how ai enterprise messaging is driving the future of communication

mobile messaging platform

Artificial intelligence (AI) is one of the hottest tech topics today, partly because it has already changed the way businesses interact with their audiences. AI-powered messaging solutions, also known as chatbots, have allowed companies to provide assistance for their customers and potential clients around the clock. Now, artificial technology is slowly infiltrating the world of big corporations and enterprises as well.

Thanks to advancements in AI technology, artificial intelligence messaging solutions are now helping enterprises automate and streamline numerous business processes. These messaging solutions, sometimes called enterprise chatbots, have many benefits like increased productivity and faster turnaround just to name a few.

That being said, setting up a successful enterprise chatbot requires a lot of planning and time investment. To help you out, I’ve put together an article that will teach you how to build an AI-powered chatbot and show you the benefits of using one for your enterprise.

Benefits of AI-Powered Enterprise Messaging Solutions

AI-powered messaging solutions offer an array of benefits and advantages, if used correctly. For instance, they can help big companies cut costs while improving performance. Once integrated, enterprise chatbots can provide information about specific accounts and statistics quickly and efficiently.

In addition, enterprise chatbots can:

Help Manage Projects

Small companies can get away with reduced teams, but larger corporations need as much help as they can get when it comes to organization. Enterprise chatbots are dynamic tools that can help you organize your tasks in a more efficient, productive, and cost-effective manner.

Each one of your clients has different needs, and AI-powered messaging solutions can help identify and ameliorate potential areas of improvement. They allow you to establish communication, receive regular updates, and generate reports automatically. Serve as Virtual Assistants

Having a personal assistant at your disposal can take a huge load of work off of your hands, but not all employees can have their own secretary. But, AI-powered enterprise chatbots can serve as a virtual assistant not only for you, but for your entire team. They can help you make or change appointments, set reminders, make bookings on your behalf, provide extensive information about any major or minor company details, and much more.

Automate Mundane Tasks

One of the best ways to increase productivity is to find a mechanism that automates mundane, yet essential tasks that need to be carried out on daily basis. We all know that boring tasks can become a huge stress factor and can have a negative effect on productivity. Enterprise chatbots can help by taking over these grueling responsibilities, which are often simple in nature but considerably time-consuming.

Instead of hiring new personnel to address mundane responsibilities, big enterprises are implementing AI-powered chatbots. Automating these boring endeavors will help your team keep focus, spend their time completing tasks that add value to the company, and develop new strategies that help promote growth.

Collect Valuable Insights

One of the biggest reasons why chatbots are so efficient is because they help companies gather valuable information about their target audiences. These companies then use the information gathered to build marketing campaigns that have a better chance of connecting with their potential customers.

Enterprise chatbots can help do the same for a corporation’s internal structure. By collecting information about each transaction, an enterprise bot can reveal what areas of your business your team is struggling with the most. You can then use this information to build or remodel your training and upskilling programs, which will result in a more prepared staff.

Provide Assistance for B2B Applications

Artificial intelligence messaging solutions are now helping businesses with numerous B2B applications. These enterprise chatbots are designed to answer questions about supply options, stock, delivery schedules, invoicing, prices, and payments. Moreover, natural language processing and voice activated technologies allow users to interact by voice input, creating a seamless experience.

Streamline Internal Operations

Customer-facing chatbots are stealing the spotlight, but that hasn’t stopped enterprise bots from proving that they are versatile tools. Big enterprises can now streamline internal operations to cut down on paperwork and man hours spent on tasks that don’t generate revenue.

Enterprise chatbots are already being used in different departments, including human resources, finances, production, sales, customer service, and even purchasing. They help by creating reports, comparing prices, sending reminders, analyzing production outputs, and contributing to other vital areas.

Gather Feedback and Satisfaction Surveys

Businesses need to be aware of where they stand at all times, so having open feedback channels is critical for success. Moreover, you have to consider both external feedback that comes from your clients and internal responses from your employees. AI-powered enterprise chatbots can collect and organize surveys that will give you a good idea of where you stand with your customer base and how your team’s morale is doing.

Assist Your Sales Team

Your sales team is the engine of your enterprise, and you need to give it all the tools it needs to be successful. An enterprise chatbot can be a valuable tool for your sales team that can help them answer questions and find unique selling points for each service or product.

How to Build an Enterprise Chatbot

Although they have traditionally required extensive coding knowledge, you can now create an AI-powered enterprise chatbot in a matter of minutes thanks to platforms like Chattypeople. With Chattypeople you can create an AI-powered chatbot without any coding knowledge whatsoever, which you can then manage and optimize through their easy-to-use dashboard.

Building an enterprise chatbot requires a good amount of planning and precise execution. It’s important to remember that the first version you create will not probably be your last one, so you will most likely have to run through the creation process a few times before making it available to your team members

The first thing you have to do is set a tangible goal for your AI messaging solution. Ask yourself:

• What department will my bot be serving? 
• What tasks take up most of my team’s time? 
• What is the most frequently asked question in the office?

