ADDITIONAL TECHNOLOGIES

Voice-enabled website
Customers can call into a voice-enabled website that integrates Voice XML (vXML) with an IVR system. A common platform can be built to be accessed by either phone or browser. Through the use of a phone, customers can input data and execute web applications that they previously could only have done through a browser.

One of the latest standards to emerge from the World Wide Web Consortium is VoiceXML (vXML). This vXML standard allows the telephone to access web sites built with this technology. On vXML-incorporated sites, customers can perform typical web-browsing functions such as perusing content and navigating through links and pages—entirely over the telephone. In the manner that a web browser is needed to read HTML-constructed pages, vXML-enabled IVR is needed to “hear” vXML-constructed pages. Most new IVR software platforms are now vXML-enabled and can function as the necessary voice gateway to translate vXML content to telephone signals.

With the proliferation of mobile phones adding to the ubiquity of landline telephones, this standard can allow for a tremendous increase in the number of simultaneous visitors to a web site. As with unified messaging, vXML-enabled IVR can provide organizations with yet another opportunity to serve their customers.