Hey Alex, not sure if you've logged into your Twilio account lately, but we reduced prices a couple months back so inbound calls are now $0.01/min, SMS is $0.02/msg, and phone numbers are $1/domestic or $2/toll free. We've yet to see someone actually blow through the whole $30 in trial credit, but if you run out and need more just let us know at help@twilio.com
Also not sure if you've seen this, but you can pick from English, French, German, and Spanish accents here: http://www.twilio.com/say
I'm not sure why you're saying it's cheaper. As Danielle mentioned, the prices are actually very less. And as a developer, every penny difference counts. Also they give $30 credit, which is more than enough to "try and play" and release your app to production.
I agree with point "3" though. I use Twilio for an app which sends voice call reminders to other people. But when automatic reminder call goes to these people, it goes from a 1-877 number and many people don't pick up the phone thinking that it's a spam number. Instead if I could call from the number of an original user who sets the reminder, that would be really great.
Point "6" also seem to be great, and I'm sure Twilio will add that.
But somehow, the article coming from Tropo's evangelist is not strong enough or convincing to make a switch from Twilio to Tropo. In fact you did a good job in highlighting some of the technical differences. I think the post lacks these kinds of specifics.
There is a validation that has to be done with the number to make sure you own it, but you should be able to use it as much as you want after that first validation.
Hi - Tropo should cost about the same as Twilio depending on your use case, but Tropo does alot more than Twilio for a roughly equivalent price. For example. Twilio just does SMS, Tropo does SMS and IM. Tropo adds speech recognition and higher quality speech synthesis, etc.
Also, I wanted to make sure I understand, what kind of specifics did you feel are lacking in Diggz post? We love to learn how to improve our product and our communication about it. If you are up for discussing it we will give you $100 on Amazon or Paypal for your time. Just email me at jtaylor at voxeo dot com.
Woah there, your post is misleading and I want to make sure no one is confused as a result.
You said you inquired about Voxeo/Tropo but the pricing you mention above has absolutely nothing to do with Tropo.
Tropo is 100% free for development use - always.
Production Tropo pricing starts at 3 cents per minute with free second-leg (connected) calls, free voice recognition, free high-quality speech synthesis, free 24x7 support, no minimum, and no port limitations.
Thanks for the info. Looks like I should re-evaluate things as at the time Tropo seemed to be a coming-soon/developer-only service that didn't have details around production pricing nailed down. The Prophecy IVR info scared me into thinking that Tropo might have similar limitations.
That's a great summary. A good analogy is that Tropo is 30% harder to learn than Twilio... but it can do 300% more than Twilio.
We've got a big release coming that makes Tropo much easier to use. Entirely new documentation, sanded off some of the rough edges on features, added new ones to make some use cases simpler.
I'd love to hear about the specific road bumps that made it harder for you, it would really help us improve our simplicity. We will give you $100 on Amazon or Paypal for your time. If you're interested email jtaylor at voxeo dot com.
1. Cheaper
2. Multiple voices and accents (UK British Male & Female)
3. Use any number as caller ID.
4. Calls during development are free.
5. Recordings are a breeze
6. Voice recognition from a set of options instead of pressing digits (eg. "Say yes, no or repeat").
On the downside, I've found their system wasn't quite as easy to get going with as Twilio, but it is much more powerful.
Twilio have been more visible and active - Tropo seem slightly behind in evangelism and generally pimping their product.