Telco 2.0

Ifbyphone mashes call data to Google Analytics

Doug Mohney — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 11:57:58 -0400

In the latest "Gee, that's cool" Voice 2.0 mashup, Chicago-based Ifbyphone has created a mashup to integrate direct response call date with web advertising info from Google Analytics to enable customers to gauge the overall effectiveness of a lead-generation campaign.

The "Marketing 2.0" (ugh!) mashup creates a pseudo web page that is dynamically linked to a "Smart Telephone Number" assigned to an Ifbyphone's customer account. Each time the phone rings, a page view is automatically counted by Google. Advertisers run the reports on the web page hits and therefore get the number of times the assigned phone number has rung.

Since it's all integrated under Google Analytics, marketing wonks can add up website and click stream clicks in the same report with phone call reports; each phone number can also be associated with a Google tracking value for source, content, campaign, term and medium.

For more:
- Read the Ifbyphone release on the new Google analytics mashup

BT Spears Ribbit

Doug Mohney — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 10:24:17 -0400

The rumors were true. BT announced it has bought Ribbit for $105 million in cash. It is a deal which is exciting currently operating Telco 2.0 players, but don't miss BT's thinking in the hype.

Mountain View-based Ribbit, billing itself as "Silicon Valley's First Phone Company," gives future-looking BT an open Telco 2.0 platform to create new voice apps and services, plus a community of already-active developers. Ribbit enables developers to add voice and automation features to nearly any web-based application. The company also has the consumer-targeted Amphibian application for visual voicemail in the wings.

Since BT has its IP-anchored 21CN network rolling out, the software acquisition would seem to be a very good fit for BT to roll out new products and services onto 21CN and potentially to other carriers.

Earlier this month, rumors were circulating about BT acquiring Ribbit, but at a price tag of $55 million; interesting what a difference a couple of weeks makes in the final price.

Ribbit's rapid exit - the company was founded in February 2006 - has stoked other Telco 2.0 companies into thinking that they could be the Next Big Thing if they find the right combination of story-telling and buyer.

For more:
- BT announces purchase of Ribbit
- ZDNet UK reports on BT buying Ribbit

Related articles:
Ribbit Bought? Maybe Yes, Maybe No
Ribbit touts new telephony platform

Mixed Returns on Voice APIs

Doug Mohney — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 10:22:26 -0400

Can you attract customers and make a buck by providing an applications programming interface (API) for your telephony platform? Providing an API is necessary, says GigaOm, but it's not a ringer for financial success.

APIs provide the tools for voice mashups, making it easy for service providers and independent developers to combine voice with data and applications across multiple systems. Voice mashups can save money and help enforce business process quality and consistency, but an API isn't a solution and doesn't necessarily make money.

Lots of voice API-based companies are in business, but they're not generating a ton of minutes or money. For example, Jakuda and parent company NetworkIP make about $150 million in total; API Jakuda may only contribute a paltry $1.2 million to the bottom line.

APIs have a lot of potential, but telephony companies need to focus on broader business plans that take into account what customers want and how to solve their problems rather than see the release of an API as a simple check box on the list to financial profitability.

For more:
- GigaOm asks if there is money in Voice APIs

Related articles:
AOL opens up, Yahoo outsources PSTN interfaces
Introducing Telco 2.0 - A Business Primer

Howe: A Telco 2.0 Technology Primer

Mon, 07 Jul 2008 15:09:51 -0400

by Thomas Howe

In my previous article, "Introducing Telco 2.0 - A Business Primer", I explored the fundamentals of Telco 2.0 business models and cases. In this article, I'd like to touch on the technology side of the equation, and try to define the technologies and architecture that distinguish Telco 2.0 applications from those built on more traditional technologies and approaches. The real excitement that surrounds Telco 2.0 comes from compelling business models and the promise of a final escape from per-minute charging models, but the application of web technology to voice services is the clear enabler.

A Telco 2.0 application is an application that uses other networks to carry voice, uses web services to integrate (or to be integrated) into other software services and typically has voice in a supporting role to a larger application. Let's look at these points in detail:

Over the Top: Telco 2.0 applications are almost always deployed as "over the top" solutions. A terrific example is Grand Central from Google. Grand Central is an application that accepts an inbound phone call, then rings all of the other phones in your life. Once you answer the phone, it allows you to record the call, and if you don't answer, it saves it in a visual voice mail box and emails you a link. Other than accepting the incoming phone call, Grand Central works with all of your other phones from any carrier, and here's the important part, without the carrier's permission or consent. As far as Verizon is concerned, calls from Grand Central are indistinguishable from any other phone call in the network. From a carrier perspective, this is truly scary, as the Grand Central delivers the value and Verizon becomes what they most fear: a dumb pipe. This is the first element that allows Telco 2.0 applications to scale: they ride on the backs of elephants.

