This release marks a milestone at VirtualPBX: the launch of the all-new VirtualText, a unified messaging platform that brings SMS and webchat together in a single team inbox. To mark the occasion, we sat down with Lon Baker, Chief Operations Officer, and Linh England, Chief Product Officer, for a VirtualText interview that explores how it was built, why it matters, and what comes next.
Watch the Full Interview
If you would like to see the complete conversation with Lon and Linh, you can watch the full interview here:
Why Build a New VirtualText?
The origin story of the new VirtualText is refreshingly simple. The tools we were using just were not good enough.
Lon remembers the moment clearly:
“We started building the product because Linh and I were talking one afternoon and we decided we could build it because everything we were using today at that moment in time was not very good. It was missing features, it wasn’t moving fast enough, didn’t solve all of our needs as a business. And so we decided ‘can we build a prototype in a week or two and see what it looks like?’… Luckily, it came together fast thanks to both our own extensive experience as a company, as well as the power of AI to accelerate our development cycle.”
That early prototype became the foundation for what is now a fully realized product designed to solve real communication challenges for real teams.
Why Add Webchat?
Interestingly, webchat was not part of the original plan.
Lon shared how the idea emerged:
“Speaking of webchat, that came on later.”
Once the prototype was in hand, the team took a step back and asked what was missing.
“We looked at the prototype and asked ourselves, what are we missing? We’re like hold it, we have to have webchat. It’s one of those critical things that we didn’t have in the existing version of VirtualText, but we ourselves relied on every day through a 3rd party. Like, why are we doing it through a third party when we can add it to VirtualText.”
That realization became a turning point. Webchat was not just a nice to have. It was essential.
Linh expanded on this:
“We created the product to solve our own pain points… We wanted to give our team the ability to have a seamless experience with our customers. It became a solution that integrates webchat as well as text.”
What Did We Learned While Building and Using It Internally?
One of the biggest advantages of building VirtualText in house is that we used it ourselves every day across every department. That internal usage surfaced two major insights.
1. Webchat is absolutely critical
Lon explained:
“We learned that webchat was so critical to everybody. We surveyed the entire team. ‘What would make your jobs easier and better?’ If we could have webchat and text messaging together it would be so much easier than having two different systems.”
That feedback pushed the team to invest heavily in making webchat a first class feature.
2. No conversation should ever get dropped
This insight led to one of the most innovative parts of the new VirtualText: AI-powered triage.
“The other big aha moment was, what if no one ever got dropped? And that led us down the path of adding AI to the product as kind of a triaging agent. It triages inbound communications and then gets them to the right person and do it intelligently.”
The result is a system that helps teams respond faster, stay organized, and never lose track of a customer conversation.
Linh summed up the internal development approach perfectly:
“We didn’t just build the product for our potential customers. We built it for ourselves, so we could validate the use case and make those changes as we went through iterations of the launch. And ensuring that we’re creating the best possible experience for our customer because we’re using it on a daily basis.”
What Is Happening Next Now That We've Launched?
The launch is only the beginning.
Lon shared a glimpse of what is coming:
“We keep going full bore. We have a whole roadmap of features and functionality improvements.”
One of the biggest upcoming enhancements is a fully responsive UI.
“We’re going to be building a new responsive UI, so this will scale down perfectly onto mobile phones and tablets.”
And as customers begin using the new VirtualText, the team is eager to hear what communication channels they want next.
“We have a lot of ideas internally on what we want to do, but we want to hear from our customers. What do they want.”
The New VirtualText Is Live and This Is Only the Start
VirtualText now brings together SMS, webchat, AI-powered triage, and team collaboration in one unified inbox. Businesses communicate faster, smarter, and more reliably with VirtualText, without depending on fragmented tools or disconnected systems.
This VirtualText interview highlights just the beginning of what the team has built. With a growing roadmap and customer-driven innovation ahead, the future of VirtualText is bright.
