Speech Analysis
By Anna Karampahtsis Are Voice Portals Really a Joke?
No, It is the Early Stages of the Industry In the early stages of the industry, "voice portal" was the term used to describe certain services offered to consumers when calling a toll-free number. However, with the passage of time, the focus on the consumer side has turned into a focus on the enterprise space. There are voice portals where the consumer application plays the role of a showcase. Their goal is to show the industry that the technology is here, the applications are desirable and they are ready to build awareness and educate the market. The idea is to build brand recognition, promote and sell their infrastructure. Others initially thought the revenue model from the consumer side would be strong enough to support their business entities. Yet, after realizing that the margins were limited in this space, especially since the industry was in its early stages, these portals began reforming their business strategies focusing on the enterprise segment. Voice portals have found significant roles in working with businesses to build their corporate portals. Voice Portals' value proposition to the Telecom Carriers
Although voice portals are planning to target a plethora of industries and offer a number of services and applications, their main focus will be telecom carriers. The telecom industry faces the problem of declining revenue and increasing churn. Voice portal services and applications will enhance the carriers' existing offerings and address some of their fundamental needs. At the moment, the major benefits for the carriers are:
New customer insight - additional applications address consumer needs and make cell phone use more desirable for non-users.
Expansion of revenue sources. - Revenues from additional minutes from existing customers, contributing to an increased market potential (users multiplied by usage). -Revenues from subscriptions, sponsorships, ads, commerce and transactions - telecom carriers are planning to share revenues with the entities that will be involved in such activities.
Increase competitive differen- tiation/advantages - with enhanced, personalized services customized to the profile, needs and location of the caller, carriers can increase customer satisfaction and loyalty and reduce churn.
Reduced costs through automation of enhanced directory assistance churn. Value Proposition to the Enterprises
The benefits in the enterprise space are coming from different directions and depend on factors such as the size of the company, its primary technology, whether it is capital or labor intensive and the company's field of operations. Generally speaking, the voice interface will have a major impact on industries where it can decrease overall costs and increase efficiency and effectiveness, resulting in customer satisfaction and loyalty. The voice interface can replace the traditional interactive voice response systems and contribute to the call center's automation. Call centers can handle more calls and require fewer customer representatives, who will be used only when necessary. The rate of dropped calls is significantly reduced, since callers are satisfied with their requests in a faster and more convenient way. Companies are becoming more "virtual" every day. Multiple office locations, telecommuting, offshore manufacturing, international engineering teams and remote salespeople are common examples of how business entities operate today. Applications such as voice-enabled unified messaging, call completion, personal assistants and voice interfaces provide ways to keep businesses and employees connected and make information available any time from anywhere. The voice interface can transform corporate data into audio, giving a broader range of applications and supplementary services in the business world. The plethora of new applications includes voice-enabled address books, e-mail, send and receive fax capabilities, sales force automation and travel related services. It also allows for integration with corporate data such as inventory, production schedules or payment information to sales people, conferencing calls and/or delivery of third-party content. Voice portals have begun a migration from serving as simple dial-up instant information sources to developing and sometimes hosting valuable information sources for companies in the enterprise. It is this latter role that could very well be the profitable business model driving the voice portal expansion.
