By Rich Tehrani
March 03, 2005
Forget Tupperware parties baby,
the future is VoIP parties. Remember the good
old days where women (now I don’t mean to be
sexist but it really was almost all women,
right?) would come together and buy Tupperware?
Well now that Tupperware is commoditized – you
can buy it cheap in any grocery store. Well not
Tupperware perhaps but something similar. You
get the idea.
I was reminded about Tupperware,
Amway and a host of other network marketing
business models when I saw that a major VoIP
provider is working with a company called 5LINX
to sell its services through 11,000 independent
representatives around the country. Will it
work? Probably. These referral oriented
businesses do work. Not all the people in the
world, read blogs and fantasize about winning
the lottery so they can blow it all on A/V
equipment and ever-more powerful computers. Some
people actually rely on these sorts of parties
to buy things.
Here is a salient excerpt
discussing how the service will be branded from
a recent release:
The Globalinx (www.myglobalinx.com)
branded offering encompasses voice and video
broadband phone services. The VoIP solution
allows Internet users to enhance the
functionality of their high speed connection
with a telephone service that is affordable, as
easy to use as a regular telephone, and bundled
with many advanced features (e.g., voice mail,
caller ID, call waiting, call waiting caller ID,
call forwarding, hold, line-alternate, 3-way
conferencing, web access to account controls,
etc.) not included with traditional
circuit-switched telephone services. The
standalone VideoPhone is the industry's first
exceptional quality, consumer priced videophone
that uses a standard broadband internet
connection to transmit high quality audio and
crisp instant-on video communications.
VoIP in theory should be sold
like any other telecom service and like any
other product for that matter. What I mean is
use every channel you can find to distribute
your product. This is a great move on the
provider’s part. Will it work? That is to be
decided but the bottom line is the deal probably
cost little to no money to put together and
there is likely only upside potential.
How does Vonage one-up this
announcement? Simple. Girl-Scout branded VoIP
service. You think I kid. Well maybe I do but
why not? Imagine how popular the idea could
become in an Atkins inspired age. Here is a nice
marketing slogan for them to try. Watch your
weight fall while you make that call!
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