Making VoIP compelling for mainstream consumers
Jim Courtney at Skype Journal refers to a post by Michael Arrington suggesting that the latest wave of wizbang VoIP services are not compelling for mainstream consumers.
Jim then goes on to describe a set of metrics for defining an “easy to use” service. His list includes accessing Skype Contacts and Skype’s Instant Messaging functionality. Sorry Jim, those things are NOT on the agenda of the mainstream consumer that Michael Arrington is referring to. Michael says:
None of these services is good enough to change user behaviors in the mass market. Having to be at your computer, or call special phone numbers, is too much trouble for most people. Certainly forcing the person receiving the call to hang up and call back isn’t very attractive. And traditional POTS rates continue to fall fast, meaning the incentive to go with a hard-to-use VOIP provider is lower.
PhoneGnome owners make it pretty clear that ease of use, simplicity, and reliability are as important as wizbang features and cheap rates.
We continue to believe in the future of Telephony 2.0 applications, but the fact of the matter is that, in the real world today, saving money is still by far the primary driver for adoption for the vast majority of users. This is a bit of a disappointment to feature-buffs like us, but that’s the reality. Voicemail-to-email is really the only stand-out among advanced features, playing a role in the purchase decision and impacting customer satisfaction.
Pip Coburn, in his new book The Change Function talks about something he calls the perceived pain of adoption which is the perception of how difficult a product will be to setup and use, how much pain will be involved in the change. Features like multi-ring, hop-on/hop-off are very attractive to a small percentage of people, but they can increase the perceived pain of adoption for the majority of users and actually make the product harder to sell.
Jim talks about “a base line for the level of simplicity” and we agree with that idea, but when it comes to mainstream consumers, PhoneGnome users tell us this base line is the following:
- I can Dial normal phone numbers with a real phone
- I don’t have to leave my computer on in order to receive calls
- I have reliable landline 911 that works when the power goes out
- I have at least some basic phone service when the Internet is down or when the power is out
- I don’t have to change my phone number or get a separate number
- I have a compelling ROI
Since the main driver is still in the saving money category (either free calls, free features, or lower calling rates), the simplicity part of the equation must be very strong, since the opportunities to save money are becoming more and more difficult. Even a small bump in the perceived pain of adoption may outweigh the potential cost savings for mainstream buyers. This means that features like Outlook integration, Skype IM, etc. may actually detract from the success of a product in the mass market.
