Grasshopper Blog » read your voicemail

Americans Hate Listening to Voicemail

Gary G — Tue, 07 Dec 2010 17:05:46 +0000

Information Week reported today that a new study from Yap.com shows Americans receive 70 billion voicemail messages per year. More than that, those 70 billion messages resulted in one billion hours of people’s time (recording, managing & listening). That’s crazy!

The author of the article, Eric Zeman, goes on to discuss how much he dislikes dealing with voicemails and it turns out he’s not alone. According to the study:

15% dislike navigating the menu to delete their voicemail

13% dislike having to take notes about the voicemail

12% dislike the fact they feel obligated to call the person back

10% dislike they can’t listen to the message during meetings or in noisy places

In today’s fast-paced world, where text messaging & emails are replacing voicemail, it’s not surprising that people don’t want to listen to their messages. Think about it, one billion hours of time!

Here at Grasshopper, we came out with a solution for this last year – Read Your Voicemail. The feature transcribes your voicemail and then emails it to you, letting you read your voicemail anywhere. No notes to take & you can get the contents of your voicemail in noisy places or meetings.

For more info on Read Your Voicemail, check out a few of our blog posts.

Friday Flix: Want to Read Your Voicemail?

Gary G — Fri, 04 Jun 2010 16:38:18 +0000

Blog readers and customers know that in the past year we launched the Read Your Voicemail feature on our virtual phone system. More and more people are using the feature, which transcribes your voicemail and emails it to you. You can now even get it at signup, including a 30 day free trial!

If you haven’t checked it out, head over the features page, watch the video below or check out the following blog posts: Benefits of Voice Mail Transcription & Voice Mail When You Need It. Happy Friday!

Benefits of Voice Mail Transcription

Gary G — Mon, 03 May 2010 20:53:49 +0000

This past year here at Grasshopper we added Read Your Voicemail to the long list of features used on our virtual phone system. The feature has been met with a great response and we continue to have more and more people use it every day.

If you are still wondering if having your voice mail transcribed is worthwhile, let us answer that for you below. Here are four great benefits of voice mail transcription:

No calling, listening, re-listening

A friend calls you and leaves a message. Do you immediately listen to the message or do you just call them back? I can’t tell you how many people I know that call back and say, “Got your call but didn’t listen to the message.” Sometimes you simply don’t want to call and listen to the sweet voice mail lady telling you to press 1.

With business calls you can’t just ignore your voice mail like you can your personal line but that doesn’t mean you sometimes don’t want to. With voice mail transcription, you don’t have to call your voice mail and you don’t have to open the MP3 file (for our Grasshopper customers). You open your email, read your voice mail and decide what action you want to take next. Easy enough.

Out of office or In a meeting

You’re sitting in a meeting and your phone rings. What do you do? You know you probably shouldn’t answer it but it could be important. If you have Read Your Voicemail, you open up the email notification on your Blackberry or iPhone and read your message.

The same thing applies if you are out of the office. For most people, whether you work in an office or work from home, when you leave the office, answering business calls is the last thing you want to do. If the call is important enough to leave a voice mail, you will immediately know what the voice mail says.
Prioritize your messages

If you get a lot of voice mail messages each day it can be tough to know who to call back first. You listen to six messages, a couple hours pass, do you remember which callbacks were the most important? Open up your email, read the voice mails and refresh your memory. You don’t have to listen to six voice mails again to figure out who/what was needed.
It’s unlimited!

With Grasshopper there’s no limit to the number of voice mails you can have transcribed. Plus, if your voice mail transcription doesn’t come across as clear as it should, you can have a human transcribe it for free!

Have more questions? Want to learn more about voice mail transcription? Check out Read Your Voicemail now! Grasshopper customers can add it to there account here.

Visual Voicemail vs. Voicemail Transcription

Gary G — Tue, 02 Mar 2010 16:12:16 +0000

With the launch of Google Voice there has been a lot of talk about visual voicemail, voicemail transcription, voice to text, voicemail to email, etc. There are so many different terms it can be confusing!

Here at Grasshopper we offer a feature to our customers called ‘Read Your Voicemail‘. When a customer subscribes to this feature, they are emailed a transcription (and an MP3) of their voicemail immediately after receiving it (we offer human transcription at no extra charge for better accuracy). They can then read the voicemail on their computer or Smartphone.

