Customer Story
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Robotalker Moves a Thousand Phone Lines Off Twilio in Five Days
Robotalker.com has sent automated phone calls and text messages for churches, schools, and medical offices for close to 14 years. The company moved that traffic from Twilio to SignalWire and finished in five days, testing included. Thousands of lines of autoresponder code went across unchanged.
Abbi Minessale
Senior Product Marketing Manager
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Migration
Overview
Robotalker.com provides automated phone calls and text messaging that keep organizations in contact with the people they serve: churches, schools, medical offices, and healthcare providers. The company moved from Twilio to SignalWire for faster support, added call redundancy, and lower per-number costs.
The existing Twilio-compatible implementation stayed in place. One initialization method, keyed to the SID format, decides which provider handles a given number. Numbers ported in batches, and the migration closed in five days with all testing done.
About Robotalker
Robotalker.com has served clients for close to 14 years through a web application for sending automated calls and text messages. Common uses include event notices, medical information, and appointment reminders. The company designs its calling and messaging use cases to stay within Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and Federal Trade Commission (FTC) rules.
Two workloads run on SignalWire. The first is an autoresponder: a caller dials a dedicated number, hears answers to common questions, then receives a text with details such as rental listings, directions, and website links. The second is toll-free business-to-business broadcasting for political campaigns and seasonal promotions.
“It was so easy to switch to the SignalWire SDK. We had thousands of lines of code for our autoresponder and we didn’t need to change a single line of code.”
Thomas Mahoney
CEO, Robotalker
The Challenge
Robotalker’s own support quality depended on its provider’s support quality. With previous providers, reaching an agent took up to 48 hours, the conversations were difficult, and resolution ran two to three days. A single number failing meant email exchanges with a bot while client campaigns waited.
Two other constraints pushed the evaluation. Call redundancy rested on a single path. Per-number pricing set a floor under the cost of operating roughly a thousand phone lines.
The Solution
All of Robotalker’s existing Twilio code ran against the SignalWire API without modification. The one addition was a separate initialization method keyed to the SID format, since SignalWire SIDs contain dashes and Twilio SIDs do not. That switch lets legacy Twilio numbers that could not be ported coexist with new SignalWire numbers in the same application.
Numbers moved in batches. Each ported number began billing at the lower monthly rate as it landed, so savings accrued during the migration rather than after it. Handlers for interactive voice response (IVR), inbound text replies, and the autoresponder needed no changes.
“With other providers, we’ve had to wait 48 hours to speak with agents who had difficulty communicating with us and took days to figure out our problem. Now we have the ability to pick up the phone and speak directly with our dedicated SignalWire agent to get answers immediately. Rather than having a relationship with another chat bot at Twilio, we had and still have great support with SignalWire, which is the most important reason we needed a change.”
Thomas Mahoney
CEO, Robotalker
The Results
Migration completed in five days | Thousands of lines of code unchanged | Per-number cost cut by more than 90 percent | Support reachable by phone, not by ticket |
|---|---|---|---|
Robotalker changed over from old provider to new within five days, including all testing. Nothing in the schedule was reserved for a rewrite. | The autoresponder moved across without a single line changed. Handlers for IVR, text message replies, and autoresponders needed no modification. | Robotalker reports monthly direct inward dialing (DID) cost falling from 1 dollar to 8 cents per number. Across roughly a thousand lines, the company describes the savings as far outweighing the coding changes. (Customer-reported figures at time of migration. Confirm against current published pricing before publish.) | A dedicated agent answers directly instead of routing through a queue. Robotalker contrasts this with 48-hour waits and multi-day resolution cycles at prior providers. |
Does existing Twilio code run on SignalWire?
Robotalker reports that all of its Twilio code was compatible with the SignalWire API. SignalWire maintains a Twilio-compatible API surface for that reason. The only addition in Robotalker’s case was an initialization method that selects the provider.
What has to change during a migration from Twilio?
In Robotalker’s migration, the change was a separate initialization method keyed to the SID format. SignalWire SIDs contain dashes and Twilio SIDs do not, so the format identifies which provider a number belongs to. Application handlers stayed as written.
How long does a Twilio migration take?
Timelines depend on number volume and test coverage. Robotalker completed its change in five days including all testing, across roughly a thousand phone lines.
Can Twilio and SignalWire numbers run in the same application?
Yes. Robotalker supports legacy Twilio numbers that could not be ported alongside new SignalWire numbers in one dialer, switching between providers per number.
Do IVR flows, SMS replies, and autoresponders need rework?
Robotalker reports no modification to handlers for IVR, text message replies, or autoresponders during the migration.
What support is available during a migration?
Robotalker cites direct phone access to a dedicated agent as the primary reason for the change, and contrasts it with waits of up to 48 hours at prior providers.
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