Phone
The call that goes unanswered goes to a competitor. A real local number, divert or port, transfers to a person, hours on the number's own clock, and five, ten or fifteen calls at once with no queue. The main channel.
Channels
Where the agent talks.
A business's customers ring, text, type and email, and they expect the same answer from each. The phone is the main channel and the one every agent starts on. The others are the same agent, with the same facts, reached a different way.
The phone first
Every agent starts with a number
Talkgate is a phone product underneath. Every agent comes with its own real local number in New Zealand or Australia, and the other channels hang off the agent that answers it.
The phone channel is where the agent does most of its work: a local number included with the agent, the business's advertised number diverted to it in a couple of minutes, or a number ported in and, if they ever leave, ported back out. Calls are answered on the first ring at any hour, put through to a person on the business's rules, and summarised by text and email within seconds. Everything the agents do, they do on the phone.
The other channels share the agent's knowledge base, so hours, services and the service area come back the same by text, on the website and by email as they do by voice. Change the opening hours once and every channel changes together. Text and email are in early access and are sold that way; website chat and call notifications into Microsoft Teams are available now.
The channels
Five ways a customer reaches the same agent
Text
Customers text the business number and nobody replies until tomorrow. The same agent texts back, one question at a time, reads the photo they sent, and hands over to a person the moment somebody asks. The texting agent is early access; text campaigns and the texting API are available now.
Microsoft Teams
The team lives in Teams and finds out about calls by walking past the desk. Call notifications post into a channel with plain-English routing, available now. A meeting agent that joins from the Microsoft 365 calendar and takes the notes is in early access.
Website chat
Visitors leave without asking the one question that would have sold them. One line of code puts the agent on the site in the business's own colours, typing or talking, with the chat remembered from page to page.
The enquiries inbox is read on Friday afternoon, if at all. Forward it to the agent and every email is answered, booked, handed to a person, or set aside with the reason on screen. Early access.
Stated plainly
What is not a channel
WhatsApp. The platform can send one-way messages WhatsApp-first with a text fallback, such as a booking link or a follow-up after a call. There is no WhatsApp agent, a customer cannot hold a conversation with the agent over WhatsApp, and Talkgate does not sell one. The detail is on the website chat page.
The texting agent does not book or look things up. Over text the agent answers from the knowledge base and hands over to a person. Calendar bookings and account lookups are phone, website chat and email jobs, and the texting agent offers a call rather than guessing.
Sold through partners
One agent to sell, five ways to reach it
A client buys an agent and chooses the doors into it. Most start with the phone and add website chat, because the knowledge base is already there. Sold through partners: you set the price, Talkgate runs the platform, the numbers and the hosting. Channels in early access are sold as early access, in those words. The partner programme explains how a client is set up and supported.
Next step
Ask the same question three ways
A partner briefing shows one agent answering by phone, on a website and by text from one knowledge base, and is clear about which channels are early access.