One of the most common questions we get about Awaaz.De is, “So, what exactly does it do?” It’s a question we’ve tried to answer in our written materials, including this website 🙂 But sometimes it’s still hazy. So in this post we’ll try to explain in the simplest way possible, using very casual language. This is officially a no jargon zone! Here we go:
What is the problem Awaaz.De is trying to solve?
We are trying to connect people to information using voice applications over mobile phones. The people that we target are rural, remote, and/or marginal; they are low-income, lack Internet access, speak local languages, lack literacy skills, and use low-end mobile phones. There are many groups and organizations trying to deliver various types of information services to these people, such as agricultural advice, health information, banking services, and even entertainment. But they all struggle to do so in an affordable and accessible manner.
What does Awaaz.De do to solve this problem?
Awaaz.De is developing a software platform to reach the target communities through automated voice applications. We allocate a regular phone number and provide a way for organizations to upload audio content for it over the web. People listen to the content by calling the associated number. Awaaz.De’s web interface lets the organization organize the content into different message boards so people can choose which information they want to listen to. Within a message board, messages can also be categorized by topic/subtopic. Once a caller calls in and selects a message board, she uses the phone keypad (touchtone) to listen to the messages one at a time. This is sometimes called interactive voice response (IVR) systems.
You can think of Awaaz.De as supporting a voice version of the Internet. Rather than typing in URLs into your browser to access a person or organization’s textual content, you are dialing phone numbers and accessing their voice content.
Are IVR message boards the only thing organizations can have?
No, there’s much more! Over the last three years, real-world usage has helped us identify new features to build in. Awaaz.De’s current functionality falls into three components:
 | Information Dissemination. Organizations make information available through IVR message boards that people call into. In addition, orgs broadcast out messages to target phone numbers through automated calls. Broadcasts can be informational messages, personal alerts or reminders (for e.g. a medical appointment or event notification). But we take it a step beyond one-way broadcast to let you collect user feedback through voice response or touchtone voting. Between call-in message boards and voice message broadcast, Awaaz.De supports information dissemination through both pull and push mechanisms. |
 | Data Collection. Awaaz.De lets you create custom voice surveys that either automatically call people or are available through dedicated phone numbers. Orgs record questions, specify the order of the prompts, and whether each question will accept touchtone (i.e. multiple-choice question) or recorded voice input. All of the collected results are made available in a nicely formatted report, in real time. We developed this tool after observing the amount of time, effort, and money spent by organizations to send field agents to administer and aggregate paper surveys. Voice surveys are more cost-effective and convenient for many data collection tasks. |
 | Social networking. Awaaz.De’s message boards aren’t just listen-only. You can also set up a message board to solicit messages and responses from the callers themselves. For example, DSC’s Avaaj Otalo line has a question and answer message board that lets farmers record questions, browse the previously recorded questions and answers of other farmers, and respond to questions themselves. So farmer-to-farmer knowledge sharing is facilitated. Awaaz.De’s web-based tool lets organizations review and moderate posted messages. Orgs can also assign questions to expert responders. Once assigned, the experts get a phone call that plays their assigned questions and prompts for response. Recorded responses are routed back to the original question asker through another automated phone call, letting the asker review the response and follow-up with another question or comment if necessary. Meanwhile the administrator can approve the conversation for the public message board for others to listen and participate in the discussion. |
Why is everything voice?
Voice is a medium that is easy to access over any phone, no matter how low-end. It can be consumed by low-literate or illiterate people. It is easily translatable into different languages. And it lets people with limited experience with computing easily create content by recording their voice over the phone.
Ok, so a Voice Internet. But what exactly is Awaaz.De’s role?
We provide this software as a hosted solution for any organization in India and beyond to offer voice-based information services to their audiences. Awaaz.De technology acts as a bridge between organizations and their target communities. Organizations don’t have to install anything or have IT experts on hand. We manage the technology, and the organization does what it does best: communicating and developing quality, relevant content. Awaaz.De provides an effective and efficient mechanism to make the content widely accessible.
You keep talking about organizations. Who are they?
Any group or institution serving rural, remote, marginal, and/or disconnected people. This may be an NGO, rural development institution, university, philanthropic foundation, agricultural cooperative, producer company, MFI, SHG, rural bank, rural service provider, rural sales and support organization, or a government.
Who pays you, the organizations or the target community members?
Either can. Awaaz.De is serving organizations across India. Amongst them, some orgs choose to make the service free for the end-user to access, so they make the line available through a toll free number or a missed call. In this case the organization bears the full airtime charge, and also pays Awaaz.De’s hosting fee. In other cases, an organization has demonstrated enough value through the information they are providing that they are comfortable soliciting subscription fees. The revenue is shared between the organization and Awaaz.De. So it depends on the use case, and Awaaz.De is flexible to these and other sustainability/revenue models.
Whew! This post is longer than I thought it would be. If you’ve read this far we hope things are now clear. But if still not, let us know!
