Telecom Lead Africa: VAS provider Kirusa said its voice SMS message service in Ghana has resulted into a 3 fold increase in the retrieval rate of off-net Voice SMS messages.
The total number of Voice SMS messages has continued to increase every month since launch of the Exchange Service, further illustrating the value of providing a seamless service to users.
Introduction of the Exchange service provides seamless interoperability of Voice SMS across Airtel, Tigo, and Vodafone users in Ghana without a fragmented user experience between on-net and off-net messages.
Kirusa claims that its platforms are deployed with over 30 mobile carriers across four continents, and process more than 1 billion calls every month.
Kirusa’s Exchange service enabled the three mobile operators to adopt an interoperable service for Voice SMS, as they have an interoperable SMS service. Kirusa’s Exchange is a hosted cloud service.
“The mobile subscribers of Airtel, Tigo & Vodafone are observing a rich and integrated Voice SMS experience regardless of the carrier of the sender or recipient of a Voice SMS. Kirusa’s Exchange service facilitates the first retrieval of all Voice SMSes for free, even if the sender belongs to any of the other two carriers, by dialing a single short code, *0*,” said Inderpal Singh Mumick, CEO, Kirusa.
All other features of Voice SMS are available for users, regardless of the source or destination of the message.
In absence of the Exchange Service, off-net recipients were charged for the first retrieval of Voice SMS — they had to dial a 10 digit off-net number for retrievals, had to manage multiple mailboxes, and did not get an option to forward Voice SMS messages. This fragmented experience of Voice SMS lead to confusions among users, and lowered adoption and retrieval rates.
Mrinal Roy, chief operating officer of Airtel Ghana, said: “This service comes as a high value-add and we are happy customers have responded well. The increased retrieval rates give us a reason to believe that our subscribers are satisfied with the service.”
“What makes the exchange service special is that it enables easy retrievals of Voice SMS messages by users, which encourages them to use Voice SMS more often,” said Adil El Youssefi, general manager of Tigo Ghana.
“Vodafone’s value of customer obsession begins with creating the best mobile experience for our customers. The Exchange Service speaks to the needs of our customers by being convenient and easy to use; the service is innovative and gives a great customer experience on our network,” said Tara Squire, head of Consumer Marketing at Vodafone Ghana.
