1. Home
  2. Customer Engagement Platforms
  3. Twilio Reviews
  4. User Review of Twilio
Communications Platform in the Cloud, the next level
Updated August 09, 2019

Communications Platform in the Cloud, the next level

Anonymous | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User

Modules Used

  • Programmable Voice

Overall Satisfaction with Twilio Programmable Voice

Our main telephone platform is currently being handled by Twilio across the entire organization. After previously using another communications platform, we switched to Twilio to take advantage of its automation features--especially the IVR development (in PHP, Python, Ruby and other languages,) and the ability to allow our resources to employ their own SIP softphones, both in desktop and mobile versions. Also, Twilio allows us to record our outgoing calls and attach them to sales leads, opportunities and other related elements.
  • Flexibility: Twilio uses a pseudolanguage known as TwiML, in XML format, with which we can develop anything from simple IVRs to complex skill-routing call engines on a variety of common languages, such as Ruby, Javascript, PHP and Python.
  • Modularity: You can build up with Twilio, from phone numbers up to entire logic handling solutions, and even interconnect with your existing infrastructure.
  • Portability: Twilio is entirely in the Cloud; it's an SaaS communications platform. You don't need to deploy anything onsite to make it work, besides accessories such as softphones (although you can develop your own if you wish), so you have immediate access to Twilio's entire infrastructure from anywhere in the world.
  • The Twilio Studio. It's perhaps the most powerful feature on Twilio, with the ability to build full-fledged IVRs with little to no development on our side, and other advanced functions such as auto-SMS and chat bots. However, it's somewhat expensive at the moment. Though there is a free tier, it comes with several restrictions.
  • The handling of stale SIP sessions. When a user connects via softphone to his/her Twilio SIP account, it sometimes loses connectivity and resets it by opening the softphone again; sometimes this causes a second (current) session to be opened. Twilio gets confused with this, since it sees two sessions (it lacks the logic to take the most recent one), and generates an error.
  • Our ROI was improved compared to our previous providers. Twilio Voice fees are very reasonable comparing with similar alternatives.
  • We can add easily new phone numbers for as little as US$1 for newcomers and offices, just with the click of a button inside Twilio admin console.
We previously used Skype for communications, however the price per minute or second per call was more expensive, and it didn't give us the flexibility of integrating calls with our CRM (Vtiger), allowing our sales force to initiate a call with a prospect just by clicking on its opportunity's phone number.
Twilio is well-rounded for almost any company that doesn't require much in terms of voice automation (smart IVR, call center forwarding, etc). It can hold its own on as many phone numbers as you like, and the voice quality is very clear most of the time (some countries' destinations might experience issues such as light noise, just as with a normal landline). You can even develop a reasonably complex IVR platform with TwiML and PHP, but the maintenance on this case is your own, so you'll need to evaluate this option if you're running heavily automated interactions with your customers.

Twilio Feature Ratings

Evaluating Twilio Programmable Voice and Competitors

Yes - Skype. We previously handled our calls via Skype, and it worked flawlessly (in some aspects even more stable than a SIP solution), however it impaired our sales force into registering and associating calls with specific leads and opportunities, it didn't have the ability of recording the incoming and outgoing calls, and the outbound call price was in general sensibly lower in Twilio.
  • Price
  • Product Features
  • Product Usability
  • Third-party Reviews
Integration. Twilio integrates with Vtiger (our corporate's CRM solution, also in the Cloud), so allowing the vendors to initiate a call and attach it automatically all from inside Vtiger is a definitely must have for a communications solution. Also, the call not only gets registered and associated with the contact, but also attaches the link to the recording, adding further details to the interaction.
Not at all. We reviewed the products on three main factors: usability, integration and price. On Usability we evaluated solutions that were portable and available in a big range of products, as well as offering all the comm interactions we use (phone calls, call forwarding and conference, IVR capabilities, etc). On integration, the ability to seamlessly pair with our CRM was a must, and Twilio provided. And finally, the price factor (in terms of price per outbound traffic).