SpeechCycle, a company that hosts millions of technical support calls, primarily from Cable or satellite TV subscribers, has joined with Jingle Networks, the popularizer of “free directory assistance” to offer a way for businesses to insert sponsored audio messages into customer care calls. The joint offering is well suited for the current economic climate because it gives companies across a multiplicity of verticals the ability to deliver targeted promotional messages, thereby attracting advertising dollars to offset customer care operating expenses.

For those who can overcome the wince factor evoked by the idea of listening to audio advertisements while waiting on hold, the idea has appeal. If the messages offer deals that are valuable to the caller — such as upgrades, discounts or coupons for goods or services of interest — they will be well received, especially in this economic climate. Joe Bentzel, SpeechCycle’s CMO, equates the service to “one-to-one radio.” Audio promos can be tailored to the precise interests of the caller and delivered at that “ready-to-buy moment,” as Jingle Networks used to characterize the occasion of a call to directory assistance.

The new service is the product of a mash-up of SpeechCycle’s RPA On Demand (where “RPA” stands for “Rich Phone Applications”) and JingleConnect, which is an audio advertising insertion platform developed behind 1-800-FREE411. Jingle busted out JingleConnect in September 2008 to make its audio advertising insertion technology available to third parties. At roughly the same time SpeechCycle, which had built a successful, but highly specialized business around automated handling of technical support calls from cable and satellite TV service subscribers, sought to grow its business by making its tools and software available to a broader community of developers — including a joint development initiative with the Tellme subsidiary of Microsoft.

RPA On Demand conforms to an architecture designed to be partner- and developer-friendly. Bentzel equates it to the opening up of Saleforce.com through AppForce, the open API for hooking into CRM “in the cloud.” The deal with Jingle Networks is the first of many possible future services that will leverage this architecture. It enables the two companies to position their offering as a real recession fighter, with the potential to generate (or split) revenues from targeted ad delivery, or for companies to use the SpeechCycle platform to produce automated ads with offers that support specific loyalty programs or upselling strategies. As a company that cut its teeth with the originators of the “triple play” (subscription TV, telephone and Internet services through a single pipe) SpeechCycle has been intimately involved in such programs.

The implications for Jingle Networks could be equally profound. Assaults on “free DA” are coming from all angles — GOOG411, Nuance, Microsoft/Tellme, V-Enable and the directory subsidiaries of the major carriers. Any revenues that can be generated from unbundling its ad-serving platform will be a big plus. However, as a sign of the times, the competition for audio or multimedia ad serving, especially to mobile devices, is getting very crowded and competitive. In the chill of a tough economy, competition to develop and deliver new services is heating up.

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