CRBT (Caller Ring Back Tone) is a very popular IVR application used in Telecom Industry. It is known as “Hello Tunes”, “Caller Tunes” in India. CRBT is a fairly simple IVR system which has a smart call routing and a IVR application which plays one audio file, a music as per choice by the CRBT subscriber. CRBT is one of the highest revenue earner for Telecom companies in voice based value added service (VAS) all around the world.

CRBT can also be used as very useful, targeted advertising tools where the IVR software will play an ad jingle instead of a number for chart topper, or a old hit. The ad jingle to be played can be chosen by the following criteria:
1. Caller Id : Since IVR application will know both the caller number and called party number, it can choose ad jingle based on the caller ID. For example, if the caller id is an land-line number, a ad jingle related to land line facilities should be played. When caller ID is a Airtel land line number, why not play a internet facilities available on Airtel land-line number ?
2. Area of Caller ID : Area of caller can be decided based on the caller id. In case the caller ID is a mobile number, first 4 digits of the caller ID will determine the area of the caller. And if the caller id is a land line number, the first 3 digits which is a STD (Subscriber Trunk Dialing) code which denotes an area. So, using this information, the ad jingle can be chosen.
3. Telecom Operator Wise : From the caller id and the called party ID (DNI, Dialed Number Identification), Telecom operator can be found out. Advertisement can be targeted by Telecom Operator too. For example, all BSNL caller would be played about 3G availability on BSNL network!
4. Integration with Billing Server : If IVR Server or CRBT Server is connected to billing server, than high paying customers, prepaid customer, post paid customer can be identified and accordingly ad jingles can be targeted.

Advantages of CRBT advertisement :
Advertising on CRBT is new. But it is obvious that there are certain advantages of CRBT advertising. It can be very targeted advertising. The advertiser would know exactly how many times ad jingles has been played and to whom. He would be able calculate his conversion rates.

I think CRBT advertisement would pick up in India soon. There are people who are experimenting on it. But we are still to see wide scale adoption of this advertisement platform.