Setting up a Ring Group

Video Walkthrough: 

What is a Ring Group?

Ring groups allow incoming calls to be routed to multiple agents in one of three ways:

1. Simultaneous: incoming calls will ring to all agents at the same time.
2. Linear: incoming calls will ring to the agent at the top of the list first, and then progress down the list until someone answers the call.
3. Linear Round Robin: incoming calls will be evenly distributed between agents. Call number 1 would go to the agent in the first position, call 2 would go to the second agent on the list, and so on.

When you receive a call to a ring group that you are in, the ring group name will be displayed in the pop-up in your Kixie dialer. Only a manager on your Kixie account has access to set up a ring group.

Setting up a Ring Group

On your Kixie.com Dashboard, go to Manage → Inbound → Ring Groups on the left side menu. Click "+ ADD"

On the pop-up in Settings, you will need to fill out the first two boxes to proceed: "Group Name" & "Send Voicemail to".

Below this annotated screenshot, you will find a detailed breakdown of each of the menu options:

1. Group Name: the name of your Ring Group (for example Sales Team, Customer Support, etc.)
2. Send Voicemail to: the email you want to send voicemails to from this number (separate multiple emails by a comma and a space after the comma)
3. Group Greeting Type: this is the audio that the caller hears when first calling into your ring group
4. Group Ring Audio: this is the audio that the caller hears instead of the normal ring audio
5. Group Voicemail Type: this is the voicemail greeting your caller will hear if they don't reach anyone in the ring group, and you choose your No Answer action as voicemail
6. No Answer action: this is the action that will occur if no one in your ring group picks up the call (DO NOT set this as a loop to go back to your same ring group - this will make your system crash!)

Now you want to set up your actual ring group's agents to determine who will receive these calls and in what way they will receive them. Click on "Ring Groups" on the left side of the pop up.

1. Ring Type: this will determine the order in which your ring group dials your agents
   • Simultaneous: all agents will receive the inbound call at the same time
   • Linear: the agents will receive calls in a linear formation, so the position will determine who the call rings to first, second, third, etc.
   • Linear Round Robin: the agents will receive calls in a linear formation, so the Position will determine who is called first, second, third, etc. The difference with Round Robin is that the ring group will skip over the last person who answered the call. For example, if Position 1 answered the last inbound call to the ring group, the next inbound call to the ring group will start dialing at Position 2 and work its way down the line.
2. Seconds to Ring: the number of seconds you want calls to ring to each agent in your ring group if you have the Ring Type set to Linear or Linear Round Robin. If you select Simultaneous, it will ring each agent simultaneously for the specified Seconds To Ring.
3. Press One to Accept: when your agent accepts the phone call, they will hear a tone that asks them to press 1 to accept (this may help them tell which people are calling from the ring group or to their personal Kixie number, for example).
4. Select Agent: select the agent you want to place in that position
5. Select Device: select the device you want that agent to receive their call on
6. Add another agent after this current position
7. Position: this is the position that the agent will be rung in (only applies to Linear Ring Type)

You can continue to add agents to this ring group by clicking option 6 in the previous screenshot.

Here's another screenshot to show you how it would look after you add more agents:

After this step, you can click "ADD GROUP" at the bottom if you want to create another tier to ring to if the first ring group doesn't answer. (Clicking "COPY GROUP" will create a second tier that is identical to the first tier.)

Adding another group will be the same process as setting up the first group. To prevent errors in call routing, you should NOT set up more than 10 agents per group.

Below is an example of another group set up under the first group:

Make sure to hit "Save" after you create your ring group and move on to the next step.

To enable your ring group, you must assign a Kixie phone number to your ring group, or add it as an option on an IVR. (If you do not do one of these, no one will be able to call into your ring group.)

• Go to Manage → Numbers in the menu on the left side of your Dashboard
• Find the number you want to route to the ring group (or add a new number) and then press the pencil button to the right of it
• Click Group → Select the group you want this number to route to
• Select a Default User for the ring group number. This is the user who will receive any texts that go to the number.

Your ring group is now enabled! Go ahead and test your ring group out by calling the number you just assigned, or call your IVR and select the option that goes to your new ring group.