RingCentral Contact Center Review: Features & Alternatives for 2023
This article is part of a larger series on VoIP.
RingCentral Contact Center is an omnichannel communications solution that allows businesses to connect with customers through voice, chat, email, and other digital channels. In this RingCentral Contact Center review, it received a high score on features, offering various call management, reporting, analytics, and omnichannel capabilities. However, it scored low on pricing as the subscription cost is higher than competitors, starting at around $150 per seat.
RingCentral Contact Center Review: At a Glance
What We Liked
- Omnichannel communication allows context-based customer experience
- Wide range of application programming interfaces (APIs) improving the software’s capability
- Easy-to-use interactive voice response (IVR) visual flow designer
- Advanced voice recording allowing managers to spot training and coaching opportunities
What's Missing
- Pricing is not readily available on the website, unlike top competitors
- Screen recording tools for agent performance monitoring not available in the entry-level plan
- Glitches on the platform, according to some users
- When you need contact center software that accommodates different communication channels: Its omnichannel platform (message, voice, and phone capabilities) connects you with customers in their preferred communication channel.
- Coach and train agents: The contact center has a robust monitoring and reporting system, letting you track key performance indicators (KPIs). It made it to our list of the best call center monitoring software platforms.
- Improve agent efficiency when calling leads: Based on our evaluation, RingCentral Contact Center is among the best predictive dialer software in the market. It has various outbound dialing modes (e.g., predictive, progressive, and preview dialers), letting you manage call campaigns more efficiently.
- Route calls to the best agents: With its excellent automatic call distribution (ACD) feature, every incoming call is distributed to the proper company representatives. Its ACD features include skills-based routing, call recording, and automatic callback.
- Accommodate a large volume of local calls: If your contact center regularly receives several customer calls, RingCentral Contact Center is a fitting communication solution because it provides unlimited calls within the United States and Canada.
- When you start a business and require an affordable contact center software: RingCentral Contact Center pricing isn’t published on the website. However, our research showed that its subscription cost ranges from $150 to $170 per seat, which is way above competitors’ pricing. Compare different packages from the best call center systems here.
- Need a simpler call recording solution: If your business typically has a low call volume and thus requires a no-frills tool for revisiting calls, RingCentral Contact Center’s rich feature set may be too overwhelming. Choose among these call recording apps instead.
- Require a robust ticketing system: Unlike RingCentral Contact Center, Nextiva and Freshdesk Contact Center feature a ticketing management tool. This allows teams to organize customer concerns coming from different communication channels.
Visit RingCentral Contact Center
RingCentral Contact Center Deciding Factors
RingCentral Contact Center is an omnichannel solution with an extensive set of features for a seamless customer and agent experience. It offers four plans featuring call management capabilities, workforce management tools, and integrations with third-party apps. Overall, we recommend this platform to businesses that provide different communication channels for customer service, as the platform keeps all customer interactions in one platform.
Best For | Businesses that want a complete omnichannel contact center solution | |
Standout Features |
| |
Pricing Plans |
| |
Annual or Volume Discounts Available | Not available | |
Key Integrations | HubSpot Data Sync, Shadow Agent, Voxjar, and Zoho Flow | |
Customer Service |
|
Aside from a contact center platform, RingCentral has a cloud-based phone system equipped with unified communication features. For its scalability and comprehensive feature set, it topped our list of the best small business voice-over-internet-protocol (VoIP) service. Learn more about the tool in this RingCentral review.
RingCentral Contact Center Alternatives
If you think RingCentral Contact Center doesn’t meet your business communication requirements based on the above factors, other contact center systems, like Freshdesk, 8×8, and Nextiva, may suit your needs. Freshdesk Contact Center is especially beneficial for those who need an affordable tool since it has a forever-free plan. Its basic package starts at $15 per user, per month.
Meanwhile, 8×8 features more extensive workforce engagement tools compared to the RingCentral Contact Center. It allows you to assess the quality of customer interactions, highlights calls that need attention using artificial intelligence (AI), predicts call volume, and gathers customer feedback after calls.
Nextiva is ideal if you need an omnichannel solution with a robust call center threshold system. This suits call centers that see spikes in call volume every now and then, as Nextiva will alert you whenever there are too many calls in the queue or the estimated wait time is high.
