All mobile value-added services have the same distinguishing qualities. First and foremost, they are not basic service offerings but are additional options that expand a user’s communication capabilities. From a technical standpoint, they may work in conjunction with core services or function as an added feature that does not diminish the standard services. When a value-added service is provided as an accessory to core offerings, they typically charge a premium price.

For over ten years, we have worked with hundreds of organizations in and outside Uganda to extend our stable, dependable, and scalable SMS, USSD, and IVR aggregation services to power country-wide and localized for-profit and social campaigns.

Today, we look at the benefits of VAS which include SMS, USSD, and IVR services for your business.

Short Message Service
Benefits of SMS

• Increase customer retention
• Develop greater brand loyalty
• Provide immediate communication
• Attract new customers
• Increase overall sales
• Provide a profitable ROI

Unstructured supplementary service data (USSD)
Benefits of USSD

• Surveys; USSD can be used in collecting customer feedback.
• Voting; in this case, it can be applied during polls for voting in real-time.
• Financial Services; e.g. Mobile banking.
• Utility Services; Here it can be used for bill query and payment purposes.

• Product Promotion: Business retailers can use USSD to communicate special offers on products and can send discount
• Vouchers for the next payment or purchase.

Interactive Voice Response (IVR)
Benefits of IVR

• Intelligent Call Routing; If optimized for your customer journey, it can lower abandon rates, reduce queue times for calls and provide tailored IVR call back options for times of particularly high call volume.
• Improve Morale by Freeing Consultants from Mundane Task; An IVR can route routine calls and common questions, allowing callers to use IVR self-service and freeing up agents to handle more complex calls or questions via multiple channels.
• Support for Busy Times and Disaster Recovery; IVR contact center technology gives organizations options for their callers to self-serve and leaves messages.

• Measuring Customer Satisfaction; If Customer Satisfaction (CSAT) scores are important to your organization, an IVR survey after each interaction will help to provide accurate satisfaction scores.
• Improving the Customer Journey; IVRs provide clear messages that reflect the organization’s brand, providing an effective self-service tool.

Yo! Journey
Over the years, Yo! Uganda has established itself as an innovative and reliable technology solutions company. Several businesses, organizations, and individuals trust our services immoderately enough to rely on our solutions to realize increased efficiency, reduce costs, accelerate growth and increase profitability.

From customer service improvements to an improved chance of return business, IVR can give businesses a real leg up in the field. If you don’t already have one of these systems in place, here are 5 good reasons to put one in.

1. Better customer experience
An IVR makes sure no customer hears nothing but a ringing phone. An IVR can also help move customers quickly to the most relevant person to answer any questions.

The key to enhancing the customer experience is that if the caller does need to speak to an agent, the information is seamlessly transferred and presented to the best agent to handle the query. This greatly improves productivity and reduces caller frustration. In addition, a well-crafted IVR and more advanced speech IVR (a system that recognizes spoken words or is “speech-enabled”) allows callers to self-serve outside of your standard business hours, enabling your organization to be available 24x7x365.

2. No more connection errors.
A receptionist transferring calls can accidentally transfer these to the wrong department, frustrating callers. With an IVR, customers place their own transfers.

3. More inbound calls.
Instead of having just enough call capacity to take care of a few callers, all calls hit the IVR at the same time. Customers then begin the process of connecting to the appropriate department, which gives employees more time to resolve calls.

4. Improved costs.
Greater efficiency — and the ability to handle inbound calls — from an automated system means the same number of employees can handle more calls.

5. Non-stop availability.
A customer can enter the IVR system at any time of the day or night. Even if the end result is “leave a message,” the customer still gets something accomplished. That improves the customer’s perception of the process and the chance of return business.

All mobile value added services have the same distinguishing qualities. First and foremost, they are not basic service offerings, but are additional options that expand a user’s communication capabilities. From a technical standpoint, they may work in conjunction with core services, or they may simply function as an added feature that does not diminish the standard services. When a value added service is provided as an accessory to core offerings, they typically charge a premium price.

For over ten years, we have worked with hundreds of organizations in and outside Uganda to extend our stable, dependable and scalable SMS, USSD and IVR aggregation services to power country-wide and localized for-profit and social campaigns.

Today, we look at the benefits of SMS, USSD and IVR services for your business.

Short Message Service
Benefits of SMS

• Increase customer retention
• Develop greater brand loyalty
• Provide immediate communication
• Attract new customers
• Increase overall sales
• Provide a profitable ROI

Unstructured supplementary service data (USSD)
Benefits of USSD

• Surveys; USSD can be used in collecting customer feedback.
• Voting; in this case it can be applied during polls for voting in real-time.
• Financial Services; e.g. Mobile banking.
• Utility Services; Here it can be used for bill query and payment purposes.
• Product Promotion; Business retailers can use USSD to communicate special offers on products and can send discount
• vouchers for next payment or purchases.

Interactive Voice Response (IVR)
Benefits of IVR

• Intelligent Call Routing; If optimized for your customer journey, it can lower abandon rates, reduce queue times for calls and provide tailored IVR call back options for times of particularly high call volume.
• Improve Morale by Freeing Consultants from Mundane Task; An IVR can route routine calls and common questions, allowing callers to use IVR self-service and freeing up agents to handle more complex calls or questions via multiple channels
• Support for Busy Times and Disaster Recovery; IVR contact center technology gives organizations options for their callers to self-serve and leave messages.
• Measuring Customer Satisfaction; If Customer Satisfaction (CSAT) scores are important to your organization, an IVR survey after each interaction will help to provide accurate satisfaction scores.
• Improving the Customer Journey; IVRs provide clear messages that reflect the organization’s brand, providing an effective self-service tool.