However, one of the questions we often get is, ‘Do you offer visual voicemail?’ The answer to that is, it depends.

Here is how others describe ‘visual voicemail’:

Verizon

“Visual Voice Mail allows customers to see a list of all of their voice mail messages with important information, such as date and time of receipt, as well as message duration, in order to prioritize and efficiently manage their voice mail messages directly from their phones.”

Apple/iPhone

“When you decline or don’t answer a call, the caller hears a recorded greeting and can leave a voicemail message. On iPhone, visual voicemail lets you see a list of your messages and choose which ones to listen to or delete, without having to listen to prior messages or voice instructions.”

AT&T

“AT&T Visual Voicemail provides an easier way to check voicemail. No more dialing into complicated voicemail menus. Visual Voicemail delivers messages directly to your handset, so you can review your voicemail messages anytime, anywhere, and in any order you choose.”

Here is what Wikipedia has to say:

“Visual Voicemail is the process of adding a visual aspect to phone voicemail such as allowing users to view a list of audio voicemail entries or even read transcripts of these voicemail as text. These voicemails are converted to text by use of advanced speech recognition software…”

What we have here at Grasshopper is voicemail transcription AND visual voicemail. Through the online account manager, you can see a list of your voicemails, phone numbers, times, dates, notes and more. And with the Read Your Voicemail feature, you get your voicemail transcribed and sent to you.

Do you define visual voicemail and voicemail transcription as the same thing?

Voice Mail When You Need It

Gary G — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 16:21:36 +0000

You are in the zone, ideas are flowing, work is getting done and the phone rings. You don’t want to miss an important call but you also don’t want to interrupt your work flow. With the Grasshopper virtual phone system you can see who is calling and send the caller to voice mail without worrying you are going to miss important information.

Why? Because with Grasshopper you will immediately be emailed the MP3 and the voice mail transcription (if you subscribe to the “Read Your Voicemail” feature). Voice mail is a great asset for your business and we have included some of the best ways to get the most out of it below.

Voice mail when you need it:

Out of the office?

The great thing about having Grasshopper is that you can choose when you want calls to be forwarded or when you want them to be sent to voice mail. When you are out of the office, you can have calls forwarded to your cell or home phone. Don’t want to get calls after 8 pm? Set up an after-hours greeting and send calls directly to voice mail.

The other great thing is that even if you are out of the office, your voice mail will be emailed to you (in MP3 form), giving you the ability to listen to it on your Smartphone. You will know right away if it is an urgent call.
Don’t want to talk?

We have all been there. The phone rings and you really don’t want to talk to anyone. With Call Screening & Announce, you can simply listen to the number and decide if you want to talk or send them to voice mail.
Don’t want to listen?

To summarize, there is a Facebook group called “I Only Check My Voicemail To Get Rid Of The Little Icon On The Screen”. Yes, we can all be lazy and sometimes we just don’t feel like listening to our voice mail. The great thing about Grasshopper is that you don’t have to!
With the “Read Your Voicemail” feature, your voice mail will be transcribed and emailed to you. You can get the contents of your voice mail without having to listen to it.
Want to go above and beyond?

In a recent post here on the Grasshopper blog, we show-cased how the unlimited extensions feature can help you go above and beyond for clients. By creating personalized greetings & voicemail messages for individual clients using separate extensions, you can create strong relationships and make your business stand out.

Grasshopper voice mail makes life easier for small businesses, is there when you need it and can help keep you and your business organized. Find out more about all the great features of the Grasshopper virtual phone system.

Sign Up Now: Unlimited Voice to Text Free Trial Ends Today!

Gary G — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 17:23:56 +0000

Free Trial Ends Today!

Just a reminder, the Grasshopper Unlimited Voice to Text 60-day free trial ends today for most of our customers.

Do you love having your voice mail transcribed?
Did you enjoy not having to listen to your voice mail?
Will you miss it?

If you answered yes to these questions, head over to your account and sign up today.

The Unlimited Voice to Text feature is just $10 a month and each voice mail transcription is done digitally to ensure your privacy and a quick turnaround. The option of human transcription is just a click away (at no extra cost!) and allows for improved accuracy in your transcription.