Best For | Small businesses looking for an affordable contact center system | Organizations that require a feature-rich workforce engagement tool in their contact center system | Companies wanting an omnichannel solution with an excellent call center threshold system |
Starting Monthly Price | Free; $18 for the entry-level plan | $85 per user | $50 per user |
Read Review |
Among all the criteria points we considered for this RingCentral Contact Center review, pricing is the only one with a low rating. The provider is not transparent in its subscription costs, and businesses need to contact RingCentral to get a quote for the packages. Our research found that the price typically starts at $150 per seat, which is significantly higher than other providers. It doesn’t have a free plan either, unlike Freshdesk Contact Center.
RingCentral Contact Center Plans | Essentials | Standard | Premium | Ultimate |
---|---|---|---|---|
Best For | Teams needing basic call center features | Small businesses requiring an omnichannel contact center | Organizations wanting an omnichannel contact center with quality management tools | Companies looking for an omnichannel contact center with an excellent workforce engagement management system |
Automatic Call Distribution (ACD) | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
Interactive Voice Response (IVR) | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
Call Reporting | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
Voice Recording | Basic only | Advanced | Advanced | Advanced |
Integrations With Third-party Apps | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
Omnichannel Routing | ✕ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
Quality Management | ✕ | ✕ | ✓ | ✓ |
Workforce Management | ✕ | ✕ | ✕ | ✓ |
Outbound Dialers | Available as an add-on | Available as an add-on | Available as an add-on | Available as an add-on |
Learn more about RingCentral Contact Center pricing and plans by clicking the options below:
The entry-level plan features basic call center capabilities, including ACD with skills-based routing, advanced IVR, and click-to-call. It also offers access to 90-plus real-time and historical reports and 300-plus APIs for integrations with third-party platforms. The package includes basic call recording.
While Essentials is limited to voice features, the Standard package has an omnichannel capability allowing users to connect with customers via 30-plus digital channels. It also comes with advanced voice recording.
All the Premium features are included in RingCentral Contact Center’s Ultimate plan. Plus, it features workforce and performance management tools. Interaction analytics, feedback management, and outbound dialers are available as add-ons.
RingCentral Contact Center Features
In this RingCentral Contact Center review, the provider earned a perfect score for general and niche features. The platform has a range of valuable features, especially when you choose higher-tier plans with expanded omnichannel functionality. In addition, the contact center has integrated messaging, video, and phone capabilities. These unified communication features facilitate better team collaboration.
Here’s an overview of the contact center’s features:
Since the platform ticks off all the basic capabilities businesses look for in contact center systems, RingCentral got a perfect score in the area of general features. It provides omnichannel support, covering voice, messaging, live chat, email, social media, and reviews.
RingCentral’s omnichannel contact center supports different communication platforms. (Source: RingCentral)
Moreover, the system allows businesses to use different routing methods and ensure efficient customer service. Choose among skills-based, artificial intelligence (AI), voicemail, data-driven, and omnichannel routing modes. Here are other essential call center features RingCentral offers:
- IVR
- Automatic callback
- Call deflection
- Call blending
- Call recording
- Call monitoring
- Contact list management
- Analytics and dashboards
Similarly, RingCentral Contact Center’s niche features received a perfect score because it has plenty of tools enabling enhanced customer service. For instance, it has different types of outbound dialers, allowing businesses to reach out to customers efficiently. The auto-dialer modes include predictive, progressive, and preview.
Here are some more RingCentral Contact Center niche features:
Listen in on live calls and help new agents who are still learning the ropes or those who take too long to resolve customer complaints. If necessary, respond to customers on the agent’s behalf. You also have the option to leave notes on the call to help agents improve customer communications and the overall average handling time.
Create spiels that team members will use when talking to customers. This promotes consistency and professionalism in messaging while helping agents gain confidence. With scripting, it’s easier to prevent miscommunication and inaccurate information. Ultimately, you’re able to create a more positive customer experience with well-thought-out spiels.
RingCentral Contact Center’s scripting feature helps agents follow a professional spiel that has accurate information. (Source: RingCentral)
These are browser windows that appear when a company representative connects with a customer. The box displays information that helps the agent address the customer’s concern, for example, personal information from the contact management system or the options the customer chose in the IVR.
