Call flows: Why, how, and best practices

Ever been stuck on hold, listening to bad elevator music, just trying to get help with a simple issue? Chances are that poor call flow is to blame. When call routing is disorganized or automated systems are hard to navigate, frustration can build fast. But what if that wasn’t the case?

In this article, we’ll share how to set up an automated call flow in a few easy steps. We’ll also give you a few tips to create a good customer experience when handling calls.

What is a call flow?

A call flow is the roadmap for how incoming calls are routed within a business’s phone system. It starts with a greeting, then navigates through an interactive voice response menu, then routes to the right department. It also includes any hold times or transfers.

Why your business should use call flows

Besides helping customers get the information they need faster, a call flow has strategic advantages for your small business:

• Lets your team split responsibility for incoming calls using shared numbers
• Prevents missed phone calls from turning into lost customers by forwarding to external numbers for call overflow
• Creates a good first impression for first-time customers
• Boosts customer satisfaction by routing callers to the right person on your team
• Saves time and money through automated routing, eliminating the need for a live receptionist

How a call flow works in 5 steps

Setting up a call flow doesn’t have to be complicated — a simple path creates a better experience for your team and customers. 

1. Caller dials in: The customer calls your main company phone number or a secondary number.

2. Call goes to voicemail or a phone menu: If it’s outside business hours, the call goes to an after-hours voicemail or forwarding number. If the call is within business hours, the caller reaches a phone menu with a recorded greeting and menu options.
3. Caller selects option: If the call goes to the phone menu, the caller chooses an option via keypad or voice. This routes the call to the right team, department, or informational audio recording.
4. Call routes: Based on the caller’s selection, the call is routed according to pre-set parameters, like round-robin, shift-based routing, or skills-based routing. This ensures the most appropriate team member receives the call.
5. Caller reaches the destination: The team member or department the caller selected answers the call. If they reach a voice mailbox, they can leave a message. And if they reach an audio recording, the message plays and then ends the call. You may also choose to send callers to an answering service.

11 tips for creating a more effective call flow

Here are 11 things to keep in mind when setting up or updating your call flow to improve the customer journey. 

1. Start with a simple greeting 

When dialing in, your caller may already be overwhelmed or frustrated with an issue. Keeping the greeting short reduces friction while you direct them to the necessary department. It also reduces the chances of callers abandoning calls or hanging up out of impatience.

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2. Add an option for customers who select no option

Automatic inbound call routing can help reduce confusion for callers. Information overload is real, and many people struggle to navigate complex phone menus. A default option can help reduce the feeling of being overwhelmed. 

The default option doesn’t always need to route calls to support representatives. Quo gives you the option to: 

• Repeat the menu
• Send the call to voicemail
• Play a recorded message
• Forward to a Quo number
• Forward to an outside phone number
• Let the call through
• Send to a specific team member
• Send calls to Sona, an AI agent for reducing the calls your teammates take and answering common customer questions

A phone system with customizable options like these ensures callers are routed efficiently.

3. Place popular phone menu choices first

Customizing your phone menu to offer popular options first is a win-win. Your customers reach their destination faster and your team’s setup becomes more efficient. 

For example, if you frequently receive calls about billing inquiries — such as questions about charges, payment methods, or account updates — placing billing support as the first option allows customers to get to the right department quickly. 

Internally, you can tailor training and resources to better equip staff members to handle financial queries. With specialists focused on billing, customer wait times decrease and resolution rates improve. 

Quick tip: Use voicemails and call transcripts to identify common questions, then optimize your call workflow to address them efficiently. This approach works across industries — whether you’re designing legal firm call flows to handle case inquiries and consultations, or startup call flows to manage investor relations and customer support. 

4. Customize your ring orders 

A ring order allows you to ring phones in a specific order and specify how long you want the phone to ring. This feature is especially valuable for call flows for home services, where quick response times can make the difference in securing appointments.

For example, you may want to set a custom ring order to ring more experienced team members first. After setting this up, they would be the first to receive incoming call notifications. 

You can also choose simultaneous ring so team members receive incoming call notifications all at once. Or, you can set up a random ring order, which notifies team members in a random order. 

Our support team recommends a 15-second minimum ring duration so calls can register. If you have more than three people in your ring order, consider shortening the duration to around 10 seconds so callers aren’t on the phone for too long. Balance is key!

