One of the biggest advantages in using an IVR system is that it gives your company a direct link to customers.

For companies, it’s an easy way to collect feedback and offer resources. And for customers, an IVR system means an easy way to find a solution to any problem.

Increasingly, companies are choosing to include IVR as an option alongside a website or other information source so that they can appeal to a wider range of customers.

Although the tech-savvy youth default to the internet on most issues, for many members of older generations, talking on the phone is just more comfortable, especially when using unfamiliar sites like Facebook or Twitter.

Unfortunately, many internet companies like Google are taking away the phone-in option and isolating their users.

From the New York Times:

On the other end of the line, however, some people may not know how to Google, or do not want to use Twitter. These users may be older, or less technically adept, and they are finding the method of communication they have relied on for a lifetime shifting under their feet. It does not make sense, they say, that a company with products used by millions every day cannot pick up the phone.

I have to agree.

It seems that these online mega-giants are waging war against the phone while simultaneously widening the internet gap between those who can and those who can’t Google.

Although I can understand an internet company wanting to do business mostly on the internet, the exclusion of any sort of direct communication between user and company is causing some serious waves, according to The New York Times.

Why is it that these multi-billion dollar companies can’t just get an IVR solution? That business model seems to work for almost every other company in America.

Maybe these companies are just afraid of the next big tech bubble bursting. If they never answer the phone, then maybe they won’t get the news when and if things take a turn for the worst.

Either way, this seems like a bad business model.