These include popular tools like Salesforce, Zendesk, Sugar, and Microsoft Dynamics 365. With one glance, agents are able to see the customer’s background information, purchase history, and open tickets while on the call or writing a response to a social media inquiry. This helps them personalize spiels to better accommodate customer needs.
RingCentral integrates with the popular CRM platform Salesforce. (Source: RingCentral)
Facilitate easy coordination among employees across the organization with RingCentral Contact Center’s team messaging, video conferencing, and calling features. Team members who need to ask questions or raise concerns to colleagues will quickly get assistance and relay answers to customers.
RingCentral Contact Center’s collaboration tools include team messaging. (Source: RingCentral)
This is RingCentral Contact Center’s conversational virtual agent. Through artificial intelligence (AI) technology, the chatbot responds automatically to customers’ questions and performs tasks like troubleshooting password presets, providing tutorials, rescheduling deliveries, and canceling appointments. With SmartAssist handling simple requests from customers, your agents are able to reserve time and energy for more complicated customer concerns.
Powered by artificial intelligence, RingCentral Contact Center’s SmartAssist responds to customers’ questions without human intervention. (Source: RingCentral)
RingCentral Contact Center earned a score of 3.75 out of 5 in customer service. While it has various support channels, like phone, live chat, and social media, it lacks email support. Nonetheless, it has an online community where users find answers to frequently asked questions (FAQs), raise questions themselves, and submit suggestions for additional features. RingCentral Contact Center also has a platform for filing support cases.
We gave RingCentral Contact Center a perfect score for ease of use since its setup and navigation are simple and straightforward. The menu bar along the top of the interface contains all the options and commands that make it easy for users to pick up incoming calls, set up routing, and check key performance indicators (KPIs). With this, it only takes a few clicks to perform tasks.
RingCentral Contact Center’s interface is simple and clean, making it easily navigable. (Source: RingCentral)
RingCentral Contact Center earned a perfect expert score given its wide range of features, great value for money, and high user rating in third-party review platforms. Many users particularly noted the hassle-free setup and ease of navigation. Some expressed appreciation for the customizable dashboards, which make monitoring team performance more efficient. Here are the ratings on third-party RingCentral Contact Center reviews:
- GetApp: 4.3 out of 5 based on 173 reviews
- G2: 3.9 out of 5 based on 109 reviews
- TrustRadius: 8 out of 10 based on 50 reviews
How We Evaluated RingCentral Contact Center
We identified six criteria points for this RingCentral Contact Center assessment: pricing, general features, niche features, customer service, ease of use, and expert score. Here’s a breakdown of those important factors:
20% of Overall Score
We checked the availability of a free version and the affordability of subscription packages. We looked into the number of paid plans to evaluate how the provider caters to different budget requirements. We give providers more points when they offer annual and volume discounts.
25% of Overall Score
For this, we considered the availability of essential contact center capabilities: ACD, omnichannel support, call monitoring, and call activity analytics. Providers that have robust omnichannel and reporting features get more points.
20% of Overall Score
The niche features we looked at were outbound dialers, integrations with third-party platforms, chatbot, and workforce management. We give more points to providers that have an extensive set of integrations.
10% of Overall Score
We checked the different support channels the provider offers, particularly looking for the availability of live chat, phone, and email. We also considered its customer service hours, giving more points when its lines are open 24/7.
10% of Overall Score
We evaluated the contact center’s ease of use by weighing if it requires technical expertise to set up and operate. We also looked into how intuitive the interface is.
15% of Overall Score
Our expert score consists of our evaluation of the provider’s standout features, popularity, and ease of use. We also considered its value for money, taking into account the range of capabilities it offers for the subscription plans.
Bottom Line
RingCentral Contact Center is a feature-rich platform suitable for businesses that want to streamline communications with customers on different channels. Although its subscription plans are at a higher range compared to competitors, its extensive features make up for the cost. It supports 30-plus digital channels, enables intelligent routing, and promotes efficient operations with supervisor and agent tools.
Maximize these features and improve your customer service initiatives. Contact RingCentral today for a customized quote.