In my previous post on IVR as E-Com Portal , I tried to explain how IVR can be used to generate revenue. In this post, I would try to list the some services, which should be interesting and likely to generate revenue. I think, it would be best if the IVR e-com portal is operated either on a toll free numbers or on a normal telephone number without any premium charging. Normally, voice portals provide the services free while charging premium for the call.

1. Direct Selling
One would be surprised to know that, many products, services could be sold on IVR. Few such products or services are :-
a. Music CD/Albums :
One can build a complete music store on IVR. The obvious advantage on operating a music store on IVR is ‘listening trailers’ on the fly! Callers would find it very easy to search any music number or album by language, genre, singer, films etc. There can be many options how caller pay, orders DVD etc.

b. Tickets
Most probably, many people are aware about buying tickets on IVR system. One can sell flight ticket, railway ticket, bus ticket, movie tickets on IVR e-com portal.

c. Books
Books could be sold on IVR e-com portal easily and some excerpt could be read out to the caller about new arrivals of books!

d. Food
If Domino’s can sell pizzas on phone, why not you ? One can sell foods on phone with home delivery facility!

e. Branded Products
Normally all branded products need not be touched or felt or inspected personally! There are many such products which one can buy on phone. For example, why should one need to check anything about LUX soap or 1KG of Basmati Rice ?

There must be many more items which can be sold directly on phone. All those which can be sold on phone could be automated on IVR e-com portal!

2. Services
There are many services which an intelligent IVR can provide to people which could be sold on IVR e-com portal. Some of them are :-

a. Distance education
Paid courses could be made available on IVR. Also lectures by eminent professors, teachers could be made available to registered students from distance.

b. Paid consultancy on phone
Doctors, astrologers could provide consultancy on IVR E-com portal. The main advantage of IVR consultancy is anonymity and many people can explain on phone without any inhibition. Of course surgery can not be done on IVR E-com portal, but some appointment with a surgeon could be surely sold on IVR e-com portal.

c. Notification Services
IVR can notify anyone by calling up! So IVR e-com portal may provide this service either for registered paid member or per usage basis.

d. Bulk outgoing call services/On demand outgoing call services
I am quite sure, this is one area which is picking up and likely to grow more in coming years. With increasing penetration of phones, people want to travel less for sending their messages quickly to many people!

e. Advertising
Voice advertising is one area which may sell on IVR e-com portal.

These are few services, products, which I believe, can be sold on IVR e-com portal. There are various tools to develop an IVR portal using which one may develop IVR E-com portal quickly and easily.

Like any other businesses, success of IVR e-com portal will depend on many things and those are outside scope of this article. But, IVR e-com portal can surely work and generate revenue.

I have posted one article how IVR can be used to generate revenue, mainly from caller paying to use the IVR services through a voice portal in collaboration with a telecom operator. No doubt, it is a lucrative Voice VAS(Value Added Service) for many M-VAS companies as well as telecom operators, but there are other ways too where one can use IVR to generate revenue, even without any collaboration with any telecom operator.

Also, one of the negative side of collaborating with telecom operator is, they take away majority of the revenue generated while IVR service provider does all the investment as well as majority of the promotions for the IVR services.

There comes in IVR E-Com portal! One may actually generate revenue by establishing an IVR e-com portal! IVR e-com portal can be thought of as corresponding voice portal for an e-com ( e-commerce) web portal. While an e-com portal is accessed using a web browser on a PC/Laptop or mobile phone, IVR e-com portal is accessible by any phone or mobile phone. A successful IVR e-com portal can be even hosted on a toll free number where caller will not be charged anything!

An IVR e-com portal would be capable of selling products like music album after listening to music trailers, can buy movie tickets after hearing some famous dialogues of the movie etc.

Credit card can be charged securely on IVR e-com portal for making payment. Delivery of products would be just like e-com portal, by using courier or postal service.

There are few advantages of IVR e-com portal. For example :-

1. Easy browsing
User will be focused on browsing category wise and will not be distracted by many colorful links as in a e-com web portal. Browsing of products are quick and to the point.

2. Selling Adult products
Many people, specially in India, are unable to buy many products like condom from a chemist shop. There have been many advertisements by governments and other NGOs encouraging people to buy condoms from chemist shops boldly. Using IVR e-com portal, everybody would be able to buy condom or other adult products without any inhibition.
3. Listen trailer
For products like musical album, children CD, etc. could be heard on IVR e-com portal by browsing through them. They can also listen user feedback in original voice form by celebrity users or common users. It will increase authenticity of testimonial of the products.

4. Good option for certain disabilities
IVR e-com portal is a solution for people with visual disabilities. Presently, I am not aware if there is any shop or e-com portal for people with visual disabilities. IVR e-com portal can serve them better with many options.

Challenges in running IVR e-com portal
There are some disadvantages of IVR e-com portal. Many products would be difficult to sell on IVR e-com portal. For example, shirts, pants etc.
Also, not many people may want to dial an IVR and pay for the outgoing call. Also many people may not like the idea of pressing keys on phone many times while browsing through products. Clicking on keys are easier than pressing buttons on phones.

Apart from few ticketing IVR service for airlines, IVR e-com portal has not really picked up or even started. Most probably, not many people are thinking in this direction. If you are thinking now to start IVR e-com portal abd make Ebay in IVR, remember me too that I also had this idea. . Jokes apart, in my next articles I would try to list the services which could be sold or how IVR e-com portal could be monetized.