Separating the best call center phone systems from the rest is essential for large call center teams. Perhaps you’ve sought customer care support to help you understand a specific detail.
Whether it was a company, retailer, or brand, interacting with bots will likely not have been useful because they answered programmed prompts.
This is where human support changes the customer experience and makes it more enjoyable. However, the agents can only deliver excellent services with the help of the best call center phone systems.
These include AirCall, JustCall, Nextiva, Dialpad, RingCentral, and more. But when selecting from the best call center phone systems, ensure the one you choose carries the features you need.
Are you a small to large organization looking to enhance your customers’ experience? This blog highlights the best call center phone systems worth checking and integrating with your call support.
So read on to learn more about these systems.
What is a Call Center Phone System?
A call center phone system or software is an organizational system used to manage customer communications. It handles routing incoming calls, making outgoing calls, tracking metrics, and measuring agents’ performance.
This efficiency ensures outstanding customer experience, trust, and sales.
Best Call Center Phone Systems Features
Omnichannel
The omnichannel feature ensures you can offer customer support regardless of the channel the customer uses.
While one customer may contact you via phone, another uses social media, email, or live chat. With the omnichannel feature present, another agent can pick up the customer context and offer help on the issue.
Interactive Voice Response
An Interactive Voice Response (IVR) feature allows customers to talk to a machine before reaching human support.
While a customer may call the center seeking a specific solution, it is optional to get the support team if the system can offer a solution. Moreover, if the call reaches the support team, the agent will already have the customer’s information or query.
Call Barging
Sometimes a customer can call with an urgent issue that needs a specific agent. Your customer can access the specialized support agent with the best call center phone systems. The same will apply when an agent transfers the support process to the next agent.
CRM Integrations
Customers prefer to avoid repeating their issues with different agents. The best phone system for call centers allows the storage of customer information so the agent can know who is calling and their caller history.
This makes it easy for agents to reference past interactions and ensure no issue repetition occurs.
Call Metrics Reporting
At the end of the day, you want to track and measure the call analytics to see how the agents did. With the best call center phone systems, you can track caller issues, call duration, information discussed, and the parties involved.
You can transfer these analytics to a spreadsheet for analysis and further agent training.
Cloud-Based Calling
A cloud-based calling feature allows callers to call over the internet instead of using a telephone line. With effective call center phone systems, organizations can cut on expensive hardware expenditures, updates, and maintenance.
All the organization has to do is pay a third party for the server usage.
Types of Call Center Phone Systems
1. Cloud-Based Call Systems
A cloud-based call center phone system is usually accessible over the internet. It is the cheapest to maintain since an organization does not need to hire IT staff to ensure effective running and maintenance.
However, since a third party offers the system, it means minimal customization on the organization’s end.
2. On-Premises Systems
You can install this call center system on an organization’s premises. The system will need a dedicated IT staff, server, upfront investment, maintenance budget, and space. However, it offers more customization options to suit your organization’s needs.
3. Hybrid Systems
As the name suggests, a hybrid call center system refers to a system you can install on-site and on-cloud. So, while you have customizable software within the premises, you also enjoy the cloud-based system’s cost efficiency.
Best Call Center Phone Systems
1. AirCall
This call center phone system is one of the best cloud-based call center solutions for transforming your customers’ experience. It has most of the essential features you want in the best call center phone systems, including IVR, cloud calling, call routing, recording, and management.
It also has a notable feature called call whispering. This allows an agent to communicate with an experienced peer or senior in real time to offer the best customer support.
AirCall allows businesses to agent groups according to skillset, location, and responsibilities, amongst other business attributes for strategy-making and performance. Additionally, it provides integration with over a hundred third-party applications, such as:
- Slack
- HubSpot
- Zendesk
- Salesforce
- Monday
- Shopify
- Microsoft Teams
- Intercom
This top call center phone system offers a seven-day trial period, and the best part is you do not need to share your credit card information. AirCall has three pricing tiers; essentials, professional, and custom.
The essentials tier features a $30 user per month billed annually or $40 if billed monthly. Meanwhile, the professional tier costs $50 per user per month billed annually or $70 if billed monthly. AirCall tailors the custom tier according to your business needs; hence you get a quote upon inquiry.