Once you identify the purpose of your bot, you can start creating a list of features you would like it to include. Note that your team members will prefer a simple chatbot that can complete a few tasks rather than a complex bot that doesn’t work properly. Your bot’s artificial technology gives it the ability to learn with time, but you should start simple and give it more complicated tasks once it has mastered a few simple responsibilities.

Finally, you have to remember to optimize your bot similarly to how you would optimize a digital marketing campaign. There’s a huge array of metrics available so you can analyze each interaction, and make changes accordingly to increase user experience and overall performance.

The impact of artificial intelligence in modern society is becoming more and more obvious every day. Implementing an AI-powered enterprise chatbot can help your company cut costs and improve productivity dramatically. By following the tips I outlined above you can set up and implement an enterprise chatbot efficiently and start harnessing the power of AI technology.

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best ways to ensure two-factor authentication for better mobile security

Are passwords dead? Not entirely—but as the sole means to log in, protect sensitive information, and link important accounts, usernames and passwords alone are no longer enough. Brute force attacks, phishing scams, data breaches, and SQL injection attacks have become so common that usernames and passwords can be easily cracked, captured, and leaked. Pile on top of that the use of weak passwords, same passwords across multiple accounts, and the use of unsecure wifi networks, and many people are in jeopardy of getting hacked.

So, how can you protect yourself? And how can the applications we rely on to keep our data protected better safeguard the login process?

Two-factor authentication (2FA, TFA, or multi-factor authentication) has become one of the best ways to ensure the only person logging into your account is you, and it’s an excellent way to thwart brute force attacks and hacks when passwords have been compromised. By requiring a second form of verification, 2FA is the next level of security—and it offers better peace of mind.

mobile messaging platform

Here’s how 2FA works, why it’s a great solution, and some tips for implementing it in your own application or personal life.

What is 2-Factor Authentication?

It’s pretty clear that plain old passwords are an antiquated form of security and not enough when it comes to keeping our communications, accounts, and sensitive data secure. While we use passwords for nearly everything—from banking and social accounts to email—most of us still aren’t using basic best practices for creating strong passwords, or are failing to use unique passwords for each account. It all adds up to increased vulnerability that’s making it easier than ever for hackers to steal our passwords and information.

2FA manages to make this more difficult by adding a second layer of defense. While passwords alone grant access by asking for “something you know,” 2FA requires both this and “something you have” in order to grant access. This means that even if someone has acquired your password, unless they’re you and have your phone or other trusted device in their hand, it will be much more difficult for them to gain access to your accounts.

Authentication adds a second, often physical method to verifying your identity, and it’s quickly becoming a gold standard for safer, more secure logins.

Something You Know, Something That You Have, and Something That You Are

2FA is based on providing two of the following three “somethings”: (1) something you know, which is your username and password combination or a pin, (2) something you have, which can be a bank card, mobile device, smartwatch, or another device you’ve flagged as safe, and in more advanced scenarios, (3) something you are, which includes biometrics like fingerprints, retina scans, or voice recognition. By requiring a user to verify their identity with two or more of these unique ways, 2FA is effectively extending security beyond the password.

In many cases, a unique, one-time authorization code is sent to a device via an SMS, which you then enter to prove your identity. You can also install a native application on your phone which will dynamically generate this one-time token, or a physical device like a key fob or USB drive that’s synched with a server to randomly generate numbers.

More About Tokens

Tokens are unique, one-time codes sent to users via SMS or push notification, which means you’ll need access to your phone to receive the text. It’s possible for these to be intercepted, but for the most part they’re very secure because you and only you physically have your phone and can receive them. A software token can be generated by an app installed on your phone, like Google Authenticator or Authy. Other times, tokens are sent via email (less secure, if your credentials have already been stolen, and you can risk missing the email if it’s bounced), or by phone call, which is less common and pretty inconvenient to users.

A hacker with your username and password can theoretically get as far as the second step in a 2FA-enabled application, but when that code is sent to your phone, only you will receive it—and their hack (hopefully) ends there.

This scenario is an added benefit of 2FA, because if you receive an access code when you didn’t request one, right away you’ll be tipped off to the fact that someone, somewhere has your username and password and is attempting to log in as you.

Authorization vs. Authentication: What’s the Difference?

Before we go further, let’s quickly touch on the difference between these two easily confused terms. As you’ve read so far, authentication is how an application verifies the identity of the user interacting with it. Authorization is generally dependent on that authentication step, and allows third-party applications to access your information via an authorization server and a one-time “token” that grants access between the two.

For example, when an application allows you to login and load basic profile information without having to enter a username and password—say, when you log in to your Nike Running Club app using your Facebook account—that’s authorization. It’s the process that allows an application to determine what permissions it has to access a resource, or to perform a specific operation. Frameworks like OAuth 2.0 and OpenID Connect are common protocols for this, and they enforce TLS-encrypted connections for extra security.

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enabling companies via text messaging

mobile messaging platform

Text messaging has become a societal norm, today perhaps the most frequent way friends, family, and colleagues keep in touch with one another. Texting, you might say, has become second nature -- and therein lies a dilemma. Many people today expect the ability to send text messages to any phone number, even when those aren't mobile.

In fact, network traffic analysis reveals that people send 150 million text messages a day to landline numbers that aren't able to handle them. With modern, cloud-based technology, that's an unnecessary communications.

