MOH

[PlumCrazy1]

Hello,


I work for a national retail chain and I am looking for companies that provide Music on Hold with commercial (like Muzak). I ma not looking for a tape or digital recording company. I am looking for a company that can change massages on the fly in a matter of hours not days for a 2000 stores.


Any suggestions?

 

[itpphoneguy]

Hi PlumCrazy1,
That's a tall order. Have you looked into doing it yourself and purchasing the digital announcers?
-Chris

 

[jlshelton]

What you need, and I don't know if it exists, is a box that has an audio out, and an ethernet connection. Its job would be to download a music file (.mp3) from a network drive, play it, and then look for the next file, or start with the first file. If you had 2000 of these gadgets, pointed at a single network drive, then you could replace one/all of the music recordings as you wish, and every store would be playing the new music within minutes.

Your PR company could then easily produce new music/commercial files, transmit them to you for installation.

Fancier versions of these gadgets exist: for allowing a home hi-fi to tap into a music collection on a computer. But I don't know if any of them will automatically repeat. They cost from $200 - $500 each.

 

[ttech]

Nel-tech makes MOH player that can be loaded via a network connection

http://www.nel-techlabs.com/ti1250main.htm

and Via sharing a fax line Just search their site.

 

[hbiss]

Check out Premiere Technologies, specifically their NET 7000.

http://www.premtech.com/product/det...dfa-280100096-setProductSelected-idzq342=true

Quote:

The NET 7000 unit stores and continuously plays a digitized audio production for message on hold applications. The unit receives (pulls) audio and configuration updates over the internet or intranet from a Content Management System. Connection to a local area network is made by a standard Ethernet interface on the unit.

They can also provide the server service (or Content Management System as they call it) if you don't have that capability or don't want to handle it yourself.

For the productions themselves I have been using Illinois Audio Productions-

http://www.ilaudio.com/

Another completely different possibility is one I have seen used by TJ Maxx, PETCO and other chains. All their locations are linked by satellite to a central location. They have DMX Music-

http://www.dmxmusic.com

provide a custom production for them that DMX uplinks to their satellite, is received at their central location then re-distributed via their own satellite network to all their locations. Each location has a DMX single channel receiver.

DMX is Muzak's competitor by the way.

-Hal

 

[jlshelton]

The Premiere Net 7000 looks like exactly what I described above. Hooray! One google hit on "Premier Net 7000" shows a "list" price of $699. Perhaps you can get a better deal for your giant chain.