2. JustCall
Founded in 2016, JustCall is a cloud-based call center solution that eases customer communication. It offers many options that a call center needs, such as the auto-dialer, international phone numbers, caller Id, call whispering, monitoring, analytics, and queuing.
According to JustCall, over 6,000 companies around the globe use and trust this system to streamline communication. JustCall integrates with CRM and business tools such as:
- Salesforce
- ZohoCRM
- Freshdesk
- Slack
- Zapier
- Pipedrive
- Copper
- Freshdesk
- Reamaze
Your sales team can enjoy the customized text message option that JustCall offers. With this feature, they can create customized messages and send them to prospects and customers, easing the sales and customer support workflow.
JustCall has a 14-day trial period and three pricing options, Standard, Premium, and Custom. The standard option costs $24 per user per month billed annually or $30 if billed monthly.
Premium costs $48 per user per month billed annually or $60 if billed monthly. The custom option’s quote is available upon request as JustCall tailors it according to your business needs.
3. Nextiva
Another software in our list of the best call center phone systems is Nextiva. This easy-to-use software is trusted by most successful brands, like Amazon, Panasonic, United Way, Taco Bell, and Cisco.
Nextiva offers a contact center’s essential features, such as interactive voice response and call routing, management, and queuing. It also offers excellent omnichannel support allowing businesses to unify customer communication from multiple sources.
The IVR feature collects customers’ issues and solves them or connects the customer to the right agent, enhancing their experience. You can assign repetitive tasks to Intelligent Virtual Agents (IVAs) to let your live agents handle issues that need a human touch.
Nextiva integrates with business tools and software, such as:
- Oracle
- Microsoft Teams
- Salesforce
- NetSuite
- Google Workspace
- Zendesk
- SugarCRM
- Lotus Notes
- GoldMine
- Bullhorn
- ConnectWise
While Nextiva offers less than 20 software integrations, most third-party software manages a call center’s needs perfectly.
Nextiva has three payment tiers: essential, professional, and enterprise. The essential plan costs $18.95 per user per month billed annually or $25.95 per user billed monthly.
Its professional plan has a $22.95 per user per month price tag billed annually or $30.95 if billed monthly. The enterprise option is $32.95 per user per month billed annually or $40.95 if billed monthly.
4. Dialpad
This AI-powered call center system utilizes Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) technology to streamline customer connections. Top world brands like Charity: Water, RE/MAX, Crunchbase, Xero, TED, and ShipEX trust Dialpad with customer communication processes.
Dialpad offers essential call center features, such as making and receiving calls, sending and receiving faxes, and text messages from a mobile device or computer. It also stands out for its AI-driven voice transcription, note-taking, sentiment analysis, and chatbot self-service.
You can integrate Dialpad with tools, such as:
- Jiminny
- Mixmax
- Salesforce
- Kizen
- Clio
- HubSpot
- Zapier
- Wingman
- Domo
- Microsoft Teams
- Integrately
Dialpad offers a 14-day free trial when you sign up on their website. Dialpad has three payment plans; standard, pro, and enterprise.
The standard plan costs $15 per user per month billed annually or $23 if billed monthly. Its pro plan is $25 per user per month billed annually or $35 if billed monthly.
5. RingCentral
Supported in 45 countries, RingCentral made it to our list of best call center phone systems for its popularity. RingCentral is a cloud-based system that allows users to make calls from an internet-powered computer or phone via RingOut.
It features basic call center features, such as agent management, analytics reporting, IVR, omnichannel routing, and CRM integrations. Additionally, it has silent monitoring, call recording, and barging to streamline communication.
You can integrate this call center system with the following business tools:
- Salesforce
- Microsoft Teams
- Google Workspace
- Beetexting
- Nuclei SMS Archiving
- Shadow All-In-One Analytics
RingCentral has a customizable payment strategy tailored according to the number of live agents a business has, ranging from one to over 999. Its website lists four payment plans: essentials, standard, premium, and ultimate.
The essential plan is $19.99 per user per month billed annually or $32.99 if billed monthly. Its standard plan costs $27.99 per user per month billed annually or $40.99 if billed monthly.
The premium plan goes for $34.99 per user per month billed annually or $47.99 if billed monthly. Lastly, the ultimate plan goes for $49.99 per user per month billed annually or $62.99 if billed monthly.
6. LiveAgent
This is a help desk platform that offers a cloud-based call center for reliable communication with customers. It offers the essential features a call center must have, like IVR, call routing, and inbound and outbound calls.
