So what's new? Voice SMS (Part 1)

Hello Internet people out there, it's been some time since my last post, and mostly because I've been so flat out with things that I either forget to blog, or I'm too busy to even think about it.

So apologies for that.

So then what's been happening?

Quite a lot actually, since we last spoke about anything Esendex we have had a couple of new products introduced, like Voice SMS and Inbound MMS.

The Voice SMS is an interesting product - I'll be quite honest here, outside of people with sight impairments, I struggled to get an idea on what people would use the service for? However, it's been my own customers who have shown me the light.

One example is Copper Mines Tasmania, who use the service for emergency alerts - for example, if there was an incident on site at 2:00 am in the morning, they can send an alert out to those who need to be in the know - the beauty of the product is in both the ability to send a message to both LAN lines, and mobile phones alike, along with the fact that the service continues to ring the phone until it's picked up and receives something (i.e. hitting number 1 on the keypad to listen to the message) - well, it sends it again every 10 minutes there after for 10 times until it's answered.

Another example would be sending information, like a customer order, to a location where the only means of timely inbound communication might be a LAN line office phone from a central hub.

It's a product that is coming along and growing organically - I guess what I like about it is that to a point it's still growing and in its infancy in my opinion and is something that is still being shaped by our customers.

The other beauty, unlike the standard SMS, is that it's possible to see who has listened to the message or not

With the future ability to change and customise many aspects like the number the message originates from, the preamble and post amble of the message, variable speed and test playback to name a few.

I have no doubt though that as we get on, and continue to take our customers feedback that it will develop into a truly powerful tool...

Last one for the day, but I thought this was worth sharing to show you how people land and bounce from this blog...

I started this blog because I was told I had to... I must admit even the forums I'm signed up with I lurk more than put myself out there... Confident, but not open to ridicule...

However, I'm getting into this business and enjoy the small things like which posts are more popular, how many people in how many countries check my blog out, etc...

So after posting a couple today I though lets have a look... to my surprise in Feb I had people in 17 different countries landing on my page - to some that's nothing and I appreciate that, but I get a bit of a buzz I must admit.

So I went deeper and checked out which blogs were the most popular - no surprises, you dirty buggers, hot guys vs. hot girls was number one!

Then I went a bit deeper and I think this really shows you how as a global village we've really grown to develop our search engine techniques, all these keywords were used to find my blog;

"hot guys don't" - don't what?
girls period sms - what? I mean really, what?
he likes hot girls - that's not as bad as the last...
hot girls on sms - still fairly tame... although like you I'm still recovering from the second one
hot girls australia - hmm, probably find something suitable if you left your bedroom
hot sms thoughts - you're on the internet? surely you can find something good enough there?

Now we get into the insecure faction of my readers...

how to intercept sms from girlfriends phone - told you
nokia "intercept sms" - apparently the Nokia's are big snitches with this kind of stuff
spy on my girlfriend's sms and calls - this guy should buy a new girlfriend I think
stealth call back sms - hmm, possibly a spy who's been speaking with his spy mates about black box operations? I wonder if he knows Jason Bourne?


Can I say whether you intentionally landed on this blog or not (and going by the keywords used to find me, I'll take that as a not) I would like to thank you for looking around anyway, even those buggers that spend less than 2 seconds.


Have a great weekend.
Speak soon.

Cheers,
C


P.S. if you need to speak to someone about the second one (I know I'm still a bit shocked and I knew it was coming) let me know I'll find their IP address and will bill them for your costs! :)

FIFA 08

This is really going to show my maturity - but it's my destressor which happens to be a lot of fun at the same time.

Recently I bought FIFA 08 for my PS2 - no I don't have the lasted PS3, but no doubt at some stage I will acquire one. Anyway, it has Clive Tisley and Andy Grey as commentators, and generally their comments fit the scenario and well, make sense.

There are some though that I thought I would share - please note these are loose quotations, but you'll get the idea.

At the start of a cup match Andy Grey at one stage makes the comments "well Clive, I don't know about you, but I think this side will either win it or lose today" - one word, insightful... I wonder when he was at the recording studio and that came out of his mouth what he was thinking at the time -no a bad line mate, not bad at all...?

The other comment I thought I would share with you (although there are a few I'll this short);

Again another cup match between the Gunners and some minnow team Clive says "well on paper this match has already been won", in which Andy replies "I don't know about you, but I've never seen a match won on paper" - what about paper football Clive?

I lied, I just had another one pop into my head - it was a FA match between Chelsea and Arsenal, and Clive says "no other competition in the world could put these two clubs together..." umm... OK then... hmm... What can you say? I love it.

