When a customer calls your business, they’ll usually have a specific goal in mind. To make their experience as pleasant as possible, it’s worth setting up a phone tree.

By putting together a pattern clearly laying out options, you can empower that customer by advising them what your business can offer them over the telephone—as well as sending them to the right person or department.

We’ll show you how to get a phone tree organized with minimum effort. But first, we’ll start with a definition and a quick look at the main benefits.

What is a phone tree?

Phone trees are very widely used tools. Whenever you’ve called a business and heard an automated announcement giving a series of options—like, press one for sales, two for support etc—then you’ve used a phone tree.

Simply put, phone trees are patterns that lay out the phone system of a business, so that a customer calling in with a query about a specific area will end up talking to the right person.

They usually involve a virtual receptionist and the system is usually built on an Interactive Voice Response (IVR) package. Customers can respond verbally or through pressing a specific option on their phone keypad. Of course, if you want customers to be able to respond verbally, then you’ll also need voice recognition technology in place.

There are several different types of phone trees, including the traditional phone tree that covers incoming calls from customers, as well as internal organizational communication and emergency phone trees. You can have a manual phone tree, an automated phone tree, or a mix of the two, involving AI balanced with human intervention.

Benefits of phone trees

When implemented well, phone trees cut waiting time and help you effectively handle numerous incoming calls. Here’s some of the benefits you can gain with a well-designed phone tree.

1. Appeal to a huge number of customers

Despite the rise of numerous alternatives—email, social media, etc—phone calls remain a popular means of contacting businesses. That means a lot of your customers will want to get in touch this way, and managing their calls efficiently can win you a lot of goodwill.

2. Calls are resolved quickly

If you’re a customer, there’s nothing worse than having to wade through interminable layers of an opaque organization. You’re not sure who to talk to with your query, and sometimes even the contact center agent doesn’t seem any wiser.

Not so with phone trees. You call in, you’re given a list of possible options, you select the one for you, and you get put through to an automated or person-driven solution. Plus, businesses that also have internal phone trees reduce the chances of their agents not knowing who to refer you to if you do need transferring. That means increased first-call resolution rates and increased customer satisfaction.

3. They save time and cut costs

Phone trees can route customers to the most efficient solution for their needs. This can often mean an AI-driven automated solution, which in turn means that your agents aren’t tied up with repetitive and routine query resolution.

For instance, if many of your incoming callers are looking to pay a bill, setting up an automated method will free up your agents and allow you to deploy these staff elsewhere in a role that suits their abilities and focus. Or you can trim your workforce, saving money accordingly.

4. They advertise what else is available

One of the great things about a phone tree is that, while the customer listens to what’s available, they might learn of something you offer that they didn’t know about. This is the way you give your business real transparency.

Say a customer calls with a set-up query for their new internal audit management software. In the course of listening to the options, they hear ‘press three to sign up for our webinar on effective auditing’. So they press the button, learn all about the amazing opportunities available, and sign up.

How to set up a phone tree

Now you know why you should set up a phone tree, let’s look at how.

1. Set out what your business offers

Consider all elements of your business that customers might need to access. This includes product information, billing, sales, and other services. Create a comprehensive list that covers all potential customer needs to ensure nothing is overlooked.

Then, start thinking in terms of call groups—relevant departments of the business that deal with particular areas. Set these out, ideally with the names of the individual agents that belong to each group, together with their extension numbers.

Once you have identified all the resources you have available, it’s time to think about the types of phone calls you’ll get, and how the customer will interact with you.

2. Visualize the customer phone journey

Start by putting yourself in the shoes of a customer making a call to your business. Think about the steps they go through for a number of different scenarios—if they want to find out your opening hours, can they be directed to a pre-recorded message? If they need technical support, can they be put in touch with a local agent?

Then, think about hierarchies. By this, we mean what is the chain of communication a customer needs to go down once they’ve accessed an appropriate part of their business for their query. If they don’t get a resolution, where do they go next? Think about escalation routes, to get more specialized knowledge.

Finally, think about critical communications. If there’s a major issue—a data breach, a natural disaster, or similar—then you’re likely to get a lot of inbound calls. Having a clear communication plan in place that includes an emergency phone tree template will let you avoid any breaks in communication, reassuring your worried customers.

3. Draw a flow diagram

Now comes the part where we make things as clear as possible to all parties. By creating a call flow diagram, it’s possible to lay out what stages the customer goes through, and what choices are available to them.

The business’ goal here is to discern exactly what the customer needs as quickly and easily as possible. To this end, you should think about how many specific options should be available at any one time. You don’t want to overload the customer.

Larger organizations might have a huge range of products and the capacity to offer the customer about 15 different routes. However, a list of 15 different options immediately is likely to be too many for a customer to wait through.

So, try to bundle them. If you have three categories of products, give just three options. Then, once you’ve gone through that first layer, drill down into more specifics.

Another way to deal with this is to think about your most popular queries. If people tend to ask about one product way more than any others, offer maybe just two choices:

  1. a) The popular product
  2. b) Any other reason for calling.

Again, you can drill down as you go through the diagram.

4. System inputs

Now, you need to transfer this to your phone system. To do this, you’ll need a VoIP phone service, such as RingCentral RingEX. Look for tools like the Visual IVR Editor, which makes constructing a phone tree simple.

Start with the greeting message. What do you want customers to hear first when they call up? This will be the first thing a customer will encounter, so it’s important to get the tone and wording right.

Think about your brand identity and your target audience, and speak accordingly. Note—you don’t have to use your own voice—you can hire an actor, or use a voice generated by your contact center AI solution.

Then, stick to your flow diagram and try to keep things as simple as possible. Consider inserting a language menu early in proceedings. If you’re able to cater to those with different languages, then you’ll benefit hugely in this global age. Additionally, remember to consider those with access needs. Make sure that it’s easy to request another run-through of the options, or offer a slower speech option.

Rooting for phone trees

Phone trees are a great way to simplify the customer journey through your contact center. They minimize frustrating dead ends and cut down on tedious repetition for your contact center agents.

Happily, they’re not difficult to implement. All they require is the right VoIP system paired with a little thought. Put these together, and you’ll have a great phone tree service that customers will love and keep coming back to.

FAQs

What is a phone tree?

A phone tree is a way of setting out (usually in a diagram and then transferred onto a phone system) the routes that are possible for an incoming caller to take, including the number of options offered at any point.

How does a phone tree work?

A phone tree uses two main elements: IVR, or virtual receptionists, and efficient call routing. With those in place, it’s a matter of providing the customer with options and then funneling them to the right call group or automated response.

Updated Jul 21, 2025