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Over the past couple of years, people have asked me both publicly and privately if I thought text messaging was dying or if it’s a nonviable communications channel. My answer has always been emphatically that text messaging is and will continue to be a viable choice for text-based communications – both for enterprises and brands as well as person-to-person.
As 2014 winds to a close, I think it’s important to focus on text messaging for enterprises and brands. First off, certainly I acknowledge that P2P text messaging has declined, with many subscribers around the world opting for non-text messaging solutions from WhatsApp, Line, WeChat and others. In other markets, such as the United States and Canada, Apple iMessage has taken a bite out of text messaging volumes; however, overall traffic volumes in 2014 have remained steady and have even grown by one or two percentage points.
Brands and enterprises are increasingly turning to the text messaging for a variety of solutions to reach all subscribers – not just subscribers with smart devices. But, in many cases, it is these very smart devices that can benefit from increased enterprise/brand usage of application-to-person text messaging.
In the early days, A2P messaging was mainly about acquiring mobile content from the operator’s walled gardens as well as heavy usages of premium text messaging. Then the use-cases for text message-based alerting came into being and helped fuel the growth of A2P messaging. Premium text messaging is all but gone, save a few Asian markets, and mobile content is now almost exclusively downloaded from app stores. The mobile operator walled gardens are gone and a new, social-savvy, IP-centric ecosystem has grown up. How can there be any room for simple text messaging?
The answers are quite clear. In a survey that we at SAP Mobile Services conducted early this year, called “The SMS Advantage,” we polled smartphone users aged 18-65 in the U.S., U.K., France, Germany, Spain, Italy, Australia, Hong Kong, China, Malaysia, Singapore and United Arab Emirates, and found some surprising answers. One of them was that 81% believe that sometimes a simple text message is preferable to mobile app usage.
To drill into that conclusion a bit: If you are a smartphone user, you probably have dozens of apps installed. Don’t you sometimes find that many of these apps, along with the various push alerts that they provide, sometimes seem overwhelming? If you are like me, in many cases you simply turn off push alerts. The problem with that is that sometimes I can miss important updates or benefits. True, for a game that I might periodically play I don’t need a push notification reminding me to “come back and feel the frenzy.” I’ll feel the frenzy when I am good and ready, and not until then. Those notifications are definitely off. But think about all of the various store apps you download. Sometimes, just sometimes, there are notifications that you’ll ultimately miss because, along with “feel the frenzy” notifications, you’re just overwhelmed with little numbers all over your app icons. We call this “icon overload.”
Our survey also noted that “consumers are acclimatized to frequent, habitual interaction with smartphones. Sixty-eight percent of respondents check handsets at least every hour, with 20% checking devices every 10 minutes or more often.” And what do they check? If they (and you) are like me, I prioritize my smartphone checks: text messaging; e-mail (work, personal); then and only then might I look at social media such as Twitter; finally and only finally, I’ll review my notification center. Note what was No. 1 – at least for me – text messaging. Our survey also implies that respondents likely agree, noting that: “Eighty-one percent also agree with the statement that ‘sometimes I just need a simple text message rather than complicated and varied apps.’”
A2P messaging, the “simple text message,” is a key channel across a number of industries. Think about shipping logistics – especially as it pertains to engaging consumers. Do we really want a separate app for each of the shipping vendors to notify us about shipment statuses via push notifications or for that, a simple A2P message can suffice in our in-box from any or all of the shippers (UPS, Post Office, FedEx, DHL, etc.)? The survey noted that “the use of text messaging is serving to enhance customer relationships with 83% of consumers saying that its use makes them feel as if ‘they care about my delivery/parcel’ and 81% saying it improved their experience of the organization overall.” This result suggests that for various types of consumer-oriented logistics (shipping, order handling/processing, confirmations, status changes, etc.), text messaging remains a very capable channel and logistics solutions should highly consider text messaging as the primary delivery channel for consumer notifications.
Another industry that benefits from text messaging is social networks. Yes, those social networks: Twitter and Facebook, as well as WeChat, Line and many, many other vertical social networks dedicated to a particular subject matter. I know what you’re thinking: Why would social networks benefit from text messaging? In reality, text messaging is used heavily in a number of ways by social networks: identity management (two-factor authentication, one-time passwords, registration codes, etc.); notifications of new events; and receipt of news as well as helping acquire new social network participants. Our research noted that 74% of consumers think that text messaging can help social networks improve the way they communicate with them and 67% indicated that text messaging can help social networks differentiate themselves from others.
Have you ever used a social network application in which you wanted to send a notification to a friend to try to get them to join that network? Chances are you sent them a text message from the social network app – that is a heavily used capability. The message originates from you – from your device, from your phone number – to one or more people in your address book. This is just one of the many ways that text messaging actually complements competing social networking ecosystems – some of which offer competing types of P2P messaging.
Other industries benefitting from text messaging include logistics, transportation, financial and marketing/brand teams. Businesses and brands should remember that mobile subscribers are becoming savvier about which apps they install and how they engage with the enterprise or brand through them. One of the most telling results of the survey was that only 17% saw text messages from companies as intrusive. That means consumers want to receive text messages – not more push notifications. Like me, they attach a high priority to text messages.
Text messaging is a very wise choice and should remain so for the foreseeable future, even as the operator implementations may evolve – the ubiquity and reach will not decrease; therefore the benefit will remain.
William Dudley has nearly 30 years building and managing telecommunications network infrastructures. As SAP Mobile Services’ group director for global product strategy and solutions, Dudley provides strategic guidance and solutions relating to mobile messaging and communications channels (text messaging, MMS, RCS, WebRTC, voice and video), mobile consumer engagement and IP/IPX solutions.
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