Honestly, I'm not taking the micky out of the developers/programmers/designers, etc... in fact if I have to admit I love it - when they say the right things it gets boring, when it's something that makes them look a bit dumb it's great and I find it quite amusing.


Cheers,
C

Advertising and kiddies

Can I say, in general I really like advertising and branding and all of that. I like the way James bond wears an Omega watch and that makes me want to have one as well, and how car ads make me want to buy them as well.

On the weekend I saw my brother and his kids, went out for lunch, then back to my parents for coffee and to raid the fridge (lunch wasn't that great), and the kids sat at the kitchen table and draw pictures.

Now my nephew is 10 - when I was 10 I was riding the streets pretending I was in the BMX Bandits and made up a fictional gang called the "crew of 87".

Outside of that I had no clue about clothing brands, bands (outside of AC/DC of course), or any of the generally accepted products marketed at 10 year olds today, which is what surprised me when I looked over and he was drawing fashion label symbols.

I mean it wasn't until I was 11/12 years old when we discovered Adidas 3 strips - and if you tracksuit pants had 2 or 4 strips you were going to get teased for being poor - ironic because the area we grew up in we were all poor - at least I knew my parents :)

It seems today that advertisers are managing to market to younger and younger kids, and I wonder to myself what kinds of additional pressures are we adding, to kids as well as their families - I mean we all can't be good at shop lifting. But as well as how that impacts on their development as children into adulthood?

I mean socially I found that competition really heated up at the age of 18 when we were allowed to hit pubs and clubs cruising for girls - that's not true, we stood in the corner and wished the footy players from Carlton would bugger off!

So what will life be like for them when competition really heats up in 8 or 9 years time?

One to ponder I think.



Cheers,
C

Mind control and sales

I've already mentioned before that it's my belief that every company in the known galaxy is a sales company - meaning every company has to sell something in order to be , well, alive?

Within that, there are many, many different methods to market and sell you product - some companies advertise on TV or radio, others on the net, whilst a number of companies physically go out to their audience knocking on doors.

It's funny, in a previous life I worked in industrial/engineering sales selling to manufacturers their maintenance gear like OH&S, power transmission parts, all the way through to major site work that was up for tender. There's no way, then and probably still true now, that we would have had the same level of business if we purely advertised online, or in magazines or radio for example - you needed to be there face to face to tell the store man, or purchasing manager why they should buy from you, what you can bring to the table and so on.

Almost the opposite is true with Esendex, we have a far more effective sales model through online marketing than we do outbound sales - it's fair to say that we are not always turning up on someones door step unannounced trying to push our services, but we do do outbound.

There are many difficulties associated with outbound sales that are across the board - who do I speak to? Have I got the decision maker? Are they really interested? Am I saying the right things?

Some of the sales courses I've done in the past, without coming straight out and saying it, have a lot to do with reading people and adjusting pitches to suit those people - difficult if you're over the phone and you have a few seconds to make an impression that interests the person you're speaking to, isn't it?

I got an email from a friend, and these sorts of things I cast my eye over and if there's a lot of reading I leave it, because I don't have the time or the interest to read to be honest, but for some reason I read this one - and I'm glad I did.

hopefully this comes out OK, and is readable, and works - it certainly does in the email (it means going below the fold, but if you have the patience then I think you'll appreciate this - plus I have more to say afterwards);

At the end of this message, you are asked a question.

Answer it immediately. Don't stop and think about it.


Just say the first thing that pops into your mind.


This is a fun "test"... AND kind o f spooky at the same time! Give it a try, then e-mail it around (including back to me) and you'll see how many people you know fall into the same percentage as you. Be sure to put in the subject line if you are among the 98% or the 2%. You'll understand what that means after you finish taking the test".


Now... Just follow the instructions as quickly as possible.



Do not go to the next calculation before you have finished the previous one.



You do not ever need to write or remember the answers, just do it using your mind.


You'll be surprised.



Start:


How much is:


15 + 6






















3 + 56



























89 + 2

























12 + 53





































75 + 26



































25 + 52





























63 + 32

































I know! Calculations are hard work, but it's nearly over..


Come on, one more!




























123 + 5























































QUICK! THINK ABOUT A COLOR AND A TOOL!










































Scroll further to the bottom...












































A bit more...




















You just thought about a red hammer ! , didn't you?


Now I thought this was amazing - it is and it isn't, it is because someones worked out that thinking about certain things results in likely giving back a certain answer, it's a form of subliminal messaging or mind control.

I'll be honest, I haven't gone through look for patterns or anything like that but at some stage I probably will and try to see if I can replicate it - because I have a massive brain and I think I probably could.



Now imagine that you had a sales pitch which was similar, give some simple questions get some simple answers where they are only thinking about what you asked them (and maybe where you are going with it - lets face it asking mathematical questions during a sales call is probably a bit weird, although you make you stick out) and then hit them with the last question, and that answer is your business name.

