What Is Call Whisper? The Feature Guide for Small Businesses
Corey McCraw is a staff writer covering VoIP and Unified Communications. Corey has over a decade of experience in marketing, tech writing, and corporate communications and has even penned content for the former First Lady Michelle Obama’s Let’s Move initiative.
Marianne is a staff writer at Fit Small Business who covers business phone services, VoIP, and video conferencing tools.
This article is part of a larger series on VoIP.
Call whisper is a call handling feature that allows you to listen to a call between an agent and a customer and communicate to the agent—verbally or visually—without the customer knowing. Call centers use this feature to train and support agents during live calls, improving caller experiences and agent performance. Keep reading to learn more about what is call whisper, its benefits, and the top service providers.
How Call Whisper Works
When a call comes in, an agent picks up the line and begins speaking with the caller or customer. Depending on the company’s phone system setup, a supervisor uses their keypad to silently enter the call and taps a button on their phone or desktop to “whisper” suggestions to the agent.
Some call whisper features allow supervisors to listen to the call and coach the agent using verbal or visual messages. This occurs when the manager wants to get involved in a conversation or help a struggling agent without interrupting the customer during the interaction. Supervisors can enable other features during a sales call, including automated pop-ups with marketing campaigns for coaching purposes.
This feature is beneficial for sales and customer service departments, helping businesses address callers’ needs while improving customer experiences. To fine-tune sales and customer service strategies, it is often incorporated into customer relationship management (CRM) systems with other tools, like call barging and call screening.
Types of Call Whisper Features
While call whisper allows supervisors to “whisper” suggestions to agents on a call, it also combines with other voice-over-internet-protocol (VoIP) business phone features to enhance call quality even more. Here are the other features that complement this functionality:
Call Barging
Call barging enables managers to join in a live phone call to interact with both the agent and customer, creating a three-way conference call. This provides the manager a more active role in ensuring call quality and training new call center agents. When the manager sees the agent is struggling, they can take over the call altogether and help the agent solve the issue.
Call Monitoring
Call monitoring is the process of listening to an ongoing call or a recorded phone call between an agent and a customer. Monitoring calls allows managers to oversee call quality, improve agent efficiency, and develop marketing strategies. When combined with call whisper, managers choose a line to monitor and select which agents to coach or take control over a call, if needed.
Call Recording
Call recording is the ability to capture a voice conversation associated with phone calls. It allows conversations to be stored in a digital audio format, which will be transcribed or listened to at a later stage. Recording calls benefit businesses, providing insights into previous phone calls for evaluating calling processes and driving better business decisions.
Benefits of Using Call Whisper
One of the biggest responsibilities of call center managers is providing support to their sales and customer service representatives. Call whisper comes in handy by providing assistance to struggling agents during the first few seconds of the call. Here are the other benefits of using this feature in your call center operations:
Training New Call Center Agents
Learning the proper call handling skills is an essential aspect of managing a call center team.
One of the main advantages of call whispering is that it allows you to provide on-the-spot training to new agents during their early stages or offer support when confronted with a difficult issue. This makes agents more comfortable knowing they are not alone when dealing with complications.
Improving Customer Satisfaction
In a call center environment, managers should ensure that agents make a good first impression and know how to address various customer situations. With the help of call whispering, managers can give advice or take over a call completely to find a solution, especially helpful for new agents dealing with irate customers. Providing a seamless customer experience will eventually pay off in increased revenue and higher customer satisfaction levels.
Enhancing Agent Performance
Call whispering is a valuable call center tool for improving your employees’ communication skills and call handling abilities. By listening to live calls, managers gain access to all information concerning customer interactions and are able to correct discrepancies in real time. Thus, it provides more coaching opportunities, making agents feel more confident and satisfied with their jobs.
Call Whisper Providers
The best business phone systems are scalable, allowing business users to start with an entry-level package and upgrade to one with advanced features. The call whisper tool is often bundled with other popular features like call barge and call monitor. Here are some of our top picks:
RingCentral is a business phone solution offering four subscription options that start at $22.49 per user, per month. Two of its plans offer advanced call handling, such as call barging, call takeover, and monitoring. Additionally, RingCentral offers comprehensive call management features, such as multilevel auto-attendant and interactive voice response (IVR), for managing high call volumes.
Check out our RingCentral review to learn what makes it our top business phone system solution.
8×8 is a unified communications platform that offers a full contact center solution. Upgrading to its higher X series plans, including X4, X6, X7, and X8, provides access to call monitoring capabilities, such as call whisper and call barge. The Agent Whisper feature allows supervisors to monitor a live call and initiate a one-on-one conversation with the agent without the customer being able to hear it.
Higher plan tiers like X4 offer unlimited calling to 48 countries, perfect for companies with an international customer base. Learn more about its robust features by checking out our 8×8 review.
Twilio Flex is a fully programmable contact center platform that offers customizable, pay-as-you-go packages. The call control feature supports call whisper, and users have the option to embed it in several CRMs, such as Salesforce and Zendesk. Call tracking and contact center tools screen calls and give agents data about the caller’s location and demographics.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
What is the difference between call whisper vs call monitoring?
The difference between call whisper and call monitoring depends on who is aware of the monitoring. For call monitoring, neither the agent nor the customer can hear the person monitoring the conversation. With call whisper, the agent can hear the person listening to the phone call.
What is whisper transfer?
Whisper transfer is a method of routing your calls to an agent and displaying important customer details before picking up the line. Information may include the caller’s name, location, or the extension or department number they called.
Is call whisper legal?
Yes. Call centers are permitted to legally monitor calls as long as the agent is properly notified. You can also customize your whisper message to suit your state laws.
Bottom Line
Call whisper is a valuable VoIP feature, enabling companies to boost agent efficiency and improve customer satisfaction levels. By coaching agents in real time, call center environments will be able to ensure better call quality and enhance internal training. If you’re interested in using call whisper, check with your current provider to see if they offer the feature or consider the providers we listed, like RingCentral.
