Call groups can play a vital role in call centers that consistently experience high call volumes, although the benefits they bring and the best times to use them are often poorly understood.

First, a call group, sometimes called a call group, brings together multiple phone lines or extensions to collectively handle incoming calls. This is done to provide a more efficient distribution of calls between team members, ensuring that incoming calls are answered quickly and routed smoothly to the right person or department.

If you run a high-volume call center, there are a few key reasons why call groups should be a key part of your phone system and overall strategy:

• Improves efficiency: Call groups ensure that calls are distributed evenly among team members, reducing missed calls and improving responsiveness.
• Improves customer experience: Call groups can route calls to the right agent or department so callers are quickly connected and directed to what they need. This can have a significant impact on the overall customer experience.
• Increases productivity: Call groups simplify the management of inbound calls, allowing team members to focus on their specific areas of expertise and determine what they are good at.

A call group is often confused with a hunt group, which is a tool or feature of a telephone system that distributes calls based on predefined rules. Unlike call groups, hunt groups do not offer simultaneous ringing or dynamic call distribution features: they simply send incoming calls to a group of users until one of them them are available or all have been tried.

How Callgroups Work

To configure a call group, you will need to add it to your phone system’s backend configuration.

The first step is to assign a unique telephone extension to each member of the intended call group. This serves as an identifier that allows your phone system to route calls to each specific agent.

The next step is to configure your interactive voice response (IVR) system so that its menu options send callers to the call group whenever they choose the correct department or service that applies to it.

Keep in mind that employee work hours and schedules play a role in the setup. To reduce problems, you need to ensure that your system routes calls to agents based on availability. For example, after-hours calls can be routed to voicemails and other touchpoints so callers aren’t left waiting for a group of calls that no one is available to answer.

Call Group Ring Patterns

Next, you need to choose a ring pattern for your call group. Your options will generally include the following.

• Simultaneous: All phones in the call group ring at the same time, so the call is routed to the first agent who answers.
• Sequential (linear): The phones in the call group will ring in a sequence, with each call routed to the next available agent in a predefined order.
• Round robin tournament: Each call is routed to the next agent in rotating order. This creates an equal distribution of calls among group members rather than always reaching the first available agent in the same fixed order.
• The least recent: The system will direct the call to the agent who has been idle the longest. This promotes equitable distribution of the workload.
• Fewer calls: The system will direct the call to the agent who has handled the fewest calls, which helps optimize workload distribution.
• Random: Calls are randomly routed to any available agent in the group.

Businesses that need fast response times may opt for a simultaneous ring, while those who want to build team cohesion may prefer a turnstile model.

Sequential mode works well when there is a clear preference for the order in which people receive calls, such as contacting a service administrator first.

A random ring pattern can add an element of unpredictability to the equation, which can promote a higher level of concentration among agents by encouraging them to stay on their toes in case they need to answer a call.

Seven scenarios where call groups are ideal

Call groups can be a great solution for many contact centers, but there are a number of scenarios where they really shine, particularly against hunt groups.

1. Multilingual support

For businesses that need to handle calls in different languages, creating call groups based on each is extremely useful, if not essential.

To configure a call group for multilingual service, you can configure your IVR system with language prompts that ask callers to press a number corresponding to their preferred language. From there, calls are automatically routed to a group of agents ready and able to help. Callers can get fast, accurate help in their preferred language, improving their experience.

You can also handle multilingual calls when you don’t have multilingual speakers, because talkgroups offer voicemail boxes for callers to leave messages. This way, an agent who speaks the caller’s language can respond to the message and get back to them when available.

2. Overflow management

In peak call volume scenarios, call groups are essential to manage overflows.

Configuring a call group to handle overflow calls ensures that calls are distributed more efficiently among available agents during peak periods. This avoids overwhelming individual agents.

You may have already used a hunt group to handle overflow situations, but remember that a talk group is probably a better solution. For example, because hunt groups use predefined rules, they could cause delays and uneven distribution of calls during periods of high traffic.

Alternatively, call groups have simultaneous and distributed ringing patterns, giving them a more efficient and fair way to handle overflow. They also ensure that every call is handled quickly without favoring any agent.

3. Specialized departments

Call groups are an ideal solution for businesses with many specialized departments.

For example, when you set up separate call groups for different departments, your phone system can efficiently route callers to experts who can answer their questions the first time.

In comparison, research groups lack the precision needed to manage specific services. This can cause delays in answering calls and potentially misdirected calls, leading to a more negative customer experience.

At the same time, because call groups are customizable, they can be adjusted to meet the needs of large businesses with multiple departments, ultimately leading to happier customers.

4. Urgent projects

Callgroups shine when you use them for time-sensitive projects and campaigns. This is especially true when you have a project with staff from multiple teams. This call group can be set up, used for the duration of the project and deleted afterwards.

Traditional voicemail-based systems and alternatives such as hunt groups tend to be too slow when time is of the essence.

Call groups allow for dynamic call distribution and simultaneous ringing capabilities, which can be perfect if you want one person on the team to receive calls first, then the next person, and so on. On the day of the event, you can go simultaneously if necessary.

5. Remote Work Support

If you have configured your phone system to accommodate agents working in different time zones, using call groups can efficiently route calls to agents based on their availability and location.

For a virtual contact center or multi-site call center, call groups can play a vital role in ensuring that customer calls or texts are only routed to an agent on duty.

Hunt groups are also an option for routing calls to remote teams, but call groups are generally more granular and provide much more targeted call distribution capabilities. Additionally, they are more scalable to handle the complexities of large distributed organizations.

6. Customer Feedback Lines

When you use a call group for customer feedback lines, you can be sure that agents will answer every call.

Many call centers use a single-line setup or hotline for returns, but these tend to be inefficient and provide poor coverage, which can lead to missed returns opportunities.

With a call group, you can take a systematic, organized approach to managing customer feedback, which can lead to better customer relationships and help you gather valuable business insights.

7. Emergency response

In extremely urgent scenarios, you don’t want a call to be mishandled. This makes talkgroups the best choice for situations requiring rapid, coordinated emergency responses.

You can set up a call group so that multiple team members are alerted to calls at the same time. This alone increases the chances of a quick and effective response.

Every second counts when responding to a cybersecurity incident, for example. Having a simple pre-established call group will go a long way in bringing together all the relevant communication experts.

Alternatively, choosing a hunt group for emergency scenarios can be risky. Unlike talkgroups, huntgroups do not have simultaneous ringing or targeted routing capabilities, which can slow or even block emergency response efforts.

Thus, the simultaneous ringing and dynamic call distribution features of call groups make it an indispensable tool for call centers handling urgent cases.