I'm not talking about 1984 techniques where you stick a cage on your customers face with a rat in it and ask him what 2 + 2 is (3 obviously), it's about laying the seed of your company name, so that when they think of the goods or services you provide, they think of you as number one - probably even if they don't actually like you, I don't really like one of the big phone companies hear (starts with a "T" and ends with a "elstra") but I use them at home for phone and Internet, because they're known and when I think of those services I think of them.


I know this sounds like a very cunning plan, and probably could contravene international human rights law, but it's an interesting concept none the less.

SMS for tradesmen?

For those who don't know, I've been involved in renovating my 2 bed flat for quite some time (around 12 months - can you believe it) and at times it's been absolutely soul destroying and other times it's been a great experience.

Over this time I have dealt with what I feel is a huge number of tradesmen for quotes eventual jobs, during jobs, finishing jobs, etc... The one thing that has struck me the most is that on average the were the least reliable people out there.

Now I know in Australia at least, the building trade is enjoying good times - in fact trades are able to pick and choose the jobs they want and don't want and that's great, although I don't quite get it in that they are still a business, and the idea of a business is that it should always try to push upwards and grow, at the very least it insulates itself for when the market isn't as strong without going out of business.

I regularily have conversations with friends (some who are tradies themselves) about if I had a trade business I reckon I would clean up purely through my customer service and one of the tools I would use would be using SMS.

It's so easy it's not funny, just for small things like appointment reminders because they double up as reminders for yourself - when you ge back to the office (whether that's at home or not), set some scheduled messages for the next day confirming when you're going to turn up I guarantee will bring you more business - as long as you turn up on time of course!

Why should they do it? Well, it's cheaper than calling the person to make sure they're home, but further on that like tradies, not everyone is reliable and forget to turn up themselves - so what does that cost you?

A tradesman's money is in their ability to manage time, things like getting lost can cost you money, missed appointments cost even more - phone calls to find out where they are cost them money. With day rates at around $800.00, that's about $100.00 per hour and saving one missed appointment because the owners weren't sure when you were turning up should be enough to warrant getting an SMS service onboard - then anything after that it starts making you money.

Of course we come back to the old arguement that there's so much work out I don't need to do it - and for the younger guys who haven't felt the pain of a resession and don't understand that when interest rates get into the teen's people don't build things, people don't renovate or get that pegola or conservatory knocked up. All of a sudden the only jobs on the table are the disaster struck jobs or the jobs you once knocked back, but instead of having your choice you're up against other guys desperate to maintain your level of earnings and one of the key tools in general that would go a long way is being in the habbit of great service, and that's as easy as using SMS to stay in touch.

Random translations?

For Christmas my girlfriend and I gave ourselves a brand spanking new Garmin Nuvi GPS unit - it's the 760, because I like to get the best I can afford so it stays up-to-date for as long as possible.

Anyway, I was just going through some of the tools it has, things like a currency converter, world clock media player to name but just a few - one that took my fancy was the language guide? I thought hear's something cool lets have a look.

It covers a number of different languages, but is only a taster for an upgrade (of course why would it be included in full?) although it contains some handy phrases that you might use covering words, recreation, food and drink, entertainment, accommodation, problems and miscellaneous.

I don't have to tell you that the first one I looked at was the miscellaneous list of phrases, and although they didn't go to far, it still didn't dissapoint. The following is a list of phrases ready for translation;

Am I distrubing you?
Are you enjoying your stay?
Are you married?
Are you OK?
It's one o'clock [am] exactly?

Now am I distrubing you, enjoying your stay, or if you're OK? I can see times where I might use that, but it's one o'clock exactly? Sure I might have a chance to say that once a day as long as I'm awake - but who am I going to have to say that to in a different language? Then there's the are you married line, which I think is perfect! because I know when I've been in foreign countries where I didn't speak the local language that was something I was dying to ask everyone!

Pushing through I checked out the phrases for accommodation and there was another one that stuck out - can I have an itemised bill? Itemised bill?? If I needed the GPS unit to find out how I asked the question in the first place what chance do I have of understanding what the bill says anyway? Gold.

Looking through some other phrases one more I found was are children allowed in? What kind of place am I going to that I'm not sure if the kids are allowed in anyway? I don't know about anyone else, but if you have to ask the answers probably no - followed by the next suggested phrase of are there Afrikaans subtitles?

It just keeps getting better - I'm not sure who the people are who nominated to put these phrases in the service in the first place, but I'd like to meet them and probably have a few drinks together because I reckon they're stories must be able to fill a number of books!

It's worth a small chuckle anyway.

Cheers,
C