Telephony
Auto dialer
The CONTACT.WORK auto dialer calls through your contact lists and reacts to events in your CRM. An agent joins the call only after a live person answers – answering machines and dead air never reach them. The dialer places as many calls as you have free agents, or a few extra when the list is large. Whoever you assign to the campaign greets the person who answers: an agent, a prerecorded message, or the voice AI consultant. The outcome of the call is saved to your CRM.
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Campaign settings
Examples
What teams use the dialer for
Three common reasons to run an outbound campaign.
A call in the first minute
A customer fills out a form on your website, and the lead shows up in your CRM. The campaign dials them right away and connects them to a free sales rep while they're still expecting a call. No answer? It tries again in 5 minutes, then twice more at 10-minute intervals from a backup number.
- Calls triggered by CRM events
- Scheduled retries
- Backup number for retries
CRMnew lead10:31Call10:32no answerRepeat10:37no answerRetry 210:47 AM · backupMike connectedA prerecorded message
You need to remind hundreds of customers about an appointment or a payment. The campaign works through the list and plays everyone who answers a personalized message with their date, amount, or address. If they have a question, they press a key to reach an agent or the voice AI consultant.
- Message with customer details
- Press a key to reach an agent
- Confirmation saved to CRM
Customeransweredlive personMessagevisit Nov 5 at 3:00 PMplaysPressed 1questionto an agentSummaryvisit confirmedin CRMPredictive dialing for sales
Your sales team works through a list of tens of thousands of numbers. In predictive mode the platform dials the next numbers while agents are still on calls, factoring in the share of people who usually answer. Agents barely wait between conversations.
- Dials ahead
- Accounts for answer rate
- No gaps between calls
Available2 agents3 more soonEnrollment7 numberswith bufferRepliesusually 33%notedAnswering machinesfiltered outdon't connectPick the mode for the line: progressive for high-value leads, predictive for large lists.
Under the hood
How the dialer works
Campaign
What a campaign is made of
A campaign is a list of numbers, a set of rules, and the agents who take the calls. Numbers come from a file or arrive via API from your CRM or another app. Rules set the number of attempts, the interval, how many calls run at once, and the schedule. Calls go to the agent queue you choose.
- Number list
- Rules and schedule
- Agent queue
Numbersfile · 2,400uploadedAttempts3 every 30 minutesalternate numberScheduleweekdays 9:00 AM-9:00 PMactiveQueuecollections6 agentsDialing
How the platform calls
The platform dials several numbers at once and decides how many to dial: in progressive mode, one per free agent; in predictive mode, adjusted for the people who won't answer. It recognizes answering machines, voicemail, and silence and hangs up on them, and connects a live person to whoever is assigned to the campaign.
- Parallel dialing
- Answering machines screened out
- Live people go to the assignee
Agents4 available4 callsReplylive personto agentReplyanswering machineendedReplysilenceendedControl
Monitoring and results
Start, pause, and change campaigns in the web interface or from your CRM via API. Supervisors watch campaigns live and can stop any of them. The customer's response and the agent's notes are saved to your CRM.
- Control from your CRM
- Live campaign view
- Agent notes in CRM
Dialed2 400100%Reached1 56065%Opt-outs42excludedResultsin recordsCRMLaunch
How we launch a campaign
- 01GoalWe define who you're calling and why, then pick the dialing mode for that goal – progressive or predictive.
- 02NumbersWe upload your list or set up numbers to flow in automatically via API from any of your systems.
- 03RulesWe set attempts, intervals, the schedule, and how many lines to use at once so your team isn't overloaded.
- 04ScriptWe write the script for the agent, the prerecorded message, or the AI consultant, built around the campaign's goal.
- 05TestWe run the campaign on a small slice of the list, check the answer rate, and adjust settings if needed.
- 06Go liveWe open up the full list, then tune the schedule and dialing pace based on the first days' results.
Requirements
What you'll need
- Telephony
- Asterisk; several servers for high volumes
- Lines
- SIP trunks with enough channels
- List
- A file, your CRM, or an API event
- Outbound numbers
- One or more, for retries and rotation
- Agents
- A campaign queue, working in the browser
- Cost
- No licenses; minutes at your carrier's rates
Preparation
What to decide up front
Q&A
Frequently asked questions
How many calls can run at the same time?
Our record is 2,000 concurrent calls, with the load spread across several servers. In practice, the limit is usually the number of channels from your carrier and how many people work the campaign.
How is predictive mode different from progressive?
Progressive mode dials only when an agent is free, so the person who answers hears a human right away. Predictive mode dials ahead, assuming some numbers won't answer: agents sit idle less, but if no one is free, the person who answered holds with music or a message until an agent picks up.
Can the AI consultant run a campaign?
It can. It talks to the people who answer – reminds, confirms details, takes notes – and brings in an agent when a question gets complicated.
Can I run a survey without agents?
You can. A prerecorded message asks the questions, the customer answers by pressing keys, and the answers go to your CRM.
Why switch numbers on retries?
People are more likely to reject an unfamiliar number calling for the third time in a row. A different number on a retry improves the odds that the customer answers. If you connect several outbound numbers, the platform rotates them, so they're less likely to get flagged as spam.
Can I control the dialer from my own system?
You can. Through the API, your CRM or any other system can create, stop, and reconfigure campaigns, send numbers, and receive call results.
When can I legally call customers?
Under the TCPA, US telemarketing calls are allowed only between 8:00 AM and 9:00 PM in the recipient's local time, and marketing calls made with an autodialer or a prerecorded voice need the person's prior consent. Sales calls to numbers on the National Do Not Call Registry are prohibited. Because the platform knows each number's time zone, the campaign schedule follows every customer's local time. For collection calls, you configure the rules that keep you compliant. This is not legal advice – verify the requirements for your industry and states.
What if a customer asks not to be called again?
The agent marks the opt-out, and it's sent to your CRM. That number won't be included in future campaigns. You can also upload numbers you must not call as a do-not-call list in advance.
What do supervisors see during a campaign?
The progress of every campaign: numbers dialed, answered, and remaining, how many agents are on calls, and how many are waiting for the next one.
Are campaign calls recorded?
Yes, as are all calls on the platform. For complaint reviews or quality checks, search the recording by the customer's number. Where state law requires everyone's consent to record, open the call with a notice.
Can I run several campaigns at once?
You can. Each one has its own list, rules, schedule, and agent queue.
How much does the auto dialer cost?
There's no separate fee for the module – it's part of the platform. You pay your carrier for minutes at its rates, and campaign setup is billed in support hours.
Glossary
Terms on this page
- CRM – customer relationship management
- Where a company keeps its customers, deals, and full communication history. Learn more →
- API (application programming interface)
- The way programs exchange data with each other without a person in the loop. Learn more →
- Predictive dialer
- The system dials numbers in advance, predicting when an agent will be free. Learn more →
- Voicemail
- A recorded message when the person does not pick up. Learn more →
- Backup
- Data is regularly copied to a separate place so it can be restored if something goes wrong. Learn more →
- Power dialer (progressive dialer)
- As soon as an agent is free, the system dials the next number on the list. Learn more →
- Supervisor
- Leads a team of agents: watches the queue and quality, helps and coaches. Learn more →
- SIP trunk
- A phone line from the carrier over the internet instead of a wire. Learn more →
- SIP (Session Initiation Protocol)
- The protocol that sets up calls in IP telephony. Learn more →
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