Simple Twilio Forwarding

I was setting up an online store for a bunch of friends through Shopify. We setup chat channels using Messenger and Shopify Ping, but we still wanted to have a phone number in case the customers wanted to talk. The online store did not have a physical store and did not yet want to invest in a help desk setup.

We came up with a simple solution through a Twilio phone number - that when called simultaneously rang the mobile phones of the partners.

Requirements

1. A Phone Number
2. Initial Greeting
3. Simultaneous Dialings
4. Record A Message

A Phone Number

Twilio has been super great being a developer friendly service. We chose Twilio to purchase a virtual phone number. Some of the choices include region specific phone number or a toll free number. You can purchase once you sign up for free at twilio.com

Purchase a number here

• Search for a number of your liking
• Choose Voice capability

Initial Greeting

When any customer calls the above phone number, you could program it in multiple ways. We went with creating a simple TwiML script.

• Configure your active numbers here
• Configure the Voice & Fax section by choosing TwiML Bin for A call comes in option

• Press the + on the right to create a new TwiML script (full script in the end)

Voice greeting can be set using the block.

    <Say voice="man">
      Welcome to online store dot com - please wait while we connect your call.
    </Say>

<Say> block speaks the text in a computerized (yet human-like) voice. There are multiple options for voice available.

Simultaneous Dialings

The next requirement was to have the incoming call result in calling a few of the partners and the most available person would pick up and connect the call.

This code block dials the numbers in the values.

    <Dial timeout="20" record="true" callerId="[phone]">
      <Number>[phone]</Number>
      <Number>[phone]</Number>
    </Dial>

Parameters timeout, record, and callerId are passed to the Dial block.

• timeout sets the number of seconds the numbers below should ring before going to the next block
• record sets the setting to record or not
• callerId sets the phone number from which the Numbers below should receive the calls. We set to a Twilio verified number, as we wanted to partners to know that this is a call for the online store. You will not be able to specify a number that has not been verified in Twilio

<Number>...</Number> blocks are put inside <Dial> block to dial simultaneously.

Record A Message

At instances where all the few partners are able to receive the call, we wanted the customer to record a message to replay and address the needs.

This code block achieves the requirement

    <Say voice="man">
      All our representatives are busy. Please leave a message and we will contact you back. Thank you.
    </Say>
    <Record maxLength="20" />

• Before recording the voicemail, we put a prompt that everyone is busy and to leave a message.
• Record block records upto 20 seconds of voice

Conclusion

TwiML script is executed top down one block at a time. <response> block will be executed as response to the incoming call. Here is the full code.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<Response>
    <Say voice="man">
      Welcome to online store dot com - please wait while we connect your call.
    </Say>
    <Dial timeout="20" record="true" callerId="[phone]">
      <Number>[phone]</Number>
      <Number>[phone]</Number>
    </Dial>
    <Say voice="man">
      All our representatives are busy. Please leave a message and we will contact you back. Thank you.
    </Say>
    <Record maxLength="20" />
</Response>

Hope this helps you in a similar case. Please let me know if there is a better way to fulfil the requirements.

Also, here is a referral link if you would like to try out Twilio.