Light Weight: Telco 2.0 applications are typically written with a light-weight approach, and rarely try to be all things to all people. Jott comes to mind here. Jott subscribers load their contacts into the service, then use any phone to leave messages for the people on their list. Jott takes the voice mail message, transcribes it and sends it off as an email. For the mobile in life, it provides the fastest way to send status, assign tasks and keep in touch. What else does Jott do? Not much. Like a screwdriver, all it does is its job, and it does its job very well. This is the second element that allows Telco 2.0 applications to scale: the feature sets are manageable and can be well tested.

Web Technologies: Telco 2.0 applications are based on web technologies, and nearly always integrate well with other web applications using web services. Lypp is Erik Lagerway's new startup, providing web based conferencing services. The differentiator is the API: it is drop dead simple for any web programmer to put conferencing on demand into his application. Consider how an engineer only a few years ago could enable this functionality, which now only requires a credit card and a an afternoon with a text editor. This is the third element that allows Telco 2.0 applications to scale: the Internet was built to scale.

Voice is a Spice: Telco 2.0 applications aren't about Telco--they're about anything else. Instead of the phone being the star of the show, it plays a bit part. Twitter is a shining example, as Twitter is about micro blogging and keeping in touch with those you care about. The phone is an interesting way of getting that job done. This is really apparent in communications business model applications, such as using voice messages to alert a population during a natural disaster, text messaging to vote for a game show or the thousands of pay-by-phone applications. Voice is the pawn, not the King. Voice isn't the meat, it's the spice. This is the last element that allows Telco 2.0 applications to scale: by forcing voice and messaging to be a commodity, it can permeate any other application, radically increasing the places where we can use it.

Some say there are 1,000 Telco 2.0 applications, but I would say they underestimate that number, as voice and messaging will show up in a hundred applications in a thousand niches. The technical underpinnings of Telco 2.0 make those applications inexpensive to build and deploy, and will scale to impressive heights.

Thomas Howe is a long-time telecom consultant, writer, and speaker who is the CEO of the Thomas Howe Company, providing expertise in improving the business process with real-time communications. His website is at http://www.thomashowe.com

Howe: Congratulate Failure

Wed, 28 May 2008 16:01:22 -0400

By Thomas Howe

The recent demise of Jangl is an excellent sign for the overall health of the Telco 2.0 marketplace, and although difficult for their investors and employees, portends great things for this market. My sincere wish is that Telco 2.0 failures become more commonplace and numerous, and I firmly believe it will be so. As stakeholders in this market, we need to expect and encourage such failures. Congratulations to those involved, and I mean that sincerely and with no animosity whatsoever.

Not too long ago, new telecom services and applications were costly to develop and deploy, with only a chance of success in the end. Even for those that succeeded, competitors typically replicate the service in short order, gutting profits. The logical conclusion of many managers is to be cautious with new service deployments, and to concentrate on maximizing existing services, stifling innovation. They are afraid to fail, because failure costs money. However, something's changed.

What's changed is that costs of service deployments are falling at an increasing rate. The Internet provides a near frictionless marketplace for both service delivery and sales, and the challenge is no longer the design and development. The trick is now fundamental marketing: what do people want? How do I price this? What is the fundamental problem I can solve? Surely this is no small task, as these questions are notoriously difficult to answer and are as often discovered through dumb luck as solved through excellent analysis. There's no way the existing telecom infrastructure could support the development of a million applications, with the hope that ten thousand will be successful. However, a Telco 2.0 infrastructure can and will.

Telco 2.0 applications are built using web technologies to overlay functionality on the existing PSTN infrastructure. Since the PSTN infrastructure exists, there's no reason for the Telco 2.0 engineer to build the capacity for switching calls around the network. Since Telco 2.0 applications are delivered through the browser, there's no large workforce to manage and train. Since there's no natural geographic barriers, the entire world becomes your serviceable market. Since web technologies are naturally scalable, and are paid on a transaction transaction basis, large capital investments are unnecessary. As a result, it's radically simpler and cheaper to write and deploy them as compared to traditional services.

The result is that we'll see many more Telco 2.0 applications than we've ever seen from any other telecom market. Ever. Nearly all of them will fail, as most of the people developing them will not have the marketing skills to have any real chance of success. They tell authors that about one in a thousand books are actually published, and the number of authors that have published more than one book is smaller still. As you enter your local Barnes and Noble, start counting the books, and realize each represents a thousand others you'll never read. However, without mechanisms that allow people to write books simply and cheaply, how many of the books that fill the shelves would have been written in the first place? I say not many.

Congratulations to all those authors of software and prose who remain anonymous. Congratulations to my brothers and sisters at Jangl. Even though success was not personal for them, in very real and important ways, they guaranteed the success of their markets.