An Outbound IVR is one of multiple different outbound tools – others are Predictive Dialers and Robocallers – that can be part of a contact center solution. Essentially, an Outbound IVR is used to proactively reach out to a large number of customers in a personalized manner using different interaction channels, such as voice messages, SMS / text messages or emails.
An Outbound IVR is similar to a Predictive Dialer in the sense that it will use customer data, for example from a CRM system or a customer database, to determine which customers to reach out to, where to reach them and via which channel. An Outbound IVR should also enable you to personalize the communication sent for each recipient. It is different from a Predictive Dialer because an Outbound IVR it is not limited to the voice channel, and the interaction sent to the customer is fully automated. Predictive Dialers are often used in Telemarketing, where the intent is to as quickly as possible connect as many customers as possible with live agents. Conversly, unless the recipient of the message actively reaches out to the contact center by making a return call, or sending a text or email reply when they receive the message sent by the Outbound IVR, there will be no agent involvement in an Outbound IVR interaction.
It is also somewhat related to a Robocaller because it helps distributing messages to large numbers of recipients. It is different, though, because Robocallers basically blast large numbers of one and the same message to everyone on the list, whereas an Outbound IVR actually personalizes the outbound messages it distributes for each recipient. Robocallers are often used in election campaigns.