5. Minimize hold times and transfers

Most business owners know customers dislike being put on hold but lack a streamlined system to avoid it. While eliminating hold times may not be possible, be mindful of your averages. Regularly update your call management systems with ring groups and self-serve options to take the load off customers and support reps. 

To further optimize your call flow, use a phone system that makes it easy to get context on callers. For example, reps can use Quo’s internal threads and contact notes to address issues independently without needing to transfer calls.

6. Test and update your phone menu

Business models, customer needs, and team structures are constantly evolving. To keep up, regularly test and iterate call flows to ensure they align with customer expectations. Here are a few best practices: 

• Schedule shifts based on call volume: Use analytics to identify peak times and plan shifts accordingly.
• Test-run your phone menu: Have your team review your phone menu to ensure the recording isn’t too long and that customers don’t have to consider too many options.
• Update pre-recorded greetings: Think of your phone menu as your storefront window. Regularly update it for holidays, team retreats, new feature upgrades, and service downtime.
• Add promotional offers or policy updates: At the end of your phone menu, consider adding promotional offers or changes to existing policies.

To get clarity on whether you need to update your phone menu, Quo customers can track if callers abandon calls before selecting an option. They can also see which menu option a caller selected in real-time on the incoming call screen.

7. Invest in training support reps

As more businesses move online, customers expect digital support to mirror in-person experiences. This requires reps to practice empathetic problem-solving. 

Training reps on the product, active listening, and empathy can lead to better support. To make customer service training more effective, consider using these tools:

• Call recordings for shadowing: Let new or less experienced reps listen to call recordings for training. Shadowing real customer interactions can help them learn best practices and improve their communication skills.
• Transcripts and call summaries: Use transcripts to review conversations and provide actionable feedback. Call summaries provide key takeaways from each call, including action items that need follow-up.
• Call tags: Tag calls based on specific issues or actions taken, making it easier to track common problems and identify trends. This data can be used to improve your training and support materials.

8. Build out your knowledge base

Ninety-one percent of customers say they’d use a knowledge base if it met their needs. Creating a searchable, well-organized support blog makes it easier for your customers to find answers on their own. This, in turn, reduces high call volume and frees up your team for more complex inquiries. 

Beyond a support blog, consider offering other self-serve options, such as:

• A help center or FAQ page with answers to common questions
• Self-scheduling and rescheduling tools for appointments or service calls
• An AI-powered assistant to handle routine inquiries and provide instant responses

By expanding your self-service options, you improve the customer experience and reduce strain on your support team.

9. Use call scripts but allow for flexibility

Call flow scripts provide a structured framework that ensures consistency and high quality service. Well-crafted script templates:

• Keep conversations on track
• Improve metrics like first response time and average handle time or AHT
• Help with first call resolution or FCR
• Ensure key information isn’t missed

But flexibility is just as important. Reps should be able to adjust their approach based on the customer’s tone, urgency, or unique situation, helping conversations feel natural.

10. Manage how calls are handled at different times of the day

Set up call handling rules based on business hours so customers always know what to expect, no matter the time of day. Here’s how it typically works:

• During business hours: Greet callers with a professional message and route them to the appropriate team or department.
• After hours: Play an after-hours greeting that informs callers of your availability and offers options like leaving a voicemail or requesting a callback.

Conditional call forwarding adds another layer of flexibility. You can forward incoming calls to an answering service, another team member, or an external number during specific times. These can include lunch breaks, team off-sites, or peak call hours. This also serves as a fallback when no one is available to answer, helping reduce missed calls.

11. Get 24/7 coverage with an AI answering service

When your team can’t answer calls, an AI answering service can act as an intelligent extension of your team. This prevents customers from going to voicemail — and from calling a competitor. You can train Quo’s AI agent, Sona, with your business information like operating hours, pricing, and policies so it can answer FAQs. You can also give Sona instructions for lead qualification and other jobs. 

When more complex issues arise, Sona can seamlessly transfer callers to a team member with full context from the conversation. You’ll see a call summary and transcript right in the customer’s conversation inbox.

Types of call flows

Here are the most common call flows small and growing businesses can implement: 

Auto-attendant/IVR 

Auto-attendant systems use automation to guide customers through a phone menu. For example, callers can say ‘sales’ to be routed to your sales department, or press 1 on their keypad to reach someone in customer support.

