The Death of Voice - Long Live Voice Telecom

In late 2001, many of the Canadian telecoms purged their staff of experienced folks who could support traditional voice technologies — 800, 900, casual calling, calling card and other TDM based legacy systems. The theory was that VoIP would soon usurp TDM, and who wouldn’t want VoIP?
Needless to say, many - if not most, of the business and enterprise customers weren’t ready to make the leap to IP Voice.  As it turned out, many of the carriers weren’t as ready as they thought either.

Now, the remaining industry experience is reaching retirement age, with no *junior* experts to fill their roles in the coming few years. Where does that leave the customer? Making a jump to an immature technology? Sticking with a service with limited support?

Ten years ago, I was an Internet and Data specialist. Now - I’m a budding voice specialist, simply because there wasn’t anyone else who knew the answers to the questions I was asking about TDM based voice services. The internet can only help you so far in setting up a 900 network :-)
I’m looking forward to VoIP replacing carrier networks.
The NGN network deployments across Canada are expanding.
I can dream about the SMS-800 database taking on more of a DNS-like quality.

Until that time, I’m going to be using access tandems, term numbers and buddying up to the last remaining TDM voice talent in Canada.

Building Personalization, One Number at a Time

Everyone wants to feel special, unique, catered to. No one wants to feel like one of the great unwashed masses…

Businesses and retailers are just starting to nibble on the idea of customer personalization. Imagine, you have your own direct line to your salon. You call, they know who you are, what you like and more than likely, what you want. The same could be said for a myriad of services. Dentists, lawyers, accountants, mechanics…. Call centre technology pushed to the premise.

How about taking it a step further —- personalized toll free numbers anyone? Damn sight better than a calling card, especially for the kids at college…. (I know, Skype them, but with Skype not yet offering DID service in Canada, that’s tricky when you have to convince your parents to get Skypified, and be on the computer at the SAME TIME.) For less technified parents, get a 1-800 number and give it to your kids. They call you. You pay. You don’t have to give out your calling card number for them to (inadvertently) call Romania. I love Romania, don’t get me wrong, but the price per minute from Canada to Romania is almost the same as tuition at a Canadian university.

I’ve got a personalized Starbucks card. It’s got me, in caricature, on the front. I’d love a more personalized credit card. Yes, I’d likely pay a few bucks for it, or it should be included with the *annual fee*. I want a personalized Debit card, that should be easy too.

:-)

What do you want personalized?