Read more about Voice to Text:

*The Unlimited Voice to Text feature is now referred to as “Read Your Voicemail”

*As of 4/28/2010 there will be no free trial upon signup

Unlimited Voice to Text: Free Trial Over Monday, Sign up Now!

Gary G — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 13:32:28 +0000

At the beginning of October we announced the launch of the new Unlimited Voice to Text feature and the feedback has been great:

“This is probably the *best* innovation in voice mail I’ve seen in years. The automated transcription is amazingly accurate, so much that I didn’t realize the first couple of times that it was real. Just assumed it was boilerplate text for marketing the new feature.”

“Great Voice to text feature!! Thanks for bringing it in house. I’ve already signed up to the service.”

@elizabethpw: my voicemail system now emails me voice-to-text transcriptions of each voicemail. THAT IS AWESOME!

@ducttape: Grasshopper phone service just added VMs to text something I’ve wanted for a while – Nice!

As a reminder to everyone, the 60 day free trial is over December 7th (that’s Monday!), for those customers who were signed up prior to October 9th.

Unlimited Voice to Text is only $10 a month and unlike most companies, includes human transcription at no extra charge! If you don’t want to lose this great feature, sign up now!

Signing up is easy:

Sign in to your Grasshopper Account
Choose My Account in the upper right
Choose Update Plan from the top navigation
Select the check box for Read Your Voicemail (Under Additional Features) at the bottom

*The Unlimited Voice to Text feature is now referred to as “Read Your Voicemail”

*As of 4/28/2010 there will be no free trial upon signup

Five Favorites: Features of the Grasshopper Virtual Phone System

Gary G — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 04:01:29 +0000

With over 25 great features in the Grasshopper virtual phone system it was hard to narrow it down to just five. But believe it not, based on feedback we have received from Grasshopper users over the years, we were able to do so.

Here are five features that our customers love and take Grasshopper above and beyond:

1. Call Forwarding

Stay connected. That is one of the mottos here and it is one of the main reasons our customers use Grasshopper. Have calls forwarded to any number in the world. Your cell phone, home phone, office phone, the pay phone down the street (we don’t necessarily recommend that but hey, it can be done). The call forwarding feature is easy to use and helps you stay connected to your small business.

2. Toll Free Numbers

One of the goals here at Grasshopper is to help entrepreneurs and small businesses sound more professional. A toll free number is a great way to do that. With a toll free number and the Grasshopper virtual phone service you can have a one person outfit or a hundred person outfit and no one would know the difference. We have toll free numbers, true 800 numbers and vanity numbers.

3. Unlimited Extensions

We want our customers to be successful and with unlimited extensions they can do just that without having to change their entire phone system. Grasshopper offers unlimited phone/voice mail extensions with every plan for no extra charge. The best part is, every extension comes with voice mail, call forwarding, away greetings and more.

4. Voice Studio

Have you ever heard the sound of your voice after being recorded and thought you couldn’t possibly sound like that? Are you comfortable recording your main business greeting? Grasshopper offers professional voice talents to help our customers sound more professional and not have to worry about what their voice sounds like. You can have greetings recorded in English, French and Spanish.

5. Read Your Voicemail

This is the newest feature of the Grasshopper virtual PBX and it has been extremely well received. Every time someone leaves a voice mail, an email will be sent to your computer and/or Smart phone with the voice mail transcribed for you. In a meeting? Can’t take the call or listen to your voice mail? With the read your voicemail feature you won’t miss any important messages.

What are your favorite features? What would you like to see from Grasshopper?

With Transcription, Voice Mail Has Never Been More Entertaining

Darren Rosebrugh — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 20:37:41 +0000

There’s no doubt that voice mail transcription has improved the strained relationship we all have with voice mail. My guess is the cool factor for voice mail wore off about 2 days after it was invented.

Since it’s easier to scan text than to call in and listen, the appeal of voice mail transcription is pretty obvious. One thing people may overlook though, is how much enjoyment you can get reading messages that the transcription program wasn’t able to process well.