Text enablement provides a way to patch that hole by adding messaging functionality to landline and 1-800 numbers already in use for voice calls. A customer can still pick up a phone and call, but should he or she decide to text to that number instead, the cloud-based business texting platform delivers the message to the customer's connected device. That might be a desktop, laptop, tablet, or even mobile phone, for example.

Companies that text enable their business lines report benefits such as improved engagement, reduced costs, and impressed customers. Simply put, customers expect the ability to send and receive text messages rather than being forced to call, or email, and they appreciate companies the recognize this.

Customer support, as well as appointment scheduling, are popular use cases among those companies that have already text-enabled their 1-800 and landline numbers. However, text-enabling phone numbers isn't limited to customer service operations. Sales calls, account management, and order status notifications are among potential use cases.

Companies that stick within their voice calling and email comfort zones are out of touch with today's messaging-based reality. Their customers will notice -- and not in a good way.

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how text messages can be a highly effective way to connect with customers

Connecting with consumers when they’re on the go is more important than ever, and text message marketing (also referred to as SMS, or short message service marketing) can be a highly effective technique.

But the proliferation of mobile devices doesn’t guarantee marketing success. If your pitches don’t resonate with consumers and motivate them to act, then your efforts are for naught.

Dynamically Send, Receive & Enhance Text Message Campaigns.

Here are five tips for writing marketing texts that get read and produce results:

1. Be brief and focused.
Your text message should be laser focused and succinct. There’s no room for fluff in mobile marketing. Know who your target audience is and speak directly to it. Leave out extraneous details and simply describe how to take advantage of your offer and its benefits.


2. Avoid hype, slang and abbreviations.
If your text message looks like spam, consumers will delete it without a second thought. It’s critical that you leave out anything that might seem too slick and promotional. That includes marketing hype like “amazing” offers, slang and text abbreviations, all of which cheapen the perception of your brand and can destroy your campaign.


3. Offer something of immediate value.
No one wants to receive texts from a company unless the messages offer something of immediate value. Because text messaging is an instantaneous medium, you should include real-time offers. Whether you’re providing information about a sale or a new product, the message should describe the benefits of acting now.


4. Identify yourself.
How often have you received a text that doesn’t identify the company or brand? Instead, you often see a phone number you don’t recognize and a vague message that could have come from any number of companies. And how often have you simply deleted those anonymous messages? It’s essential that you clearly identify your business or brand to avoid getting the spam treatment.


5. Make consumers feel special.
Don’t clutter consumers’ text message inboxes with offers and news they could easily get from your website or your brick-and-mortar locations. Instead, make recipients of your texts feel they’re special and have qualified for an exclusive promotion. Otherwise, they will most likely opt out of receiving any future texts from you.

Examples of Mobile Marketing Texts

Here are a few sample texts to help you avoid mistakes and write an effective marketing message:

Bad Example 1: Amazing prices at www.abcbags.com almost 2G2BT. Miss these prices AYOR.

Bad Example 2: Hey! Did you see this sale? www.abcbags.com. Gotta get your bag before it’s too late.

Both texts include the hype, abbreviations and slang that can hurt your campaign.

Now, look at some good examples:

Good Example 1: 50% off all leather laptop bags at www.abcbags.com for the next 48 hours only. Use coupon code HALFOFFTEXT at checkout.

Good Example 2: ABC Bags 50% off leather laptop bags through 3/31/12. Show this message to store manager to get half off. Find a store: www.abcbags.com/locations.

Notice in each example that the offer is succinctly stated, with a clear call-to-action. Each text also provides a sense of value, timeliness and exclusivity. The messages create a sense of urgency, which people would expect from a text.

Remember that finding the right messages for your audience will take time and experimentation. But the tips and examples above should help you achieve your goals of getting noticed and making some sales.

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SMS provides unified key management across data communication

Dynamically Send, Receive & Enhance Text Message Campaigns.

Over the past two decades, email has evolved from a novel method of communication to the primary form of correspondence used by businesses around the world. Discovery of emails and other electronic documents has followed this trend to become a fixture of commercial litigation, with its own set of ever-improving methods and tools familiar to inside and outside counsel. Recently, short and multimedia message service (SMS and MMS, better known as text messaging) has exploded in popularity across all categories of users, including businesses, leading to a glut of less formal (and less cautious) "instant" communications as a supplement to, or replacement of, traditional email. While SMS e-discovery is in its relative infancy, numerous recent court decisions should put all organizations on notice: Texts are discoverable, and failure to plan accordingly may result in damaging admissions, adverse inferences or worse.

Several related factors have kept SMS e-discovery from becoming a commonplace practice to date: unfamiliarity with SMS data management, fear of reciprocal demands for SMS data and the general objection that it presents an undue burden under discovery principles of proportionality and reasonableness. With the expanding use of SMS, however, such excuses are going by the wayside. The growing number of decisions on this issue illustrate that plenty of litigants are willing to open this door, and that courts are unlikely to accept a blanket objection based on undue burden. In light of these trends, organizations are best advised to develop strategies and procedures to manage texting practices, to preserve information on SMS devices, and to develop procedures for SMS data management in the civil discovery context.

