Should we dance? No, let's chat!

The other day I came across a new service called ChatToText.

Take a look at their 5-minute video for details.

The concept behind it is pretty simple - it's a service that allows you to chat from your computer. Certainly not a novel concept, but what makes this unique is that you can chat with the person who isn't on the Internet, who may not be anywhere near a computer. How? Via SMS (aka text messaging).

Here's how it works. You get on a web site and click on 'Text Me On My Cell Phone' button (like the one you see here). You see the usual chat window, where you type your short message and click to send it. Within a few seconds I receive this message on my cell phone, click Reply and enter a reply in my phone and hit send (no need to select where it goes - it already knows it). Within a few seconds the chat window shows my reply and you're ready to enter another message, if you wish and the process repeats.

So, essentially you are chatting, although a little slower than usual, but you are chatting.

Since everyone nowadays has cell phones, and all of them have SMS messaging (texting) - ChatToText service could be very useful. For example a restaurant could have such button right on their web site and their customers could ask a question like 'What's today's special?' and get an immediate reply. Or they could ask if you had an opening for 20 this evening.

Of course the question one might ask - couldn't they just pick up the phone and call? Of course they could, but then there's a chance of getting a busy tone or being placed on hold or being unable to understand someone on the other end (no disrespect intended to anyone, I'm one of those people with an accent myself). So, I think it does have possibilities.

Another interesting side-effect of this is privacy. If you wanted people to text you on you cell - you could simply give them your cell number and then they could. But for obvious privacy reasons - nobody would want to do so. So, this capability protects your privacy (since the person initiating the chat simply sees and clicks on a button), and it gives you the convenience of being able to receive such text messages on your cell.

Last but not least, you don't necessarily even have to use this for chat communication, you could could also use it as a simple way for someone to text you, right from your web site or blog.

For many restaurants, especially smaller ones, having computers infrastructure, Internet connections etc. is simply not an option they want to pursue. Whether it would be for technological reasons, financial reasons or any other reasons - we see lack of technology in many restaurants daily. But with this kind of tool - they can participate in interacting with their customers who do like and do use the Internet and its tools, via a cell phone, without missing a beat.

So, check out this 5-minute video and see if this kind of service would work for you. They only charge $6/mo for the service, which is pretty affordable for most, even in today's economic climate. To offset/eliminate the cost - you might want to participate in their incentive program, certainly not mandatory but something to consider.