August 23, 2006
Show Me The Money In VoIP - Even More Thoughts
Tele2 is handing out free wireless phones for customers who buy thirty euros of their Parlino Dial Out service. The phones are supposedly worth about 69 euros (approx. US$87). [via The VoIP Weblog]
Given that my laptop is actually overloaded with text/ VoIP IM clients, I'm declaring a moratorium on downloading more for now, so I'm not going to try Parlino's soft client just yet. However, Tele2 had a bright idea! Maybe some of the frree soft VoIP companies such as Skype, etc., can learn something from this.
For example, I previously complained that despite my love of Sightspeed, the signup process just to try the client wanted all kinds of info including whether I wanted to buy a phone. To Sightspeed: great product, just take a cue from Tele2. Heck. I'd pay a similar amount of money for dialout if I got a free Wi-Fi phone in the deal. [Just make sure you use something like Paypal as an option.] Same goes for Skype, Gizmo Project, etc.
Hardware is one of the areas of VoIP where the money is. Give customers something tangible to associate with your service, and you might find them using your service more often. It's purely psychological, and just my hypothesis, but if I had a "free" Wi-Fi VoIP phone, I'd probably order more minutes after my initial minutes ran out, unless the call quality sucked. Otherwise, my free gadget would just be sitting around, and we wouldn't want that, would we?
If customers reloaded their callout minutes just once, VoIP soft client makers could probably cover the cost of the phone. If call quality is good and the device easy to use, then you just might have repeat customers. Hardware/ software combo deals like this could really push VoIP use.
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