An organization's well-defined mobile device policy will provide the foundation for managing the use, and preservation, of this ubiquitous form of communication. There are essentially three categories: company-owned-personally-enabled (COPE), bring-your-own-device (BYOD), or a hybrid approach that gives some or all employees the option between COPE and BYOD. While a COPE policy gives organizations the most control over the mode and storage of instant messages, such uniformity presents significant costs and overhead. For large and complex organizations, a hybrid approach is often preferred because it allows increased flexibility at a reduced cost; however, the great diversity of devices and operating systems adds further complexity in preserving and managing the underlying data. For example, while a typical Android or iOS mobile device preserves text messages for some period of time after a user deletes them, both operating systems have data volume limits and hidden automatic functions allowing permanent deletion unless backed up elsewhere or re-configured and actively managed by IT professionals. There are additional usage-based variables that can be impacted by the database rules and architecture of each system, which are compounded by carrier-specific device configuration, as well as cloud-based and other personal storage options. While a growing number of manufacturer-specific and third-party software platforms are being developed to manage data retention on individual devices, there is no industry-standard enterprise solution. These factors tend to make management, data holds, backup and retrieval a case-by-case challenge.

Company-owned and managed-texting applications, or "apps," provide a particularly interesting option to lessen the obstacles presented by the multitude of mobile hardware and software systems, along the lines of an enterprise email server for instant messages. These apps provide a texting platform separate from the "factory installed" applications on iOS, Android, or other operating systems, allowing enterprise-level data retention and deletion policies to be implemented, without the cost of a traditional COPE policy. One potential shortcoming of this category of apps is that they may only support texting between devices that have the app installed, limiting their use to internal SMS communication. Nonetheless, the cost and security benefits of enterprise-level management of enterprise-managed texting apps are apparent.

While this remains a developing area of law, inside counsel and their IT counterparts can take a number of immediate steps to minimize risks associated with SMS:

• Adopt a formal, written texting policy defining the proper use of mobile devices and instant messages, including what topics may and may not be discussed by text;

• Educate personnel to apply the same caution to email and SMS correspondence; whether it is a company-owned or BYO device, all communications, including business and personal texts, may be subject to discovery in the event of litigation;

• Perform an audit of all employee mobile devices and messaging platforms to produce an active and dynamic picture of a company's user base, determining what employees use mobile devices for work, whether they are COPE or BYOD devices, manufacturer, model, and operating system of devices, and what security measures are in place on those devices;

• Develop realistic monitoring procedures, coupled with practical enforcement tools to maximize compliance;

• Consider a third-party internal texting app to provide enterprise-level management of SMS data; and

• Implement proportional and reasonable procedures governing the preservation and discovery of text messages, focusing efforts on key personnel or a control group subset from the entire universe of relevant mobile users. By taking proactive steps to identify the key actors and preserve their texts, a party lays the foundation to argue the steps it took were reasonable and proportional in the event of a discovery dispute.

Like email discovery before it, SMS discovery will evolve as the courts shape its parameters and as vendors and counsel develop the tools and procedures to meet this growing need. The organizations best prepared to deal with these challenges will be those that evolve their practices in tandem with these trends. An affirmative, integrated approach will minimize the risks when—not if—employees' text messages become key evidence.

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how ai powered chatbots empower customer experience

Advances in artificial intelligence and natural language processing are helping bots to drive more engagement than ever.

From geo-targeting to voice search, technology is opening up a world of possibilities for marketers. But it’s also complicated, as new capabilities and use cases seem to emerge every day.

With the goal of breaking down some of the most important concepts to provide a better understanding of the basics — and a jumping off point for exploring how far the power of location may take us — we introduce the next installment of our GeoMarketing 101 series: what marketers need to know about chatbots.

mobile messaging platform

What Are Chatbots?

Put simply, a chatbot refers to a computer program designed to simulate conversation with human users, responding to texts or other forms of digital chat.

Chatbots able to respond to a to a greeting (“hello, how are you?”) or a simple query have been around for a while, and plenty of older Millennials probably remember the SmarterChild bot of the 90’s in particular. But today, advances in artificial intelligence (AI) and Natural Language processing (NLP) concurrent with the rise of voice-activated intelligent assistants, like Amazon Alexa, have given chatbots stronger conversational abilities by allowing them to learn over time, thereby beginning to expand the possibilities for their use.

With that in mind, it’s fairly easy to see how these bots can be a boon to marketers. Consumers often have far more questions for businesses — ranging from inquiries about products to seeking help navigating a website — than human employees can deal with in an efficient or profitable manner. With bots becoming “smarter,” marketers are increasingly using the technology to engage customers in-app, answer questions, and help build the personalized, one-to-one relationships that today’s consumers seek.

As Trevor Hardy, chief executive at The Future Laboratory, explained to retailers at this year’s Retail Week Live, “we certainly think the future of retail is about service, and about the human element of service — but [it doesn’t all] have to be provided by humans.”

