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Switchboard — Turn your phone into a handsfree intercom
Switchboard is your instant voice network. It gives you a hands-free intercom between close friends and colleagues to let you chat more spontaneously, as though you're in the same room. You control your availability so that you're easy to reach when you want and you can focus when you need.
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Since I have met @jimsrand @jamesmeier during Techstars, they have made tremendous progress. Switchboard is the best thing that happened to our team of 15 since Slack.
As a remote worker, I use switchboard to communicate easily with my coworkers as well as with clients. It's great to be able to talk with my team at anytime like we are in the same room. For clients I love that I can just share a link for them to talk to me without having to signup if they don't want to.
@noeltock You're very welcome, Noel!
We hope you enjoy the app, and please do reach out to us with any feedback or questions you may have. The team is standing by in the public groups as I type this!
It's that kind of idea which makes us think, isn't this product already there in the market! Great job guys. Totally useful (for the intended audience). Do you have broadcast option too? For e.g., in a construction site, I would like to update all my colleagues on the 3rd floor!
Been looking forward to this launch for quite some time! Congrats, Jim and team! Looking forward to taking it for a test spin :)
@chrisbuttenham Thanks Chris! We hope you enjoy it and as always, please let us know if you have any questions or comments!
How does this differ from voice specific messaging apps, like Voxer? Or any other Walkie Talkie apps
@andredalbuq Good question.
In general, you do not need to push to talk, the conversation flows from an intercom (the first person reaching out) to a full duplex conversation (as soon as they respond). Voice commands are another differentiator (depending on the app / specific commands) for now.
That said, we built Switchboard with a persistent connection architecture and the ability to establish and control communications via side channels. So, for example, we have used smart buttons, Slack shortcuts, and other things to control what channels you’re monitoring or speaking to. We have the ability to mix audio channels (voice & other things) as well. Expect more to come here. Gestures and proximity based controls are on our roadmap, for example. The way we built Switchboard allows for a lot of flexibility and our pipeline is full of fun stuff to take advantage of that!
@ohad_savir Sorry to hear that, Ohad. We see the crash and are investigating. We're happy to dig into more detail if you're able to provide us with some more context. Please hit us up at feedback@synervoz.com - your help would be greatly appreciated!
@jimsrand @tony_anastasi Thanks for the security question, since that's under my purview I'll answer. All data (voice, API,presence, etc) in our network travels over a secure connection. We implement security best practices such as salted
passwords, asset isolation, audits, IPS and IDS. Conversation recording is a paid premium feature and strictly opt-in. Access to our Voice Message repositories is limited to a small group of staff members. All access is logged.
Hi Hunters!
We set out to build something that would change the way we use our voice to communicate. We started with the idea that the most important people in your life, whether they are friends, family or colleagues, no matter where they are, should be available without needing to schedule specific times to meet. What we ended up with is Switchboard, an intercom for your phone that lets you talk to your important contacts instantly when they are available. It is a seemingly simple concept, but thanks to presence indication and other features that make it faster than normal calls or video meetings, it enables more spontaneous conversation as if you’re in the same room. (We also have some really exciting features in the dev builds that will be released into the wild soon...).
Our team has been using the product and iterating to build the perfect tool for our own needs. And as a distributed team working on Switchboard from 6 different cities, we put this product through the wringer on a daily basis.
Just like Slack, it takes time to work into your normal routines. But also like Slack, once it becomes a part of your routines, you don’t know how you survived without it.
Please let us know your thoughts in the comments below. Hope you like it!
See you on Switchboard,
Jim
@jimsrand Great stuff! We have a team that's spread out geographically. Assembling people into a call is extremely clunky. When people want to talk, they don't like waiting, and every action (unlock, select app, contact drive up friction and drives down engagement).
Over time I have used every type of chat/voice tool (Skype (hate it), Viber, messenger, original Google Chat/Talk, new voice, hangouts, meeting etc.) . Right now we like Facebook's Workplace/Workchat and Whatsapp.
Last year I tried to bring Discord into the company and it was awful. The UI/UX was horrible.
Your app looks great. I'm going to try it with some team members today. I'll keep you posted.
Cheers
Resh
@jimsrand @resh Hi Resh - wanted to follow up with you and see if you'd be around for a quick chat about what worked / didn't work about Switchboard. I just sent you a friend request on Switchboard, but if you'd rather chat over email I respond to feedback@synervoz.com. Thanks very much in advance for your time.
Seems like a great app, will give it a try soon with my team. However, I do have one question: where do you guys get your revenue from since the app is free and there’s no “premium” subscription?
@gvkjr Hey Gerard great question. While we do intend to introduce a premium tier for the Switchboard app for power users, we have developed a deep audio and voice technology stack to power Switchboard and intend to license via an SDK. We are currently running paid pilots to validate this model.
@jimsrand Thanks for the swift reply. Nice to see a company monetising their tech instead of their data once in a while. Hope things go well!
I downloaded the app and spoke to Michael (helpdesk) in App and the sound was perfect and they talked about some cool features that are upcoming. This is a simple, fun solution to awkward conference calls and instant messaging for me with clients.
@josh_robbins Thanks for the feedback, Josh! Glad to hear you like Switchboard so far and that @michael_reynolds has you excited about some of our upcoming features! Please let us know if we can help you further in any way.
@edwardvasquezdr Thanks for the interest. We plan to introduce a premium tier for the Switchboard app for power users, but the business model revolves more around the technology stack. We have developed a deep audio and voice technology stack to power Switchboard and intend to license via an SDK. We are currently running paid pilots to validate this model.
This looks cool! :) I do 98% of my work remotely, so I'm always looking for tools that can help me communicate with my team in a more natural way.
@agervs Thanks Alex- glad you like it! Please let us know if you need a hand setting things up with your team. Our team is currently hanging out in the public groups on Switchboard and would be glad to help!
@adamallaccess Hi Adam. Great to hear you've been finding our product useful. We're always updating Switchboard to make it more powerful and easy to use. We'll be announcing some great new stuff over the next month or so. Stay in touch!
I've been using this for a few weeks with my husband and it's a huge hit in our house! Previously we had set up a private Discord server but found the constant connection distracting with no privacy. With Switchboard I can reach him whenever I need, even if he's got headphones on, without yelling at the top of my voice inside the house. He's happy to not have a yelling wife. 😄
It's also been good to use while coordinating with a remote engineering team, and has replaced our persistent Google Hangouts group. Engineers can focus on work, I can reach them whenever I need, it's a win win. Great product.
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