CallWave: I said They said
CallWave is a voicemail to text conversion service, similar to Jott which I reviewed previously.
CallWave provides “visual mobile voicemail” - it allows you to set up your cell phone voicemail system so that callers can leave messages which then get converted into text and emailed to you, along with caller id information. You can choose to have notifications forwarded even when the caller does not leave a message, or when there is no caller id.
The service is useful for simple notifications, and inbox reminders of phone calls that you need to return.
The CallWave basic service is free. The paid version includes call live call screening with the option of picking up the call or transferring to a different phone number.
Although the notification of the voicemail gets delivered to the email inbox along with the text, to listen to the voicemail, you still have to go to the website (the sound file is not attached to the email).
One problem is that the voicemail to text conversion is not usable at this point. I tried the service twice and both times, the text did not reflect the first part of the voice mail at all, and whatever was transcribed, did not make sense.
I got the following text back:
…believe along to me as much couldn’t gets converted into text and he made it to you.
What I really said:
…lets you leave a Voicemail that gets converted into text and then emailed to you
Needless to say, this post was not written using CallWave, unlike yesterday’s post on Jott, which was actually written using the Jott reminder recording facility.
CallWave is based in Santa Barbara, and is currently in beta. Hopefully they will improve their voice recognition so it can augment their Voicemail service, which otherwise, works quite well.
Tags : callwave, jott, voice recognition, voicemail service
Lunch 20 event in Burbank
Lunch2.0 organized a luncheon event at the offices of YellowBot in Burbank, this afternoon. This was a well attended meet and greet for local entrepreneurs, with about 70 to 80 showing up to network over a great lunch.
The last Lunch2.0 Los Angeles area meeting was hosted at the office of ThisNext in Santa Monica.
The YellowBot site is Yellow pages meets Facebook. It is a place for discovering local hot-spots and sharing opinions with others. YellowBot is a resource for bringing people together locally, in a similar way that Lunch 2.0 does, at its frequent lunch meetings hosted at the offices of companies in many cities throughout the US.
YellowBot is in beta, and self funded.
Photo courtesy Lunch2.0
Tags : facebook, lunch 2.0, yellowbot
Leads360 receives $3.25 million
Santa Monica-based Leads360 just raised $3.25 million in a Series A round led by Rustic Canyon Partners.
Leads360 provides on-demand lead acquisition as well as lead management services with its “Lead Manager” platform. Currently the company only focuses on mortgage leads, but this round of funding may change that: John Babcock, Partner at Rustic Canyon, says that the influx of capital “will allow them to expand quickly into new markets and leverage a network of partnerships for growth,” fueling speculation that the company may expand into lead management for other verticals such as autos, debt and education.
The leads management landscape is a crowded one. The company faces a number of competitors such as AIMpromote, SalesForce, icoSales, etc., the list goes on. It appears Leads360 differentiates itself by offering deep customization options for lead management workflow, allowing clients to tailor their platform in what ever way they’ve found to be successful.
The company’s CEO is Jeff Solomon, a serial entrepreneur who graduated from ASU only 11 years ago and has been starting businesses ever since. He has a blog, www.thecomplexsystem.com, where he chronicles his path as an entrepreneur. Here’s an excerpt from his latest post:
For me, the idea of learning just a bit more today than I knew yesterday keeps me going. I’ve mentioned before how my dad taught me early on that I should hire people smarter than me. I think I do that not only because it makes me successful, but because it makes me smarter. I learn from watching others. I’ve learned just about everything I know in business from watching other people. After all, I didn’t really learn much in school; well about business anyway.
We love seeing CEO’s up the transparency factor with a company blog, but personal anecdotes like this really add a unique, inspirational touch. Great reading.
Look for Leads360 to expand soon.
Tags : jeff solomon, john babcock, leads360, mortgage leads
Jott might just change the way you communicate
Jott is a very smart service which converts your voice mails into text and emails them to you. This blog post is being written by using Jott.
Jott is a free service - after you register your cell phone, you can call a toll free number to leave a voice message. The message will be converted to text within a few minutes, and forwarded as an email to a person (or group) on your contacts list, or to you.
Jott can be used in many clever ways:
1. Send emails to people when you are away from your computer.
2. Leave reminders for yourself from your cell. The reminder gets delivered in your email inbox.
3. When you get the idea for “the next big thing” record it by calling the Jott phone number (Jott to myself).
4. Use Jott to blog like I am doing here.
The application works really well. With normal speech, the text I got back was free of errors other than a slight misinterpretation now and then. The length of the voicemail is restricted to 30 seconds, although on a single phone call, you can leave several voicemails.
Who could use voice to text converters like Jott?
1. People on the go
2. Those who need to record news items and send them on for publication
3. People with injuries who are not able to type
4. The visually impaired who want to send email
5. The hearing impaired who would like to be able to “read” their email
Mark Rejhon has a thought provoking article on the blackberry forums on how he forwards his phone number to a “voice mailbox number” which converts his messages to text which he can receive, and read, via email, so business contacts do not even realize that he is deaf.
Jott is currently in limited beta and it is free. There is also a desktop version that lets you sent emails directly, without even going into your e-mail program.
As I mentioned before, this blog post was recorded entirely using Jott, with about 5 minutes of edits. For now, the Jott phone number has taken up the speed dial for “J” on my cell phone (sorry John!).
Other cool cell phone apps: Pinger YouMail
Tags : jott, text converters, voice message, voicemails
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