How Chatbots Can Drive Engagement

Messaging apps draw over 4.1 billion users worldwide, indicating that the appetite for this type of communication is functionally universal. But perhaps the more striking figure is the reliance on messaging apps — both for communicating with friends and with brands — amongst the youngest segment of the population: A majority of Gen-z teens (52 percent) say they spend three or more hours per day on messaging apps, but texting doesn’t rank in their top three mobile activities at all, according to Think With Google.

These statistics indicate a strong potential willingness to communicate with brands via text-based means. But in considering how (and whether) to implement chatbots part of a marketing strategy, brands may wonder if consumers are turned off by the idea of knowing they’re conversing with a bot. Does the technology make users feel like they’re getting a personalized response to their questions — or does it seem inhuman?

AI chatbots are still in their infancy. But recent examples underscore the idea that bots can actually drive as high — or higher — engagement than personal brand representatives themselves. Take, for instance, the example of CoverGirl’s “KalaniBot,” a chatbot inspired by one of the brand’s key influencers, actress and model Kalani Hilliker. Far from seeming impersonal or “scaring off” fans, the KalaniBot actually saw 14x the engagement of the live Kalani when she was just doing some promotion on Instagram and Snapchat.

The same trend appeared to hold true in the banking sector as well: While the company declined to release exact figures, HSBC earlier this year reported having driven a marked increase in engagement with the launch of its chatbot — which outperformed banner ads across platforms.

As Masthead Media’s Amanda Pressner Kreuser put it in an article for Inc., “the evolution of chatbots makes them ideal for marketing or as an alternative way to distribute media. If they are scripted well, these bots can mimic a conversation with a customer in a tone that reflects the brand’s identity.”

So, if marketers can identify a clear purpose for deploying chatbots — communicating with millions of customers of a global brand (like Sephora, for instance), or reaching Gen-Z shoppers through improved messaging options — statistics indicate that the technology is a smart bet for driving engagement. And with the rise of connected intelligence and voice search linked to marked advancements in AI, the future of chatbots is likely to be much more sophisticated than we can imagine today.

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sms remains key, but instant messaging is gaining

Enterprise Mobile Messaging

With SMS now over 20 years old, mobile messaging is undergoing immense changes and in the era of fluid communications the habits of consumers are providing interesting insights into our preferences and behaviors. The Mobile Messaging Report 2016 carried out by Mobile Ecosystem Forum (MEF), which we are a member off, looked into consumer and enterprise trends and revealed some great insight into the current state of mobile messaging.

The obvious emergence of over-the-top (OTT) apps such as WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, Viber and Snapchat is overtaking SMS in person to person messaging. The MEF study shows that 56 percent of people regularly use Facebook Messenger, 50 percent of people regularly use WhatsApp and 42 percent use SMS.

The data no doubt reflects a remarkable change in the way people choose to communicate on their phones since SMS has been the key communications channel since the mid-1990s. It remained this way until the start of this decade when new IP based apps took over, using the data network rather than the cellular network to move messages. In Europe and the U.S. the most successful has been WhatsApp. Launched in 2009 the application passed the one billion user milestone in February 2016. Meanwhile, Facebook Messenger has made speedy progress. It launched in August 2011 and recently passed 800 million users. The popularity of these apps no doubt stems from cost or functionality, or both. End users appreciate features such as the ability to create closed groups, image content and see when someone has read a message. Of course, despite all the hype around OTT messaging, it is worth stressing that SMS remains just as popular, with nearly half of all people surveyed still using it regularly.

Businesses are also increasingly turning to messaging and, for enterprise and business models, the preference is SMS, thanks to its versatility, reliability and usability. We are all so reliant on our phones these days, that it might not surprise you to know that 91% of all adults have a phone within arms’ reach 24/7. But did you know that 98% of text messages are read, while only 20% of emails are read and 29% of Twitter posts are read. These stats alone demonstrate the power of SMS marketing.

Going back to the MEF report, 76 percent of consumers have received communications from businesses such as banks, healthcare and retailers via SMS and 65 percent actually report having engaged with companies themselves via chat apps. The MEF study has revealed widespread adoption of A2P messaging across many industries, with financial services being the most active. The UK is the most enthusiastic adopter of A2P messaging for health with 33 per cent of us having corresponded this way.

Interestingly the report also showed that mobile-first countries such as Nigeria, China and India are embracing SMS, this is due to people in these countries skipping the PC phase, they never embraced email in the same way as their Western counterparts.

The findings from the MEF report offer a wealth of insights into what the future might look like for mobile messaging. The increase of mobile and smartphone penetration, combined with more affordable and faster mobile data access, along with the boom in the recent app economy, has given rise to OTT messaging apps. These apps are so easy to use that they have eclipsed SMS as the primary medium for P2P communications across all demographics and geographies.

SMS still has relevance in terms of global usage. Application to Person Messaging (or Enterprise to Consumer) SMS still remains the most trusted channel for communications by consumers. Also SMS remains the only ubiquitous global messaging platform, and the only one with a unique and globally recognized addressing system, making it still the preferred channel for enterprises.

The study has shown both OTT Messaging Apps and SMS are still relevant to consumers, but for different uses and based upon consumer needs. SMS offers the advantage of being device agnostic; OTT messaging apps require closed user groups that rely on users having the same application installed to communicate with each other. Furthermore, they rely entirely on the user having access to a smartphone capable of running the application, along with a data connection that is provided by network operators.

