Interactive Voice Response (IVR) Tutorial - Overview

Interactive Voice Response applications enable callers to interact with any software, such as querying and modifying database information over the telephone. Callers can use their touch-tone pad to input requests or simply say what they want to do, such as requesting account balance information. IVR systems use state of the art text-to-speech software to read information back.

Voicent IVR Studio is a complete interactive system consisting of an easy-to-use graphical user interface for application development. Voicent IVR Studio also supports outbound IVR applications such as Voicent BroadcastByPhone's Auto Dialer.

Part I: Basic Use

This tutorial provides a step-by-step procedure to create an IVR application which will enable callers to call in to record a voice message and broadcast the message to a selected call list. The sample tutorial for Part I is a complete, but simplified version.

Basic Use - Process

  1. The sample IVR application answers a call
  2. It plays a welcome message, asking the caller to enter a password
  3. If the password is incorrect, the program goes back to step 2. If the caller has tried more than 3 times the program will log the caller ID and hang up the call
  4. If the password is correct, it will then ask the caller to record a voice message
  5. It will then ask the caller to listen to the recorded voice message and either press 1 to continue or press 2 to record again
  6. Then it proceeds to start Voicent BroadcastByPhone with the recorded message with a fixed call list file
  7. Finally, it hangs up the phone

Part II: Advanced Use

The major difference between part I and part II is in step 6 where the caller is asked to select from a list of call list files. A Java program is used to obtain a list of available call list files.

Advanced Use - Process

  1. The sample IVR application answers a call
  2. It plays a welcome message, asking the caller to enter a password
  3. If the password is incorrect, the program goes back to step 2. If the caller has tried more than 3 times, the program will log the caller ID and hang up the call
  4. If the password is correct, it will then ask the caller to record a voice message
  5. It will then ask the caller to listen to the recorded voice message and either press 1 to continue or press 2 to record again
  6. Furthermore it will ask the caller to select a call list for the broadcast
  7. Then it proceeds to start Voicent BroadcastByPhone with the recorded message with a fixed call list file
  8. Finally, it hangs up the phone