Choosing the right dialer for your organizations’ needs is a critical decision.

Saving time, driving productivity, and delivering survey results in an efficient manner is directly related to the capabilities of your selected dialer, so choose wisely.  

Often, survey call centers are forced to put together piecemeal solutions for the phone surveys; employing CATI software that needs to be linked up with a separate dialer solution. This adds to the workload that call center managers and/or survey programmers need to put in to projects to bring them to life and get the research they need for clients.

(Ask the Voxco team about the CATI-integrated Dialer)

Before we jump in to what makes a dialer effective and which hosting option best suits your organizational needs, let’s cover what a dialer is, exactly.

What is a dialer?

In a few words, a dialer is a system for placing outbound calls from a call center to respondents. Using a dialer reduces the cost of making phone calls by reducing the repetitive tasks and human error.

Of course, the added benefit is that dialers improve call center efficiency. Automating the dialing process means that call center interviewees don’t waste time physically dialing numbers – and instead are spending more time with respondents!

Your organization’s dialer should be flexible in its capacity and mode of functioning – you likely deal with a wide range of research projects, so it’s important that your tools can be varied in their functionalities as well.

What are your options for hosting the dialer?

The definition of a dialer is actually quite mutable. Most early dialers were hardware based. Today, it’s also possible to have a dialer hosted in the cloud.

Practically, there is no real difference in terms of function whether you choose a hosted or on-premise dialer. It all depends on your needs as an organization to have your own server or not.

On-premise

If hosting all software and hardware solutions on-premise is the cornerstone of your IT department’s policies, then your organization will likely be required to take the on-premise option for dialer hosting.

In this scenario, there is the upfront cost of purchasing the equipment, but afterwards the costs will remain minimal.

Cloud-based

This option is the more flexible option of the two. It can be more affordable to use a cloud-hosted dialer, as you only pay for your license on a month-to-month basis. If a research project doesn’t call for a dialer – no problem!

There is also less of a responsibility for maintenance on your staff, no upfront costs, and is scalable based on your needs.

The Voxco Dialer has a versatile dialing solution with 4 built-in modes. These modes enable you to tailor the dial pattern per project:

Capture

Preview Mode

Numbers are automatically pushed to interviewers’ screens for case review. When ready, they instruct the dialer to place the call.

Capture

Predictive Mode

The dial rate is constantly adjusted based on prediction of interviewer availability. This maximizes interviewer productivity and minimizes the risk of dropped calls.

Capture

Power Mode

The dial rate is set to prohibit dropped calls. It will only dial as many phone lines as there are free interviewers.

Capture

Hybrid Mode

Simultaneously use multiple dialing modes within a single project. Predictive and preview modes are blended, eliminating the need for interviewers to switch between modes.

Choosing the right dialer for your organization is a decision that will directly impact your researchers’ success. The good news is that there are plenty of flexible options to match your research goals.

Read more