If your small business has limited front desk staff, you probably deal with a lot of missed calls and messages on voicemail. With limited funds and no specific way to pinpoint further demand for services or products, it is impossible to scale the team. Fortunately, AI has made things simpler and easier for small and large companies alike. You can leverage AI to respond to calls, ensuring your customers get prompt support without waiting. In this guide, we will discuss how to select the best ai receptionist and the features that matter.
- Natural, Human-Like Voice and Conversations: Many small business owners don’t want to use AI because they feel the outcome is usually generic and robotic. However, things have changed drastically in the last five years. Today, AI models leverage voice synthesis, machine learning, and natural language processing (NLP) for smooth interactions. When you compare AI voice agents, check the overall flow of conversations and how natural they sound.
- Smart Responses & Accurate Call Understanding: If you choose the right AI receptionist, the model shouldn’t have any issues answering some of the common questions asked by clients or identifying critical information. Your AI receptionist should be able to understand the caller’s intent, even if the question is indirect, and provide clear, relevant answers.
- Seamless Call Routing and Escalation: Just because you are using AI to answer calls doesn’t mean your existing staff is not relevant anymore. Some callers will need further assistance and have complex issues, and it is more than critical to check whether the selected AI receptionist can escalate issues. AI should be able to transfer calls to the right department and take messages if there is no one to answer the call. That’s critical to ensure no issue, lead, or information is ever lost.
- Customization for Your Business Needs: Your AI voice agent should communicate the brand voice, personality, and features. As such, it is more than critical to review how you can update scripts and details for the model. Check how the provider allows you to edit or add information, and if there is flexibility to tweak things as your business grows.
- Data Security & Privacy: You have to be 100% sure that customer data is protected and remains accessible. When you compare AI receptionists, check the information that each model can collect, how the data is stored, and whether your team can access customer data on time.
- Flexibility and Alerts: AI should ideally collect caller data, which includes name, contact information, and requests. At the same time, the system should send alerts to customer care staff if something is urgent and requires immediate attention. Also, how the AI agent can integrate with some of the existing systems, such as the calendar and CRM, is worth considering.
- Simple Setup and User-Friendly Management: One of the other critical aspects to consider is the initial setup. The onboarding process should be as seamless and straightforward as possible, and you will be surprised to know that many providers ensure the setup is done in less than an hour. Your team should also have the ability to use the system even when they don’t have an in-depth technical understanding.
The last thing to consider is AI training. The biggest advantage of artificial intelligence is trainability. Your AI receptionist should learn from the calls and interactions, and you should be able to update and change things to accommodate your business needs.
As for the price, you should always keep features as your first priority, and if that means paying a tad more, the extra amount is worth spending. Select an AI voice agent from a reliable provider that allows you to scale on demand and has transparent packages.
