Monday, November 21, 2011

Call CC

Call CC is a new product idea that was born when my colleague at work was reprimanded by our boss that he’d like to be CCed on all correspondence with a certain client. My colleague mentioned the fact that the recent correspondence was on the phone and not e-mail so as much as she’d like to have CCed him, it wasn’t possible. And crack! A new idea is hatched.
Product Innovation - Using Call CC

Call CC would be an app that would need to be installed on your smart phone and possibly on the receiver’s and CCed people’s smart phones. If Call CC is only installed on your phone, when making a phone call through the Call CC app, you would be able to CC additional contacts in your phone. The person receiving the phone call would be notified that the incoming call has additional people CCed on it and that person would be able to choose whether to answer the call or not. If the person answers, at the end of the conversation, the people who were CCed would be notified via SMS or e-mail of the following:
  • That person X called person Y
  • The time of the call
  • The duration of the call
  • All the CCed people on the call
If Call CC is installed on your phone and on the CCed people’s phones, when making a phone call through the Call CC app, the CCed people would receive an incoming phone call that would state that they are being CCed on a call from you to the person you are calling. These CCed people would be able to accept the CCed phone call and listen to the conversation (and perhaps even take part). The person who you called would be notified that the incoming call has additional people CCed on it and that they will be participating in the phone call (similar to a conference call). That person would be able to choose whether to answer the call or not. If the person answers, at the end of the conversation, the people who were CCed would be notified via SMS of the same information as before, with the addition of a list of the CCed people who participated or listened in on the phone call.
 
Call CC could also be developed to provide a transcript or recording of the phone call to the people CCed, to work with Skype, or with regular phones. In my opinion, BCC should also be included, on the condition that the person receiving the phone call is informed that people are BCCed on the phone call. This way, even though the identities of the BCCed people are not provided, the person receiving the call would be able to make a decision on whether or not to answer the phone knowing that some people (who are unknown to the receiver) may be listening to the call.
 
In today’s hi-speed, hi-tech, ultra-transparent business world, Call CC would provide a valuable time-saving resource for millions of people. Call CC is a new idea that could reinvent how we communicate with each other in the business world and would increase the faith our managers have in our competence. It would also enable our managers to constantly be in the loop on our projects and save us having to constantly provide tedious status reports. The business advantages offered to the telemarketing world are beyond reckoning.
 
Frankly, since there’s not much difference to the CC and BCC functionality on e-mails, you may be wondering about the actual product innovation of this idea. Well, it’s in the way that Call CC applies one tried and tested method to a different medium, that of verbal communication rather than written communication.

Sunday, November 6, 2011

Product Innovation Toolbar

You can download my Product Innovation toolbar here:
https://s3.amazonaws.com/com.alexa.toolbar/atbp/uKARy5/download/index.htm
Please feel free to let me know what sort of information you would like to see on the toolbar and if you find it useful at all.

The Product Innovation toolbar:
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