SMS has become a trusted medium of communication for large and small businesses, and has added to the operational efficiency of these firms. In essence, the value of SMS messaging for business communications is the ability to quickly send a short and relevant message directly to a targeted database of contacts.
Unlike the experience of e-mail spam, the price tag paid by the sender of SMS has played a large part, along with enforceable industry regulations, in reducing the number of unwanted commercial messages to cellphones.
There is a steady uptake of SMS messaging among a range of sectors. For instance, doctors and dentists are sending appointment reminders, logistics companies are alerting customers of package deliveries, and travel agents are sending accommodation and flight booking confirmations to their clients' cellphones.
Social media threat
Despite the growth of the mobile messaging industry, in today's messaging market SMS competes with other Internet communication channels. The rise of social media sites such as MySpace, Facebook and Twitter, alongside instant messaging services as offered by Skype, MSN, and ICQ, seems to threaten the place of SMS messaging as a preferred and personalised way of communicating to specific contacts via their cellphone. Many of these social media services are now available on cellphones that can access the Internet.
What needs to be kept in mind, however, is the function of these different communication channels. Internet-based social media related communication channels provide personal and public arenas for broadcasting messages and content. They are about staying in contact in what can be best described as a global digital caf'e, where a user can pop in and have a coffee and chat any time of the day or night. In many ways, social media is e-mail on steroids; with the default sending option set to “many” rather than cc'ing all contacts when sending an e-mail.
Social media also has the added networking effect of allowing people to become friends or followers by a click of the mouse. In an age where people complain about the intrusion of e-mail spam in their PC inboxes, it does seem a little ironic how egos are stroked as Facebook friends or Twitter followers grow - adding to the user's digital status or fifteen nanoseconds of fame. Here, users value how many messages they can post to their contacts.
Instant messaging, on the other hand, requires parties to be online at the same time for a conversation to occur. These conversations are between individuals or within chosen communities - where someone may have a question that he knows cannot be answered by those around him, he goes online to his instant message chat service or a designated chat room and asks the questions of his online contacts. Or someone may log in to their instant messaging service to see which friends or family (overseas or local) are online and available for a quick chat. Instant messaging is not necessarily about messaging, but about communicating cheaply via a system that potentially imitates a phone call.
I want it now
The immediacy of online chat and its mobile variants, and social media in general, all rely on people having Internet access to receive messages. The nature of this medium is informal and chatty, although businesses are looking at ways of using social media to increase their market reach through conversational marketing - a new variant of viral or guerrilla marketing adapting to the era of interactive media.
In contrast, SMS messaging offers a far simpler way of communicating a message and does not require a customer or client to be in front of a computer connected to the Internet to receive a message. Rather, an SMS message is sent to a cellphone and means that the recipient can be mobile and still get important messages.
SMS messaging does offer a more formal means of communicating than social media services.
Dr Pieter Streicher is MD of BulkSMS.com.
From a business perspective, SMS messaging does offer a more formal means of communicating than social media services. As a digitised memo, SMS allows for the sending of succinct notifications, reminders and alerts and, due to the fact that it supports minimal functionality, SMS messaging does not require a high-end phone, or for the user to be tech-savvy to use the technology to send and receive messages.
SMS messaging is an immediate and uncomplicated communications tool, and the real beauty is in how its simplicity increases the efficiency of intra- and inter-firms communications, especially when businesses use computer-based applications to send SMS messages or manage SMS campaigns. In essence, and unlike social media, SMS messaging gives a business the control over how they engage and build relationships with their contacts by the sending of relevant communications.
Where social media is ever changing, SMS is established and stable. New social media and instant messaging services are appearing regularly. The social media network of choice from two years ago is barely mentioned anymore, and in two years, the one being used today might be outdated. SMS is a time-honoured space used to communicate short messages between contacts. This is a constant medium worth investing in by, for example, integrating SMS into existing IT systems.
In the current economic climate, businesses have much to gain in looking at the SMS channel to quickly get out important messages to their contacts, and even saving on their telephone bill. SMS is here to stay as a trusted and reliable workhorse in the digital world of messaging. The current trend towards social media seems to offer much public relations value to firms. In contrast, the time and spend on SMS messaging offers a return on investment for businesses and enables them to build direct and lasting relationships with their customers.
* Dr Pieter Streicher is MD of BulkSMS.com.
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