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Voice-mail-to-email Shaw's little 'secret'

Telecom giant promoting popular service

By: Geoff Kirbyson

Posted: 07/17/2010 1:00 AM | Comments: 0 (including replies)

If punching in all those numbers to retrieve your voice mail is wearing you out, Shaw Communications has the cure for your tired fingers.

The Calgary-based telecommunications giant recently began promoting its voice-mail-as-an-email service to its residential phone customers in Manitoba.

Shaw president Peter Bissonnette said the company had a quiet launch of the service last year, but he wants to turn up the volume.

"It's one of the greatest-kept secrets, but we don't want it to be a secret."

Here's how it works: Shaw takes the messages in a customer's voice mailbox and sends them to the customer's email account as voice files. The customer receives an email alert and then can click on it to listen.

In order to activate the service, customers need to go to the digital phone page on Shaw's website and click on a voice-mail-to-email option in the features column.

This kind of service has been available for a few years from voice-over-Internet protocol (VoIP) providers, but it's new to traditional phone users, said Iain Grant, a Montreal-based telecommunications analyst. He's a big fan.

"Once you've tried it, you'll never go back. It's the new way. For those of us who live on email, it's far better to receive (messages) this way. Everything is linear in a voice mailbox, so you have to wade through all the messages to get to the one you actually want. If you see them in your email, you can listen to them in the order you choose. It's a huge advantage. It's so much more convenient."

Grant said Shaw developed the technology because a growing number of customers inquired about being able to keep voice mail messages longer than the seven days allowed by their voicemail service.

"Some people like to keep voice mails either to follow up on something later or as a personal pleasure. You can keep them forever (as voice files)," Grant said.

"People's behaviour never fails to delight me."

Bissonnette said services like this, which involve no extra charge to the customer, don't contribute directly to the company's bottom line, but they help differentiate Shaw from its competition and keep customers in the fold.

"It's like launching a niche television channel. Maybe only 10 per cent of our viewers watch it, but it's meaningful to them and our relationship with them is a positive one."

Shaw has 79,000 telephone customers in Manitoba four years after launching its digital phone service and more than 100,000 Internet customers. MTS Allstream, the biggest provider of residential phone services in the province, does not offer voice-mail-to-email service.

Greg Burch, its director of corporate and employee communications, said the company is "very happy" with its own range of products, which includes wireless, Internet, television, home security, local phone and calling features.

"None of our competitors anywhere in Manitoba currently matches our bundle," he said.

Burch said for competitive reasons, he couldn't speak to whether MTS might offer the voice-mail-to-email service in the future.

"We're always reviewing opportunities to improve our products," he said.

geoff.kirbyson@freepress.mb.ca

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition July 17, 2010 A11

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