Organisations Saying Goodbye to Voicemail, and Why Email May Be Next
For decades, voicemail ruled the corporate world. Sure, it struggled a little in the formative years, but soon, it became a crucial tool for both inter-office and customer communication. It was the ideal tool and businesses that made effective use of it reaped dividends. Decades later, even the largest manufacturers of phones with voicemail technology are cutting back on this feature, realising that people are ready to move on, and so is technology.
But what exactly kicked out voicemail? Lack of use and cost are the primary reasons. Companies spending several thousand dollars per year for voicemail services are beginning to question its worthiness as a must-have necessity. After all, most people today are communicating via text relying less on voicemail and even email. In addition to that, voicemail technologies are lethargic, way too distractive and take up a lot of time in lost productivity. Currently, only a third of top businesses have voicemail functionalities on their phones and even for them, the technology is rarely used. It can be said that email started the decline in voicemail and texting made it obsolete.
Although email is still widely used, the increased volume of email is a productivity killer. It is not unusual for employees to spend two hours per day checking, reading and replying to email. Also, it is a one-way conversation similar to voicemail. In the face of increased competition, companies need to be more competitive and are looking for applications and cloud solutions that will increase productivity and reduce costs without sacrificing customer service.
One such application that is gaining a strong-hold is in the area of collaboration software. It enables employees, customers and partners to create private channels for collaborating individually or in groups in real-time. And real-time collaboration applications like Slack are seen to many as the primary communication tool that will replace email in the near future.
With real-time texts becoming the norm, major companies including bottling giant Coca-Cola are moving on confidently after replacing voicemail with texts and other applications that improve customer service and enhance productivity.
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