Here’s an example of this call flow: 

• Press 1 for sales: Forward to sales reps as a ring group.
• Press 2 for customer support: Forward to customer support reps.
• Press 3 for billing: Forward to the accounting or billing department.
• No selection: Forward call to voicemail or let it through to a team member.

Time based routing

Time-based call routing directs calls differently depending on the time of day. For example, during working hours, you can send callers through a phone menu to reach specific team members. For after-hours calls, you can direct callers to a different phone menu with self-service options.

Here’s how this call flow might look in real life: 

• During business hours, ring team members in ring groups, at random, or all at once; if no one picks up, redirect to voicemail or Sona.
• After business hours, play phone menu:
  • Press 1 for emergencies: Forward call to on-call emergency contact.
  • Press 2 for general questions: Route call to Sona.
  • Press 3 to hear business hours and location info: Play recorded audio.

Round-robin routing

Round-robin routing distributes calls in batches across a team. It helps the same people from being overloaded by calls on a small team. For example, you could set up a round-robin group of your customer support staff so everyone gets a fair share of incoming calls.

Skills-based routing

Skills-based routing directs calls to specific team members based on expertise. For example, you may send VIP customers to more senior team members. 

After-hours call forwarding 

After hours call forwarding routes callers to an answering service or voicemail after working hours. For example, a service-based business might forward calls that come in after 7 PM to an answering service for lead qualification. 

Here’s an example of how this call flow could look: 

1. Play an audio greeting to let the caller know the business is currently closed and when it’ll reopen.
2. Play phone menu:
   • Press 1 if you’re dealing with an urgent issue that can’t wait until business hours: Forward calls to an emergency contact or on-call staff member.
   • Press 2 for non-urgent inquiries or to request a follow-up: Route to Sona

How to set up a call flow process in Quo in minutes

Setting up a call flow in Quo is quick and intuitive. Follow these steps to get started: 

1. Invite team members

The first step is to invite team members:

1.  Log into your Quo account and go to Settings, then Members. 
2.  Invite team members and let them choose a dedicated phone number or give them shared access to an existing number.

2. Navigate to the call flow builder

Once your team is set up, it’s time to create your call flow:

1. Go to Settings, then Phone numbers.
2. Select the phone number you want to set up a call flow for.
3. Under Call flow, select the sample call flow canvas and click Edit call flow.
4. You’ll be directed to the call flow builder, where you can design your flow.

3. Get familiar with the call flow tool

Understanding the key elements will help you build your flow efficiently:

• Steps: Individual actions in your call flow that you can add, modify, or replace.
  • Calling steps: These include your phone menu, ring users, voicemail, the option to play audio, and the option to forward calls.
  • Condition steps: These adjust call routing based on condition. Currently, only during Business hours is supported.
• Canvas: This is the visual layout where you structure and arrange call steps.

4. Configure call steps

You can edit call steps in two ways:

• To add a step: Drag and drop a step from the side panel into the call flow.
• To replace a step: Click the three-dot menu in the right corner of a step and select Replace step to swap in a different step in the existing flow.

Here’s how to configure each of the calling steps: 

Business hours

Business hours is a condition step where calls are routed one way during business hours and another way after hours. You’ll need to configure your business hours from the main settings page and your hours will be applied to your call routing.

1. Go to Settings and select Phone numbers.
2. Select the number you want to add business hours to.
3. Under Business Hours, toggle on Enable business hours. Note: Quo currently only supports one, consecutive time period per day. You won’t be able to add multiple time periods for one day.
4. Select your time zone and your or your team’s daily availability by selecting the hours to the immediate right of Every day.

If your team is off on weekends, you can click into Every day to set your schedule to Weekdays instead. If your hours vary depending on the day, you can select Custom. Then add in your business hours.

To add a business hours step to your default call flow:

1. Return to the call flow builder and drag the Business hours step after the Incoming call trigger.
2. After you add a business hours block, the canvas will automatically create two paths: During hours and After hours, where you can add routing steps.

Your team members can refer to this guide to set their work schedule.