SMS on the other hand can be delivered in areas where there is little or no data signal and can be used far beyond just simple P2P messaging. Individuals, organizations and M2M applications are all able to deliver SMS messages to anyone on any network, in any country, and at any time which really shows the diversity, strength and opportunities that SMS can still provide.

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three common mobile marketing mistakes can be incredibly costly

Enterprise Mobile Messaging

If you’ve been using mobile marketing for quite some time now, yet you haven’t really given your promotional campaigns a closer look to make sure that you’re doing them right, then you might want to continue reading. You just might be making some of these mistakes.

1. Not utilizing text marketing.

Some business owners in the mobile promotional industry are not using text messages marketing. They focus more on other aspects like mobile search engine ads, app development, and app optimization.

While these strategies are certainly amazing in their own way, not utilizing text messages might be their downfall if their competitors are using the promotional method — while they are not.

Statistics show that only 37.7% all the mobile phone users in the world use smartphones about three years ago.

This means that for the year 2014, 62.3% out of the 4.23 billion mobile phone users worldwide are not covered by the scope of your campaigns If you aren’t using text messages to advertise your business. Of course, this limitation can be reconciled with ease if you’ll start using this promotional strategy.

There’s a lot of good things that can be said about this advertising method. But before lets have a quick overview of what text marketing is.

Text messages are a promotional method that involves sending text messages over to mobile devices to deliver advertisements and offers to users.

The text messaging process can be done using mobile phones or can be performed in bulk via online SMS aggregators and distributors.

Also, this strategy encompasses a variety of ad types, such as brand and product promotions, sales and discount offers, and commodities that are new in the market.

The messaging campaigns can also incorporate product pictures and sales page links with the advent of smartphones.

Now that you have a better grasp of what text marketing is and how it works, here are three good reasons why you should consider using it:

It’s cost-effective and affordable.

This advertising strategy doesn’t cost as much as putting up mobile ads. In fact, it’s a surefire way to get your message across your audience with minimal expense, as 95% of people who receive texts open and read them within the first three minutes.

It’s easy to setup and to manage.

This promotional method comes in a variety of platforms that can be used at your disposal to ease the management process. With these programs, you can send your intended text to masses with just a click of a button.

It can be fully automated.

Some platforms can be optimized to have a system’s flow that regularly sends pre-written texts to different masses at preset intervals. These texts can contain links that automatically drop interested clickers into a sales funnel that eventually converts potential prospects into revenue-generating customers.

2. Neglecting cloud security

As the marketing trend continually progresses towards the digital field, more and more companies invest their time and money in technologies designed to advance the flow of extending their promotional reach to more individuals participating in the cloud.

This expanded range increases the potential digital prospects that companies could have, which may eventually get converted into customers.

With the population flocking towards this money-making spectrum, it’s no wonder that more hackers or abusers are starting to pop-up to exploit the system so they can profit from it.

Consider this: You’re using a platform that streamlines, optimizes and automates your mobile marketing campaign.

You spend money on this program to automatically text random people in a community to check out your product by clicking on a link in the text.

Hackers can exploit this by breaching into the program and changing where the inserted hyperlink would direct your audience.

When potential prospects click on the link, they would be transferred to a different landing page rather than the one you intended. When that happens, your conversion rate is going to suffer — big time.

What’s worse is that you may not even know about the attack on your system.

Such is how dangerous it can be for businesses to slack off on their cyber security.

You can prevent all this by investing in startup cybersecurity — or at least drastically reduce the chances of your system getting hacked. The ideal protective frameworks should include features such as vulnerability detection, application scanning and testing, insecure permission detection, application firewalls, security assessment, and the like.

Using programs such as these will help you have better control over the safety and security of your business systems.

You’d also be able to prevent fraudulent transactions, spot data leakages, and identify malware with these security features.

3. Low-balling your marketing budget.

You’ve probably heard about this management mistake. In the industry how some business owners aren’t putting ample amount of their resources on their mobile marketing campaigns, yet they expect to generate truckloads of leads out of their promotional efforts.

some business owners focus so much on app development that they neglect their budget for their campaigns.

The bearer of bad news, but considering how there are bazillions of mobile apps on the web, your app may need more than just a few ratings to be noticed by potential prospects and customers.

3.Low-balling your marketing budget.

You need to invest in your campaigns if you want to get real results out of them.

Also, marketing is an ongoing process and does not end once customers avail of your product. Therefore, a lot of value rides on your promotional campaigns.

If you want your customers to stay around, you should consider investing in them via in-app campaigns.

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how a2p messaging is causing mobile operators heavy losses

• More than half of all MNOs losing 50 per cent of potential revenue 
• SMS aggregators use 'grey routes' to bypass network charges 
• They increase their margins while the operators lose out
•  There have been allegations and we know who the alligators are 

It's an astonishing assertion, but, according to the UK-headquartered Dialogue Communications, a company long-specialising in A2P (Applications to Person) SMS, more than half of mobile operators across the globe are actually losing more than 50 per cent of their potential revenue from business-led Application to Person (A2P) SMS traffic.

