Power dialer
Get power dialing capabilities with RingCentral RingCX’s progressive dialer mode. Help your outbound contact center team reach more of the right leads by choosing between a power dialer, predictive dialer, or preview dialer.
What is a power dialer?
A power dialer—also referred to as a progressive dialer—is a piece of telephony technology that automates the dialing of leads in a list to help reach contacts more efficiently.
A power dialer, and other types of auto dialers like a predictive dialer, let your team members be more efficient because they don’t have to spend time figuring out which number to call next. Plus, your agents won’t be wasting time manually looking up and dialing numbers—the auto dialer does it for them.
How does a power dialer work?
So, that’s the power dialer definition, but what does that mean in practice?
It means that as soon as an agent completes a call, the power dialer will automatically dial the next phone number on the contact list on behalf of the agent. There’s no learning curve in terms of how to use a power dialer—it’s automated.
Power dialer vs predictive dialer: Comparing auto dialers
Predictive dialers are another type of auto dialer. They automatically dial multiple contacts at the same time, understanding that a certain portion of calls will not be answered.
These outbound dialers use algorithms to predict the typical amount of time it takes for a call to be answered and completed, as well as information on agent availability, to make successful live connections.
In a sense, predictive dialing anticipates when an agent will be available and adjusts the dialing rate accordingly.
This dialing technology makes sure that your team members spend their time on the phone only with calls that are answered by a live person.
Predictive dialer vs power dialer: Pros, cons, and use cases
As you’ve read, both predictive and power (or progressive) dialers increase agent productivity and efficiency by freeing your agents from having to dial phone numbers themselves. However, the best dialer for your business is going to depend on your operations.
Let’s take a closer look at some of the differences between the auto dialers and the circumstances where one might be more suitable than the other.
Abandoned calls and possible fines
For outbound dialing, any call that is answered by a customer but where no agent is available is considered an abandoned call.
It’s actually illegal to have an abandoned call rate of over 3% in the US. Predictive dialers call more than one number at a time. If the algorithm contacts more customers than you have agents available, this will result in call drops and the possibility of risking going over your allotted dropped call percentage.
So, if you’re going to use a predictive dialer, you need to guarantee that you have enough team members to answer the calls when multiple calls connect at the same time, or have a prerecorded message play if no agent is available.
Since a power dialer or progressive dialer only dials when an agent is available, you can avoid these risks.
Answering delays
When you answer the phone, you expect the person who called you to be present. Yet, we’ve all sometimes picked up a call to say hello but found that nobody was there to respond. It’s a very frustrating experience.
It’s also a downside of predictive dialers, as since they use an algorithm to anticipate agent availability, a customer can answer an outbound call before an agent is ready to respond.
This delay at the beginning of a phone call can be a negative experience for your customer and, in the worst case scenario, may be the difference between a successful or unsuccessful customer engagement experience.
Agents who use power dialers will always be present the moment a customer answers their phone call.
Voicemail connections
When you’re making large numbers of calls a day, not everyone is going to pick up. Depending on the dialing mode, when a call goes to an answering machine different things will happen.
If you’re using predictive dialers, any call that’s picked up by a voicemail is immediately dropped. The machine will then move on to the next number on its contact list.
If you choose the power dial option, voicemail is typically not detected, which can result in wasted agent time. However, team members can leave voicemail messages, which may be useful if you’re contacting a lead or when leaving a message is good enough.
General efficiency
Strictly speaking, predictive dialers are more efficient than power dialers. By working with algorithms, a predictive dialer makes sure that when your agents are at work, they’re always working. It uses statistics from contact center operations to know when calls should be made to maximize agent availability.
Power dialers work by lining up each phone number with a live agent. Rather than making multiple calls at a time, they call phone numbers one-by-one. This means that they’re unable to match the level of efficiency that predictive dialers can reach.
Power dialers, predictive dialers, and other dialing modes, then, all have a place in contact center operations. Fortunately, It doesn’t have to be a case of power dialer vs predictive dialer. If you choose the right contact center solution, you can have both—and a whole lot more besides.
Preview, predictive and power dialer software features and more with RingCX
Power dialer technology can make a big difference to the efficiency of your contact center. A standalone power dialer system, though, won’t set your reps up for success. RingCX gives your outbound teams a whole host of features to help them reach more leads, build stronger connections, and close more sales.
Preview, predictive, and power dialing software on one platform
With RingCX, your sales and outbound teams can choose between preview, predictive, and progressive or power dialing modes. Whichever option best suits their needs in the given circumstances, they’re all available on the same intuitive platform. What’s more, you can even choose voice broadcast dialing for spreading messages effectively to broad audiences.
Smart sales scripts and real-time AI assistance
An easy to use, drag-and-drop scripting builder helps you create dynamic workflows to guide reps through even the most challenging calls. What’s more, real-time AI assistance can provide extra information, tips, and suggestions right there on a live call to help them overcome objections, answer queries, and more.
Rich data insights from built-in analytics and reports
You can stay on top of the performance of your sales teams with both real-time dashboards and historical reports. Pinpoint areas for improvement, recognize new opportunities, and otherwise leverage rich data insights to keep your outbound contact center in tip-top shape.
Integrations with your favorite CRMs to streamline sales processes
RingCX is also built to work seamlessly with your other business critical tools. CRM integrations help you maintain a single source of truth within your contact center, avoid data siloes, and streamline workflows to help your reps stay at their most productive.
Since we migrated our sales and customer success reps to RingCX, we’ve gotten up to about 1,500 inbound and 1,000 outbound calls a day—and we’re still able to keep our abandonment rate to 3%. No matter how much our operations grow, we’re still consistently able to provide a world-class customer experience.
Call center software with flexible dialing options is a must
Power dialing with RingCX’s progressive mode can achieve better customer experiences and more successful call interactions. Coupled with CRM integration, you get a CRM power dialer that can increase efficiency by retrieving the relevant history and any previous call data of the customer your agent is contacting.
- RingCX provides the additional auto dialing options you may need, too, for different campaign goals.Plus, if needed, you can choose the human call initiator or manual dial alternative, instead. That’s where a supervisor or agent clicks to dial the next lead, at which point the system routes the call to an active agent. This setting is particularly helpful when compliance is critical.
That’s not all you get in terms of outbound call center features with RingCX, either.
During live calls, your managers can whisper instructions to your agents if they require support on a call, or they can join or even take over a call if the need arises. In addition, RingCX provides detailed analytics to effectively monitor your team’s historical dialing performance with logs, call storage and call recording.
RingCentral RingCX combines power dialer functionality with all of that and more, to provide a holistic AI-powered platform to supercharge your sales and outbound teams.