Phone menu

1. Drag and drop the Phone menu step into the canvas. You can either have a phone menu after an Incoming call trigger or after a Business hours condition step like during or after hours.
2. Customize the menu greeting by selecting Change greeting and uploading an audio file, recording yourself, or using text-to-speech in the right panel of the builder.
3. Add up to 10 different options that callers can select via keypad dialer or voice commands.
4. Customize routing for each option. By default, the call flow builder will add a Ring users step after each menu option. To edit these steps, select them, and click Replace step in the right panel of the builder to choose a different call step. You can choose from these other phone menu options: Ring users, Voicemail, Play audio, Forward call, Another phone menu, or Sona AI agent.
5. By default, if a caller stays on the call without selecting a phone menu option, the call flow builder will default to a Voicemail step. Select the Voicemail step and click Replace step in the right panel of the builder to replace this option with another default option, including Ring users, Forward call, or Repeat the menu.

Ring users

1. Drag and drop the Ring users step into the canvas. Keep in mind you can’t place it before the Incoming call trigger, Phone menu step, or Business hours step.
2. Under Ring order type, choose from:
   • All at once — rings all users simultaneously
   • In random batches —  rings random groups of users for a set duration
   • Custom ring groups — rings users in a specific order
   • Single users — routes calls to a specific team member
3. Set the ring duration for each ring order type. We recommend 15 seconds minimum.

Voicemail

1. Drag and drop the Voicemail step into the canvas. You can only add the voicemail step after the Ring users step.
2. Select the voicemail step in the right panel of the builder to edit your settings.
3. Upload or record a voicemail greeting in the Voicemail greeting section.
4. Toggle on Transcribe voicemail for automatic transcription.
5. Enable the Profanity filter to remove offensive words from voicemails.

Play audio

1. Drag and drop the Play audio step into the canvas. You can only add the play audio block after the Ring users step.
2. Select the Play audio step and edit your audio file in the right panel of the builder.
3. Upload an audio file, record an announcement, or use a text-to-speech file that you can enter directly in the step.
4. After the playback, your call flow will automatically route to your default action if you’re using a phone menu. If not, it will immediately end the call.

Forward call

1. Drag and drop the Forward call step into the canvas. You can add a Forward call step after your Incoming call trigger or after the Ring users step.
2. Select the Forward call step and edit your forwarding number in the right panel of the builder.
3. Choose a forwarding number. This must be a US or Canadian local number.
4. Forward calls to:
   • A shared Quo inbox
   • A specific contact
   • An external number

Go to step

The Go to step lets you route callers to a different step in your flow, without having to recreate the same configuration multiple times. This keeps your call flows easy to maintain, especially when routing to the same voicemail greeting or Sona setup across different scenarios.

Here’s how to add a go to step: 

1. In the call flow builder, navigate to a step where you want to redirect the caller to a step you’ve already created
2. Select Go to step from the side menu and drag it into the canvas. You can also click the “+” button on the canvas, then pick the go to step.
3. Choose the step you want to send callers to.

Once added, you’ll see a connector line pointing to the step you selected. This makes it easy to track your flow logic.

Temporary call flows

You can switch on temporary call flows as needed. This keeps you prepared for situations like a key team member being out of office, a planned vacation, or even a long meeting. 

Here’s how to add a temporary call flow: 

1. Go to your phone number’s call flows section on a desktop or web browser.
2. Click + Create new call flow and add a name and emoji so your call flows are easier to identify and manage later.
3. Build your call flow by adding menus, greetings, and routing.
4. Click Publish when you’re ready. This will activate the new call flow and replace your current one. You can re-publish your main call flow at any time.

5. Publish changes

Each modification prompts a Publish changes button — make sure to click it to save your updates.

6. Optional: Forward all calls

If needed, you can forward all incoming calls to another number instead of following the default call flow. This is useful when:

• Calls need to be routed to an external answering service.
• Your team is unavailable and calls should be redirected.
• You want a temporary backup number for call handling.

To enable call forwarding:

1. Go to the call flow builder.

2. Select the dropdown arrow next to Default call flow in the top left of the screen.
3. Choose Forward all calls and enter a forwarding number. It must be US or Canadian only.
4. Click Create new call flow.
5. You can toggle between Default call flow and Forward all calls as needed.

All Quo users can customize their call flows, but only Business plan users will be able to use specific steps like custom ring orders and phone menus. If you’re a current Quo Starter user, learn how to upgrade.

Create a better calling experience with Quo

Customer service call flows have been around for as long as customer service and contact centers have been in existence. But only recently have VoIP systems become advanced enough to offer call routing options that provide a better experience without you lifting a finger.

To check out how these work for your business, try Quo free for seven days.

FAQs