This is because SMS message aggregators, who are operating on behalf of a great many of the world's most powerful and recognisable brands, use so-called "grey routes" to get around network operator charges. Most of the messages are from specific sectors such as banks and finance houses, logistics and delivery firms, travel and leisure companies and big brands that periodically run competitions and other specific promotions.

Dynamically Send, Receive & Enhance Text Message Campaigns.

The SMS aggregators use grey routes to inflate their margins whilst their customers are led to understand that they are paying a fair price for the services.

Dialogue's founder and CEO, Hugh Spear, says, “There are some firms out there that are effectively not only cheating the operators but also cheating their customers. Taking the grey route to by-pass operator charges increases the chance of non-delivery, provides a safe, profitable haven for the spammers, and risks damaging brand reputation both for the brands associated with the messages and the operators themselves."

He adds that by identifying, isolating and closing the various grey route loopholes MNO's could generate a further US$15 billion in lost revenues over the course of this year alone.

Dialogue bases its arguments on the results of tests it carried out last year on 199 mobile networks in 84 countries. A mere 23 per cent of the networks tested indicated that they were experiencing zero A2P SMS by-pass activity. Meanwhile, 51 per cent of networks had seen 'significant' activity wherein half of all messages has been diverted to grey routes. Worst of all, 28 of the MNOs tested were shown to be suffering an astounding 100 per cent by-pass!

Dialogue's research is bolstered by supportin evidence from another source. The prestigious mobile industry body, the GSMA, found partial or full grey-routing on 75 per cent of 816 operators it surveyed – including 271 of the largest and most influential mobile operator networks that, between them, serve more than half of the world’s mobile consumers.

A dawning realisation that there is a major opportunity at hand. Better late than never

As Paul Garner, Dialogue's Global Director of Sales points out, the gilt is being knocked off the gingerbread where mobile operator revenues are concerned as roaming departments increasingly feel the pinch and and apps make dents in P2P SMS income. Hence the new focus on A2P which the MNOs are now beginning regard as an opportunity to claw back lost revenue they tended either to ignore or discount back in the day when money was easier to make. It's a change of mindset that has been slow to take place but is now well under way.

As Paul Garner says, "The initial growth here was driven out of emerging markets like Cambodia, Indonesia and Bangladesh. Other network operators in other parts of the world, such as eastern Europe and Latin America, looked at what had happened in those places recognised that the lessons learned were applicable to their markets as well and now there is a general realisation that A2P is very important, not only from a revenue angle but also from the perspective of the subscriber. Awareness is evolving and we are about six months or so from reaching critical mass, at which point this market will explode."

Ever since it was first introduced SMS has been incredibly popular and its use has been very high. This is unsurprising given that text messaging on mobile handsets has always been regarded by subscribers as if not entirely free than at least so inexpensive as not to be a financial concern to them.

The sheer volume of duplex P2P SMS traffic generated meant that networks operated regimes of "mutual forgiveness" whereby neither side in a given transaction charged a fee for transmitting an SMS. That worked for quite a while but, eventually, small operators started reselling those connections to data aggregators and the door was opened to grey routes and revenue leakage.

Dialogue is an unusual- perhaps even unique - player in this market in that it is not an aggregator, doesn't sell to brands and doesn't look to minimise cost via grey routing. What it does do is to guarantee to clients, be they aggregator or operator customer, that it will safely deliver 100 per cent of A2P SMS traffic on net.

This, the company claims, levels the playing field for all the aggregators, ensures a fair split of revenue for the operator and also gives the best guarantee of delivery for the brands themselves.

Hugo Spear again: “Identifying grey-routes, blocking those messages and forcing them onto controlled networks should be a priority for operators. They will reap the cost of employing the technology to force a clean approach ten-times over in a single month. The cost does not change for the brands, it simply ensures the revenue is more fairly shared, the service delivery is guaranteed, and the operator knows what is happening on its network.”

Central to Dialogue's offer to the market is its Sentinel software product which sits in the operator network and identifies grey route traffic, blocks it and then forces it onto the managed operator network and shares the revenues at agreed rates.

Paul Garner says, "Immediately after installation Sentinel always delivers, and I do mean always delivers, marked and rapid increase in A2P SMS revenue. For example one operator that deployed Sentinel in 2016 now receives more than half a million dollars in A2P SMS derived revenue each and every month, having had zero beforehand. And the beauty of Sentinel is that it will work for every operator, everywhere. That's why we are going to aggressively drive Sentinel into a new range of markets over the course of this year."

Research undertaken by a variety of bodies indicates that the global A2P SMS market is worth some $55 billion today and that figure will rise to $70 billion by 2020.

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using chatbot messaging via auditory or textual methods

mobile messaging platform

Recently, conversational business has taken center stage, thanks to the evolution of the chatbot. What used to be clunky customer service tools have now been implemented in a huge variety of other processes like marketing, sales, business-to-business, and internal uses.

Since conversational business isn’t just about chatbots,and why bots are in the spotlight, and share some design tips that will help you on your path to success.

Why Are Businesses Implementing Chatbots?

