Reality Check: Evolving telecom trends create opportunity for mobile marketers: As the low-cost wireless war heats up in Canada, marketers must take notice of consumer's evolving texting trends

Editor’s Note: Welcome to our weekly Reality Check column. We’ve gathered a group of visionaries and veterans in the mobile industry to give their insights into the marketplace.
SMS use is on a steady rise worldwide, including messages sent to and from short codes. Canadians sent 35.3 billion text messages in 2009, according to the CWTA. That’s a 70% increase from 2008’s 20.8 billion text messages. As the oldest and most universal form of mobile data communication, comparable only to voice, there’s little doubt that text is always a go-to communication feature for consumers regardless of the sophistication of the phone. The ubiquitous nature of SMS makes it available to every phone on any network with no software or downloads required.
The evolution of handset technology, however, has created a very compelling reason for brands to embrace applications and for developers to explore the limits of the tools available to them. Handset manufacturers are changing their business models to attract more developers and telecoms are rushing to update their networks to handle more data traffic. Despite the pre-order and shipment numbers of new devices, it is evident that technology is moving way ahead of social adoption with an average of only 20% smart-phone penetration among cell -phone users, according to IDC.
Smart phones have significantly influenced the way consumers access Web content and applications but they have not had as much of an impact on the effectiveness of the marketing message that is delivered via an application. There are still many steps a consumer has to go through to download these applications and with over 200,000 of them available in the Apple App store alone, marketers face the added challenge of breaking through the clutter in order to be heard.
There are many other reasons why most consumers are not attracted to smart phones.
1. Smart phones are expensive.
2. North American data plans are one of the most pricey.
3. Most plans require long-term contracts.
4. Growing immigrant communities, especially in Canada, don’t have the credit history to be able to enter a contract.
5. Large aging population are slow to adopt new technology.
Most recently in Canada, telecom companies have started to embrace the low-cost, basic-feature cell-phone market. A resurging amount of talk-and-text products are being offered by larger players, including Rogers, Bell and Telus in Canada, which only a few short years ago were focusing on data-heavy offerings for their consumers. New telecom players coming to Canada including Wind Mobile, Mobilicity and Public Mobile are positioning themselves as budget cell-phone carriers with the unlimited talk-and-text model and are quickly being undersold by the Big Three.
Price wars are attracting subscribers who would like to pay less for wireless services. This subscriber segment is a very basic user, withsimple needs. These are the same consumers interest in receiving discounts and special offers from brands, the ones who are interactive with their customer service needs and that are always looking for a way to reach the brand. If carriers are creating more “all you can text” wireless plans why not join in the conversation and text your customers using their preferred medium of choice.
The takeaway from this industry shift for consumer brands and marketers is simple. Pay attention to the emerging telecom niche who only want to talk and text – after all they could be your brand’s best customers. And if your brand is looking to expand into mobile marketing, 80% of feature phone users should not be ignored.