Its standout call center feature is the Automatic Call Distribution (ACD) capability. This feature allows LiveAgent to filter and distribute incoming calls to the proper IVR or agent.
You can integrate LiveAgent with the following:
- vcita
- Firmao
- SugarCRM
- Insightly
- Salesforce
- Close
- HubSpot
- Pipedrive
LiveAgent offers a 7-day trial period if you sign up using a personal email or a 30-day free if using a company email. The best part is that you do not need to share your credit card information when opting for the free trial period.
LiveAgent has four pricing plans: “ticket”, “ticket+chat”, “all-inclusive”, and “free”. The ticket plan goes for $15 per agent per month, while the “ticket+chat” plan is $29 per agent per month.
Its all-inclusive plan costs $49 per agent per month, and the free plan costs $0. While the free plan is an excellent starting point, it misses most of the features a call center needs, so it is not ideal for a business with multiple agents.
7. Freshdesk
Previously known as Freshcaller, Freshdesk is one of the best call center phone systems a call center can use. Freshdesk is cloud-based, and you can manage all processes with a button on its intuitive mobile application.
With Freshdesk, you can offer voice support via the responsive IVR feature and route calls to the proper support agent or department. Other features include analysis reporting, omnichannel, CRM integrations, and conference calling.
You can integrate Freshdesk with business tools, like:
- Nimble CRM
- Infusionsoft
- Copper
- Pipedrive
- Zapier
- Shopify
- WooCommerce
- ZohoCRM
Freshdesk offers a 21-day free trial period for its pro and enterprise plan to ensure client satisfaction before commitment. During this period, you do not share your credit card information.
The platform has four pricing plans; free, growth, pro, and enterprise. Freshdesk’s free plan costs $0 and supports up to 10 agents. The growth plan costs $15 per agent per month billed annually or $18 if billed monthly.
Its popular plan is the pro plan which costs $49 per agent per month billed annually or $59 if billed monthly. The enterprise plan costs $79 per agent per month billed annually or $95 if billed monthly.
8. Aloware
Launched in 2019, Aloware is a cloud-based call center system focusing on customer support and boosting sales. It offers solutions like omnichannel, sales automation, sales dialer, AI voice analytics, and business texting.
Additionally, it offers live call monitoring to determine communication analytics and weigh agent performance. Aloware also allows call whispering, which helps managers access and offers behind-the-scenes advice to help agents better.
You can integrate Aloware with business tools, such as:
- Salesforce
- HubSpot
- ZohoCRM
- Zapier
- Guesty
- Gong
- Pipedrive
- Help Scout
Aloware offers a two-week free trial without financial commitment. After the trial period, you can choose between its three pricing plans: iPro, uPro, and xPro.
The iPro plan costs $30 per user billed quarterly or $40 per user if billed monthly. Its uPro plan costs $60 per user billed quarterly or $70 if billed monthly. The xPro goes for $80 per user, paid quarterly, or $90 if billed monthly.
9. CloudTalk
This platform makes it to our list of best call center systems for its excellent customization offers. CloudTalk is available in 160 nations, making it easy for international businesses to connect with their customers from one call center software.
You can also personalize personal customer greetings and set your preferred office hours. This allows customers to know the best time to reach you for support.
It offers messaging templates, IVR, over 50 CRM integrations, intelligent call routing, conferencing, voice mail, and agent scripting. CloudTalk is cloud-based, so you will not have to cover hardware set-up costs.
You can integrate CloudTalk with business tools like:
- Intercom
- HubSpot
- Gong
- Zapier
- Zendesk Sell
- Front
- SalesLoft
- ActiveCampaign
- Dataddo
- MS Dynamics
You can try any of CloudTalk’s four pricing plans for 14 days with no hidden fees. CloudTalk’s pricing tiers include starter, essential, expert, and custom.
The starter plan costs $25 per user per month, billed annually, and the essential plan goes for $30 per user/month, billed annually. Meanwhile, the expert plan costs $50 per user per month, billed annually. The custom plan’s quote is available upon request since CloudTalk tailors it to your business needs.
10. 8×8
This cloud-based call center management solution handles incoming and outgoing customer communication. It features vital components top call center phone systems must have, like omnichannel support, speech and customer analytics, and third-party CRM integration.