Messaging is quickly becoming the most common form of communication for consumers and businesses alike. In addition to mobile app usage declining by 20% in recent times, those who do still use them spend the majority of their time on messaging apps. The number of messaging users have surpassed social media users, and as a result, businesses are targeting consumers through these channels the best way they can…with chatbots.

Chatbots can be implemented in virtually every popular messaging app today. Not only this, they can now be voice-activated and new conversational devices have been launched by some of the biggest brands in the world, meaning they’re likely here to stay. Plus, they’re able to have unique interactions, at scale, thanks to the rules, machine learning, or artificial intelligence (AI) that powers them.

We’re going to focus on the most popular form of chatbot: AI-powered chatbots. They act as direct members of your team, so it’s crucial they act like it. With that in mind, there are certain conversational aspects to consider when creating your chatbot, no matter its purpose. Here are 10 conversational business tips that will lead you to success:

1- Find Out Where Conversations Will Create the Most Value

While chatbots have proven to be extremely effective tools for a variety of business activities, they’re not necessarily relevant to all brands. You shouldn’t add a chatbot to your processes because they’ve become popular. In fact, implementing a chatbot without a defined strategy could hinder your success.

Find out where conversational interactions will create the most value for your brand and audience, and then work on your chatbot strategy. Find out where your audience frequents and engage with them on their preferred platforms. If these are messaging platforms, find out which ones.

2- Always Aim to Meet Consumer Expectations

Your chatbot should be clear about its capabilities in order to not disappoint your audience. If you promise one thing and deliver another, your bounce rate will be higher and you could lose a significant number of leads. Focus on offering valuable interactions that meet your audience’s expectations and needs.

3- Add Context To Your Conversations

As mentioned above, it’s important to inform your audience of your chatbot’s capabilities. Aside from setting realistic expectations, telling your audience about your chatbot offers them a level of context. It will make your chatbot more likable and personable.

As a result, you’ll reach a higher level of engagement with more meaningful conversations. This, in turn, should allow you to gather more data about your audience. The more you know about your customers, the more you can personalize each conversation to suit their needs and increase sales.

4- Be a Representative of Your Brand

It’s important you make your chatbot an integral part of your brand. It should represent your brand in every conversation and should be able to deliver key business functions through customized and relevant interactions. To achieve this, make sure your chatbot:

• Has the right welcome message 
• Has the correct branding, colors, etc. 
• Follows your brand’s tone of voice .
• Knows answers to your company’s most frequently asked questions 
• Is aware of various relevant business protocols

5- Tailor Your Communications to Your Customers

The beauty of an AI-powered chatbot is that the more it communicates with people, the more it learns. This will improve its understanding of user intent and allow it to generate relevant and accurate responses to any queries it receives.

For it to offer the best possible service, you should pay attention to the flow of the conversation and ensure it is natural in order to reach maximum engagement. Lastly, your bot must be able to communicate in the correct language and style. This can only be achieved by learning about your audience’s demographic, location, age, ethnicity, and so on.

6- Analyze Past Conversations

The best way for you to tailor your communications to your audience is by learning from past conversations. It’s highly likely that your chatbot’s first few interactions won’t be seamless. To improve them, you need to analyze each conversation it has and train it to better understand your audience.

Start by analyzing past conversations. First, establish what it did incorrectly. From there, you can help it understand users, direct conversational flow, and fuel it with insights that it can then use to improve its capabilities and enhance the user’s experience.

7- Humanize Your Chatbot

While you should never try and trick your audience into thinking they’re speaking to a human, there is no reason you can’t make your chatbot human-like. Making your chatbot as human as possible will likely increase user engagement, as well as offer a more positive, memorable, and personable conversational experience.

8- Backup Your Chatbot With a Human Representative

Just because they’ve become more popular and powerful tools does not mean that they are perfect. Chatbots, like humans, still make mistakes. Make sure you’re using your chatbot to automate the right aspects of your business, and if it’s not up to the task, provide a human representative as a backup plan.

Using a human to compensate for the current chatbot technology limitations will help you upkeep your reputation with your audience. This will also help your chatbot generate more data that will allow it to better understand and respond to certain queries in the future.

9- Keep Information Private

Some of the biggest challenges the chatbot industry is facing include security, privacy, and trust. Your chatbot will likely gather sensitive and private information from users. As a business, it’s your duty to keep this information safe. You must establish a conversational privacy policy and set high security standards to gain trust from your audience.

10- Aim to Reduce Conversational Friction

Even if you create the most personable and likable chatbot in the world, your audience will not want to have to chat to it for hours on end to get answers to their questions. Although giving it personality could be a great option for your brand, you need to eliminate any conversational friction and ensure your chatbot makes it easy for users to complete their desired tasks, quickly.

You could do so by:

• Offering closed answer questions 
• Creating clear calls-to-action 
• Using visuals (imagery, videos, etc.) 

Finally…

Because chatbots have improved, users have higher expectations. Launching a chatbot that doesn’t provide a productive service isn’t a good reflection of your brand; if it simply can’t get the job done, it will have a negative impact on your reputation. By following the tips outlined above, you’ll not only keep your audience engaged, but also attract new users, and in turn, increase sales.

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