Autodialer or something???

[Cliff]

Not sure where to put this.

I am looking for an inexpensive way to call about up to 30 people with reminders.
Our area has a lot of shift work and people are not in church every week.
So the idea is to set it up so I can record a message then send it out.
The autodialer would keep trying until it reaches someone at each number.
Any thoughts are help?

Could get a couple of volunteers as I have done in other churches, but inevitably someone does not get a call and trouble starts.

[hoosierdraft]

I've used this at a previous church:

Call-Em-All

Reasonably priced and includes voice and text.

[Cliff]

Not bad.
Only thing is it only re-try's when no-one is home twice.

[wogster]

Originally Posted by Cliff

Not bad.
Only thing is it only re-try's when no-one is home twice.

Is this still an issue? I think there are only about 10 people left on the planet who have a phone and do NOT have an answering machine.....

[petereit]

We just use Planning Center Online. It's been doing a great job of keeping our 300 volunteers up-to-date on everything.

[Cliff]

Many people here have call display and no answering machine.

Planning center online is email based and not all have or regularly look at their emails

[petereit]

I get all of my notifications from Planning Center Online through my phone.

[wogster]

Originally Posted by Cliff

Many people here have call display and no answering machine.

Planning center online is email based and not all have or regularly look at their emails

The dialer should produce a log, and the log should tell you what numbers did and didn't receive a call, that's when you have a couple of volunteers do the cleanup calls. If it's more then 10% of the numbers that need cleanup calls, then the phone is the wrong technology for this. Email is another way of making contact, although there is no way to guarantee that the message is read before it needs to be. There is no guarantee that they check an answering machine either. I work for the post office, even snail mail has no guarantee that people will actually check rural mail boxes, some of them get emptied every day and some of them pile up for a month before getting checked.

You can attempt to contact someone, but really they need to work with you on this.

[petereit]

I agree with Wogster. We have SO many different ways our volunteers can stay informed. We use telephone (all team leaders give out their cell, work and home numbers) our web site, Planning Center Online, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Vimeo, texting, voice mail, postcards and even the occasional robo-call.

But our primary method of communicating with our volunteers is the old-fashioned way: we TALK to them.

[Cliff]

This is for the overall church. many of our people work shift work and are not in church each week. Heck I have missed 6 weeks in a row myself.
Hmmm, something that does, Text, Facebook, Twitter, Email and voice would be great!

[sempei13]

30 people? Get their cell phone numbers and providers. Look up the domain for each (most will be att, verizon, sprint, and t-mobile). Make an email list with everyone bcc'ed. Send it out. Viola, they get a text. Additionally, you can make a list in your phone and do the same from your phone.

Do an autodial for the ones without texting.

Paul

[wogster]

Originally Posted by sempei13

30 people? Get their cell phone numbers and providers. Look up the domain for each (most will be att, verizon, sprint, and t-mobile). Make an email list with everyone bcc'ed. Send it out. Viola, they get a text. Additionally, you can make a list in your phone and do the same from your phone.

Do an autodial for the ones without texting.

Paul

I missed the 30 number in the original message, that's not enough for anything other then the oldest technology on the planet, the jungle telegraph. You have 4 people you call, they each have 3 people they call, and they each have 3 people they call, that's 36, more then covers your need. What's more important, the people calling will quickly know WHEN to call those people who don't have answering machines.

You can probably make it easier, anyone who has email gets an email, these days that's going to be more then 50%, some of the remainder will be able to get texts, so you can probably get to 75% there. That leaves you about 7 or 8 that need calling, you can convince a few people to make the required phone calls.