We’ve long heard of voice broadcast systems assisting during disaster scenarios to inform affected residents of evacuations and any endangerments, but this ability to send out one message to thousands of people by phone has found another niche in more commonplace scenarios, one of those being educational institutions.
Schools and universities may be where we form long-lasting friendships with peers and teachers, but the everyday student routine revolves around the chief goal of building knowledge, participating in campus activities and contributing to the success of that institution. With so much on their plate, students can become engulfed in the everyday hustle and bustle, which is why voice broadcasting is sometimes the reminder, and interruption, they need to stay on track.
Take one university for example. The technology proved itself useful when a voice broadcasting system was implemented to remind students of an upcoming tuition payment. The voice campaign successfully delivered calls to over 1,400 recipients, helping the university to experience the largest on-time tuition collection in history. In another case, a university with a renowned basketball team turned to a voice broadcasting service to contact its 42,000 alumni to offer them the opportunity to reserve tickets for an approaching game.
Bottom line: Voice broadcasting is a definitive technique for getting a message out to a large mass of people at the lowest cost, both in terms of money and labor. As a full-service telephone carrier offering voice broadcasting solutions, YTel enables businesses to send their pertinent messages out to thousands of opt-in consumers at affordable rates. From alerts, notifications and political calls to interactive polls and surveys and church phone trees, YTel packs its voice broadcasting services with additional features, IVR and transfer options.
With answering detection, businesses can leave specific messages for answering machines. Meanwhile, live answer detection grants callers more options with the ability to press certain numbers depending on their desire, whether it’s to leave a message or to be added to a Do Not Call list.
YTel’s voice broadcast system supports multiple, dynamic and complicated field names, and campaign management is streamlined with the ability to organize lists, voice files and do not call lists. Throughout call campaigns, users also gain access to complete Web-based reporting and have the option to download call results to Excel for further analysis.
According to YTel, its voice broadcast dialer goes beyond delivering a message to a customer as the possibilities are endless. Instead, once a campaign is created, it can be set to skip answering machines and leave voicemails when detected. In addition, clients may have the ability to leave a voicemail on the system that will be stored as a WAV (News - Alert) file.
Here are several scenarios in which voice broadcasting from YTel can serve as a way to spread the word in a university or school setting:
Events: No matter how big or small a university or educational institution is, YTel’s voice broadcasting system boasts the power to seamlessly get the word out about upcoming events, whether it’s for the Homecoming dance, big football game, or a charity march through campus. YTel offers competitive, affordable per-minute rates for notifying large numbers of people. In fact, a campaign needing a whopping 125,000 minutes will only cost $2,000, with blocks as low as 1.6 cents per minute.
Emergency notifications: With unforeseen events like the recent deadly shooting on the Virginia Tech campus, it’s imperative for universities to be equipped with a rapid and efficient method of contacting all students and staff in times of emergency. With YTel’s predictive dialers, efficiency is increased by up to 500 percent over manually dialing numbers, ensuring everyone is aware of the situation in critical timing.
Alumni donation solicitations: For anyone who has graduated from college, you’ve probably been inundated with calls asking for donations to the university’s programs. YTel’s turnkey predictive dialer technology powers a five to one dial ratio as well as robust reporting and monitoring features to keep tabs on a wide client base.
Class and curriculum updates: With YTel’s voice broadcast system, students won’t have any excuse for missing class or not completing homework, as professors and teachers can send out reminders about pending assignments and tests, schedule and classroom changes, and special events you’d like them to attend. Since YTel’s voice broadcast system can be set up to skip answering machines and leave voicemails, there won’t be any excuse for students not getting the message.
Tammy Wolf is a TMCnet web editor. She covers a wide range of topics, including IP communications and information technology. To read more of her articles, please visit her columnist page.
Edited by Rich Steeves