Additionally, you get automated call distribution, IVR, queued, and web callback. Your agents also enjoy features like expert connect, co-browse, and knowledgebase.
Its most standout feature is the strict data protection compliance policies. 8×8 is compliant with HIPAA, FISMA, and FCC Consumer Proprietary Network Information (CPNI) compliance.
You can integrate 8×8 with third-party business tools, such as:
- Microsoft Teams
- Zendesk
- Azure
- Google Workspace
- Okta
- Freshdesk
- Microsoft Dynamics 365
8×8 has three contact center pricing tiers, namely X6, X7, and X8. The X6 package costs $85 per user per month, while the X7 plan costs $110 per user per month. With 8×8’s X8 plan, you get advanced contact center features for $140 per user per month.
11. Zendesk Talk
Alongside being a leading Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software provider, Zendesk has a call center solution to help businesses connect with their customers. Zendesk Talk features the basic features you expect in the best call center phone systems.
It offers third-party tools integration, IVR, call recording, omnichannel capability, and automated call routing. Zendesk’s text messaging feature allows automated ticket raising, allowing easy customer communication tracking.
The platform integrates with thousands of add-ons you can download from its app marketplace. Some of the applications are:
- Ada for chat
- Ada for support
- Haptik
- Survey
- Kaizo
- Trello
- Undo
- CloudApp
- sync.blue
- BuiltWith
Zendesk Talk categorizes these add-ons according to their functions for easy selection. Moreover, some are free while others are premium. The platform has also divided the payment methods into:
- Free
- Free to install
- Per agent, per month
- Per month
Zendesk Talk offers four pricing plans, suite team, suite growth, suite professional, and suite enterprise. You can get a free trial period for its plans to help organizations determine their compatibility.
The suite team plan costs $49 per agent per month billed annually or $59 if billed monthly. Its suite growth costs $79 plan costs $79 per agent per month billed annually or $99 if billed monthly.
The suite professional costs $99 per agent per month billed annually or $125 if billed monthly. And lastly, the suite enterprise costs $150 per agent per month billed annually or $199 if billed monthly.
12. Five9
This cloud-based, AI-powered call center phone system focuses on sales growth and enhanced customer support. Its primary features include a predictive dialer, Computer Telephony Integration (CTI) screen pops, and workforce management tools.
Additionally, it offers automated call distribution (ACD), AVR, call monitoring, conferencing, reporting, and CRM integration. It also features text-to-speech and speech recognition, call scripting, toll-free numbers, and Do Not Call (DNC) compliance.
You can integrate Five9 with hundreds of apps downloadable from their marketplace. These apps include:
- Oracle
- Zendesk
- Salesforce
- HubSpot
- Google Workspace
- Zendesk Sell
- Sugar CRM
Five9 offers four pricing plans: core, premium, optimum, and ultimate. The core plan costs $149 monthly, while the premium package costs $169 monthly. You can opt for the optimum plan for $199 monthly or pay $229 for the ultimate plan per month.
13. Channels
Want to know who is calling before answering the phone? Channels does that heavy lifting for you, making it one of the best call center phone systems.
Formerly branded as CrazyCall, Channels is a cloud-based call center phone system aiming to ease customer communication with customers. Channels has a convenient app that allows your agents to respond and make calls.
This platform routes outgoing calls using local phone numbers to increase the response rate. Other notable features include IVR, call monitoring and reporting, live chat, and CRM integration.
Since Channels is more of a calling system, you must integrate third-party CRM software for better operation. Compatible CRMs include:
- Shopify
- Magento
- Pipedrive
- HubSpot
- Clientify
- Zapier
- Zendesk
- Make (Formerly Integromat)
Channels offers a seven-day free trial to test your compatibility with the phone system. You can opt into one of the two pricing plans if the software suits your business needs.
You can secure the plus plan for $24 per month, billed annually, or pay $29 monthly. The advanced plan is $62 per month, billed annually or $75 monthly.
Conclusion
The best call center phone systems can impact business operations. Moreover, a call center is an intermediary between customers and businesses.
So, it is true that businesses need the right strategy to connect with customers to increase leads and sales. The above comprehensive list of the top call center phone systems is a handy guide for business decision-makers.
You can make a difference with the right call center software. You can choose one of the call center systems listed above and improve your organization’s customer communication.