily guide callers through the call process and to the most suitable agent.

Over time, and with customer feedback, you can edit and update active call flows. Add new destinations, groups, users or adjust actions and so on.

Take for instance a software development company which utilizes a call flow designer to manage their customer support operations. As their business expands, they frequently need to adjust their call flows to accommodate new support agents, update routing rules, etc. They can easily edit and update call flows in real-time, like adding new support agents to existing call groups, modifying routing rules to prioritize urgent issues, etc.

Crafting Effective Call Flows

So, how to create call flows for your business communication needs? Here are the steps to designing effective call flows:

1. Visualize the Call Routes

Start by mapping out how you want calls to flow through each line using a visual representation. This means taking time to decide how you want callers—from different locations, with different pain points and diverse needs—to travel through the system.

Here you can decide which teams and groups will be available in the call flow. Remember, you can add different call flows for different phone lines that need that extra customization.

2. Streamline with Lists and Hunt Groups

Once you identify your core participants, simplify your call flow creation process by establishing agent lists and hunt groups in advance. This organizational step will aid in structuring and refining your call flows.

You can have a group for your LatAm customer service team and another for your EU remote tech support team. Feed the agents’ email addresses and extensions into your call flow for easy call routing or voicemail forwarding.

3. Customize with Voice Messages

The best part of using a cloud telephony provider is the ability to customize your phone service. One way to do so is personalizing your caller experience with custom greetings. Record them yourselves or upload welcome prompts, company info, and other key announcements. These messages are yet another way to reflect your brand’s tone and style.

How to Use The Call Flow Designer

Here are the steps to create a call flow for a specific business phone line:

1. Log in to your control panel.
2. Click My Phone Numbers on the left-hand side of the page.
3. Select the Settings icon for your desired phone line.
4. Click the Call Forwarding tab and select IVR.
5. Click the Manage IVR Applications to customize your IVR processes in the IVR call flow builder.
6. Next, hover to the right side of the screen to upload prompts and add or create lists of phone numbers and email addresses in their respective tabs.
7. Click Save Application on the top right corner to save your new rule.