[Asterisk-biz] asterisk as outbound dialer only -follow-up/clarification on program

[Cole Technical Services]

Jeff,
   I think I can help you. Please email me off list for details. cts4 at
yorkinternet dot net
Thanks.

> -----Original Message-----
> From: asterisk-biz-bounces at lists.digium.com 
> [mailto:asterisk-biz-bounces at lists.digium.com] On Behalf Of 
> Jeff Johnson
> Sent: Thursday, February 03, 2005 1:07 AM
> To: asterisk-biz at lists.digium.com
> Subject: [Asterisk-biz] asterisk as outbound dialer only 
> -follow-up/clarification on program
> 
> 
> First, let me apologize for not explaining how this tele-verification 
> program might work. I hadn't expected the moral discussion, but would 
> appreciate any feedback you have and suggestions for how to 
> make it morally 
> more acceptable.
> 
> This campaign (which is still being reviewed by Legal and 
> does not operate 
> today) would be to businesses ONLY. Do Not Call lists will be 
> suppressed so 
> that, in the event that it is a home-based business we are 
> reaching and the 
> owner is on the DNC list, they won't be called.
> 
> The purpose of this tool would be to verify business 
> information so that 
> when users (like you) go to search on MSN, yahoo, google, or 
> whoever (not 
> necessarily these particular search engines though it could 
> be), for a local 
> business in your area and find one, you reach only the 
> businesses that are 
> still around and have working numbers. The benefit to the 
> business that we 
> will be contacting is that people will be able to find them 
> easier. Believe 
> it or not, the primary reason for doing this is to make sure 
> that users of 
> the Internet have access to the highest quality information. 
> Everyone hates 
> calling a number and hearing a fax tone in their ear or that it's 
> disconnected.
> 
> We don't yet know how the actual call will transpire. 
> Ideally, we'll have 
> text to speech system so that we can say 'We are calling to 
> verify that your 
> business name is 'ABC Company' which would be read from our 
> database. Press 
> 1 to confirm or 2 to report a different information. Or press 9 to be 
> removed from future verification efforts. It could quickly 
> become a more 
> complex system, which is why I just threw out the topic of 
> saying 'sorry 
> wrong number' which I highly doubt would pass Legal review. 
> If a human picks 
> up, we would likely say that we are calling to verify their 
> business's 
> information so that customers can find them, which is true.
> 
> The legal aspect of this is significant, and as mentioned, we 
> are looking 
> into what can be done within the laws, while also paying 
> attention to the 
> "niceness" factor (i.e., not be a nuisance call, but actually 
> add value to 
> the operations of the company we are calling). Nonetheless, 
> some people will 
> be annoyed, and rightfully so. But again, this would only be done on 
> businesses, would have DNC numbers suppressed, and they could 
> opt out as 
> well, so we would be making reasonable efforts to not call 
> businesses that 
> don't want to be contacted.
> 
> We would also put our caller ID number up, as well as 
> announce our number, 
> so they could call back and remove their listing, update 
> information, etc. 
> Ideally we would have speech recognition so that we could 
> actually update or 
> verify the business name, address, type of business, though 
> that opens up 
> another can of worms altogether.
> 
> Hope that clears things up. Thanks for your input.
> 
> 
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