What is IVR short code ?
IVR (Interactive Voice Response) short code can be defined as special telephone number which has ‘less’ digits in it than traditional full length telephone number. This kind of special ‘short code’ are mainly used for special purposes like customer care for telephone/mobile subscribers, VAS ( Value Added Service) access either SMS/MMS ( Short Messaging Service/Multimedia Messaging Service) or IVR based, public utility services etc.
With recent ‘VAS boom’ all around the world in telephone and mobile industry, short-code has become quite well known and many people want to ‘have’ it! While, short code is nothing but telephone number with less number of digits in it, it has become very special special as it is always associated with some special service as well as special charging for calling to it! For any VAS short code, it is charged premium while for any customer care service, it is free of charge for the caller.

Different countries have different policies about short code used for IVR access or SMS/MMS access. Normally any short-code has length of 5 digits and can have customisable suffix for specific service.

Advantages of a short-code

Short codes work as just like any telephone/mobile number. But the main advantage is, it is short so it is easy to remember.
Customer Care numbers are widely publicised by telephone companies and these short codes grow to become brand for any telecom company. Likewise, value added service providers also build their brand around the short-code for the services they provide and try to make them popular. For example, 56969 is SMS as well as IVR shortcode for Rajasthan Patrika Pvt. Ltd. in India which offers many value added SMS and IVR services through this short-code.

Apart from being short, these short-code also tend to be vanity number. For example 58888, 56969, 54321 which have some interesting pattern and easy to remember.

Sine it is short number, it is faster to dial or send SMS. Apart from advantages of being short and faster to dial, I could not think of any other advantages. Many people may think short code as vanity number and associate it with pride.

Disadvantages of Short Code

The main disadvantage of short-codes is it is completely telecom company dependent. Shortcodes are accessible within the home network only. In order to make the short-code accessible in all operators across the country, the short code needs to be configured in all the operators. For example, the short code 56969, it is registered by Rajasthan Patrika Pvt. Ltd. in all mobile operators in India in every circle. That is why it is available in all networks in India. This activity of registering the shortcode in all operators ( in India, we have more than 12 mobile operators) and the allocating software as well as hardware resources to for connectivity to each of them is quite cumbersome and time consuming affair. Most of the time, mobile operators may not allocate the desired short code or simply refuse to allocate one.

But a long code or traditional phone number is accessible by all telecom subscribers without having to register with multiple telecom operators.

Revenue Sharing
Normally, apart from the short codes used for customer care services, all other short codes are used for value added services and so charged premium. The revenue generated are shared by telecom operator and the value added service providers.

Short code for IVR
Short codes are being used IVR portals ( popularly known as voice portal) which provide many value added services or utility services. Popular TV reality shows, Contests generate lot of revenues from this kind of IVR short codes from participants. But this kind of short-code would be accessible across country and all telecom networks only when the short-code is registered with all telecom operators. This need huge initial investment in terms of hardware and software as well as recurring expenses.
So, those who do not want to invest more initially and start any IVR service quickly, they may opt for long code or normal telephone number with E1 connectivity form single operator. It may not be possible to charge callers premium and work like a VAS to generate revenue.

Voice based value added service is known as voice portal. This is good revenue source for both mobile and land line telecom companies. Just like SMS Portal, voice portal also provides similar services but accessed through IVR. With advent of voice enabled menu using speech recognition technique, IVR has become very popular as well as user-friendly application for both mobile and land line subscribers.
IVR can be thought as platform to deliver content to users. The content may be anything, from latest news to mobile ring tone. I have written about Technical challenges and commercial challenges in a voice portal in my previous posts. IVR as content delivery platform has advantage:-

1. Its is easy to dial using the keypad while SMS is not easy to type on mobile phones.
2. Few contents are better delivered on IVR. For example, ring tone can be heard on IVR before it is downloaded by user.
3. It is limited by number of characters like in SMS. For example, complete news can be heard on IVR. Same goes for other contents like jokes, breaking news, etc.
4. IVR can be used by any kind of mobile phone instrument. Other content delivery platform like WAP does not work on low cost mobile phones. SMS does not work on many land line telephone instruments. It may be a major factor in a price sensitive market like India where maximum mobile subscribers use low cost handsets. India is a huge mobile market with more than 400million mobile subscribers.

Here I would like to list few services which are popular in India:-

1. Listening to Music
I find it amusing that people listen to music on mobile phone in this era of Ipod, FM Radio etc.! The main reason is, FM is available in major cities in India. The initial investment is high for many Indians for IPod or MP3 players. But many IVR VAS players in India has provided option to listen unlimited songs with a monthly subscription of paltry Rs. 30.
2. Astrology
3. Contests
4. Jokes
Yes, people do hear jokes on IVR!
5. Shayeri
This is an interesting application for IVR VAS.