In fact, just for fun, here’s what that first paragraph looks like when transcribed from voicemail:

“There’s no doubt that voicemail transcription has improved this trained relationship we all have with voicemail my guess is the Cool factor for voicemail more off about 2 days after was invented since it’s easier to scan texted to call in and listen the appeal a voicemail transcription seems is pretty obvious 1 thing people may over looked just how much enjoyed that you can get the messages at the transcription program wasn’t able to process well.”

I’m impressed with the accuracy given my mumbling but this is still pretty entertaining when read in a Yakov Smirnoff accent.

Every week I get dozens of transcribed voice mails and I can always count on a few good laughs. Sometimes the transcribed text is totally useless (especially with certain, ahem, free voice mail transcription services I’ve used).

With accents, low talkers, fast talkers, and background noise, it’s unavoidable even for the best services. That’s why it’s great that Grasshopper provides the option to have the voice mail transcribed again (at no additional cost), this time with human help so that you can make sense of it. Most of the time, transcriptions work great, but it’s good to have the option to smooth out any wrinkles when it really counts.

And here’s one of those junk voice mails from an autodialer, converted by another service I was testing out:

“Hi this is Cathy(?) at Assudan(?). You need to call Assudan(?) ___ to consolidate your credit cards down to as low as a 1.5% interest rates. This is not a new loan. This have been already approved by a certified non profit agency so if you can please have your statements ready ___ remember it’s 18007966200. Again my name is Cathy and you can reach me at 18007966200 until 10:00 tonight. Thanks and have a great day.”

Glad I didn’t waste time calling in to listen to that message.
Which brings me to another point (yes there are a few points in here somewhere). Many of the paid transcription services charge per message. To me, this is the wrong way to do it. If you’re like me, you’ll only end up resenting the fact that someone just wasted your hard earned money when they leave a pointless voice mail.

At Grasshopper, we want you to get value from voice mail transcription, without worrying about incremental costs. That’s why we went with simple flat rate pricing. If you’re anything like me, you won’t even think about the relatively small cost of this feature. You’ll only sit back, enjoy a laugh at the occasional mess up and wonder how anyone could get by without voicemail transcription.

Do you have any really bad voice mail transcriptions you can share?

Post them in the comments section (with names and other juicy/sensitive details blanked out) so that the rest of us can enjoy them too. And if anyone’s looking into credit card consolidation, call “Cathy(?)” at “Assudan(?) ___” before 10:00 tonight.

NEW Grasshopper Feature! Unlimited Voice to Text: View Your Voicemails

Gary G — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 20:35:50 +0000

Meetings. Conferences. Cars. What do they all have in common? They are all places you can’t always answer your phone.

As an entrepreneur running your small business there is a lot of traveling, meetings and times you simply can’t take a phone call or listen to a voicemail.

That’s why Grasshopper is excited to announce our NEW feature – Unlimited Voice to Text.

The Voice to Text feature will do just what it sounds like; take your voicemail and transcribe it into an email, giving you the ability to view your voicemail. You can read the transcription of your voicemail on your phone or your computer without having to listen to it.

The feature is free to all new customers and existing customers for 60 days (Note: for all existing customers the free trial will start today. You can add the feature to your account online – instructions are below). For existing customers, you’ll still receive the same notification email for voicemails you currently do, but now it will include the voicemail transcription.

The new Unlimited Voice to Text feature is available to all new and existing Grasshopper customers for just $10 a month. The voicemail transcriptions are done digitally to ensure your privacy and a quick turnaround. The option of human transcription is just a click away and allows for improved accuracy in your transcription in case background noise or your caller’s accent is an issue. It will even work if Ozzy Osbourne is calling. Grasshopper is the only virtual pbx provider with the option of human transcription available at no additional cost.

Existing customers can easily add Unlimited Voice to Text to their account:

Sign in to your Grasshopper Account

Choose My Account in the upper right

Choose Update Plan from the top navigation

Select the check box for Unlimited Voice to Text (Under Additional Features) at the bottom

Once you’ve added Unlimited Voice to Text to your account, you will not be billed until the 60 day free trial has expired.

To learn more about the new Unlimited Voice to Text feature or how you can become a Grasshopper customer visit Grasshopper.com.

*The Unlimited Voice to Text is now referred to as “Read Your Voicemail”

*As of 4/28/2010 there will be no free trial upon signup