Calling is charged based on your current cell phone plan: if you have 10,000 minutes, you’ll share those minutes between your personal calls and your calls through Sideline.
Sideline includes free unlimited texting, but not calling. Phone tag can make appointments difficult to schedule, but text conversations are quick and easy to handle no matter how busy you are. Since you can’t always respond quickly (maybe you’re in a meeting, on a flight, or driving into work) Sideline offers the option to add auto-responses to messages so customers know they’re being taken care of.Īnd while Google Voice will transcribe voicemail, Sideline goes a step further and initiates a text conversation with callers after they leave a voicemail. This teamwork can take the pressure off you to answer every question, and allow faster responses when some team members are busy and others are available. You’ll all get texts and calls to your personal cell phones, and if anyone responds, their response will show as a response from the group number. That’s not all: if you have a business where multiple people will need to answer calls or texts to a single number, or if you’d like to have a “family phone number” that anyone can answer, you can share your second phone number with multiple people. With Sideline, you also get a second phone number that you can customize (again, 720-NEED-SPA could be yours!) If you already have a second phone number, and you’d like to use that number with Sideline’s features, you can transfer that number to Sideline easily. Sideline isn’t free but offers more options than Google Voice. Google Voice provides a hassle-free way to handle extra calls without sacrificing your privacy – all for free. There’s no cell phone plan that can beat that! Unlimited Calls and Texts…but, with, uh, limitsįinally, Google Voice gives you unlimited texts and minutes within the US and Canada for free, including group texts and MMS. This feature is another that many phones aren’t equipped with, and because Google Voice integrates with your browser, you can access the recording on your computer as well as on your phone. Of course, make sure you notify your client before you begin recording (for legal reasons). This can be helpful if your current phone doesn’t support blocked numbers (some do and some don’t).īecause you may want to remember what was agreed on in your last client call, Google Voice also offers built-in call recording.
If you’re contacted by solicitors, or if a client or friend is harassing you, you can easily block numbers from texting and calling within Google Voice as well. You don’t have to listen to every call to know the general idea of each. Even better, you can request that callers say their name when calling with this feature, you can pick up a call, hear who is calling, and then discreetly decide whether or not to answer.Īdditionally, Google Voice transcribes your voicemails, shows the transcripts in your app, and also sends them to you as an email. When you get a call on your phone, you have the option to have your caller ID display the number as one rerouted from your Google number. Google Voice screens every call that comes through. That’s right, you can even look at your messages from a friend’s computer if your phone’s battery dies! You’re allowed to browse available numbers by name or number combination, and customize your own (720-NEED-SPA? You got it!) You can then log into your texts and voicemails from any computer or phone through accessing the Google Voice website on a browser.
You start by picking a free phone number – which you can hold for free for life. Google Voice is a free service focused on creating a simple, streamlined, spam-free phone experience for tech-savvy users. The Apps – an honest review Google Voice Review Both apps offer second-phone-number capabilities that integrate with your current phone, for increased privacy without increased hassle. Whatever your reason for wanting a second phone number, Sideline and Google Voice have you covered.
Or maybe you don’t like giving out your phone number on dates for safety reasons. If you’ve just started your own business, you may not want to go around giving out your personal cell phone number – but holding two cell phones, one for personal calls and one for business can get complicated.