How to Set Up a Voicemail IVR

A voicemail IVR lets customers leave a message for your team, whether that's during office hours when your queues are busy or outside them entirely. Admin staff can then retrieve these messages and take the appropriate action.

Before you start

You'll add a voicemail option to an existing IVR routine, using four elements: an IVR Menu element, a Play element, a Record Message element, and a Hang-up element.

Building the IVR

  1. Add an IVR Menu element to your routine, and upload a message giving the customer their options, for example "Press 1 for sales, 2 for support, 3 for customer service."
  2. Connect the voicemail option to a Play element, and upload a welcome message with instructions, for example "Thank you for calling [company name], please leave your message after the beep."
  3. Connect this to a Record Message element. The customer's message is recorded here after the beep.
  4. Connect this to a Hang-up element, which ends the call once the customer presses the terminate digit, or once the system hears silence for a set number of seconds.
ElementPurpose
IVR Menu elementGives the customer a menu of options, including the digit that routes them to voicemail.
Play elementPlays a pre-recorded welcome message and instructions before the customer leaves their message.
Record Message elementRecords the customer's message after the beep.
Hang-up elementEnds the call once the customer finishes leaving their message.

If you're adding this to an existing IVR, for example one that already routes calls to agents after an options menu, add another digit to that menu and connect the new elements above to it.

Adding a result code for identification

Every element in an IVR can have a unique result code added to it, letting you track customer journeys through the routine and spot where customers frequently hang up. For a voicemail IVR, this also means you can quickly pinpoint voicemail messages in the system. See Result Codes for more on creating these.

  1. Create a unique result code for your voicemail IVR. Name it whatever suits your setup, and create more than one if you have multiple voicemail IVRs.
  2. Select this result code from the dropdown on the voicemail element's menu.
Note. If you're using a Hang-up element after the voicemail element, set the same result code on both. Customers sometimes end the call before reaching the Hang-up element, so both need to match for accurate tracking.

Retrieving voicemail messages

Once your IVR is live, you can listen back to messages from two places.

Recording Playback

  1. Go to Recording Playback and select the advanced search option.
  2. Search for the unique result code you assigned to the voicemail element. The table filters to show every call dispositioned with that result code.

Record History

  1. Go to Record History and use the advanced search function to search for the result code assigned to your voicemail element.
  2. The table shows every call dispositioned with that result code, along with information about each one.
  3. Select the button on the right of a record to open a dialog with more detail, including the recording itself.

See Record History for more detail on this page.

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