SMS/MMS text messaging can help local governments and public-safety agencies connect to the public

According to Pew Research, nine-in-ten American adults (92%) own a mobile phone of some kind. That reach is undisputed and why more and more industries are working to develop consumer mobile engagement strategies. This includes public-safety and local government agencies.

Currently, Wireless Emergency Alerts (WEA) are the official government communication vehicle for distributing urgent public-safety messages via the mobile channel, but is it possible these agencies could take mobile communication a step further by exploring the use of additional tools?

For instance, according to research conducted by Pew Research on smartphone usage, one of the most overlooked mobile features—yet most frequently used by consumers—is SMS/MMS text messaging. If utilized properly, this can provide a direct and ongoing line of engagement to local residents, which can become extremely important when trying to notify citizens of a major public-safety incident. However, in order to do that, access and approval to message with local mobile numbers is needed. One way some agencies have been accomplishing this is through the use of common short codes. These five- to six-digit codes let mobile users opt-in to receiving text-message notifications from a particular agency. They are universally accessible on most networks and mobile devices.

Most agencies—especially local governments in cities such as Anaheim and Seattle—already have messaging alert systems that local residents have the option to join. Right now, that is possible only via a website, which can limit residents’ awareness of and engagement with these programs. In today’s mobile first world, local governments can employ common short codes to increase engagement and get more residents connected and informed. This lets residents easily opt-in to alerts and announcements, and government agencies can promote them via advertisements, brochures and other collateral.

Another advantage of utilizing SMS/MMS is that it is targeted to a mobile subscriber’s opt-in phone number, which may or may not physically be located in the geographic area where a person is currently located. For example, subscribers could sign up for weather alerts in the town where they have a vacation home or where family members live, to monitor their safety. WEA alerts only target an area where the subscriber is currently physically located and where the phone is turned on and is receiving a signal.

How can local public-safety and government agencies use common shorts codes to augment their current WEA efforts?

1. Timely information on weather or other conditions: Weather conditions can escalate quickly, putting safety at risk. Hot and dry summers can lead to brush fires; tornadoes or hurricanes can hit at any time; winter can bring frigid icy temperatures and heavy snow, and that snow and heavy rain eventually can lead to flooding. By opting into a messaging service—either with participating public-safety agencies (fire department or police) or the local city government—residents could receive timely information about these conditions, including what areas might be impacted most by unsafe conditions, who should be contacted for more detailed information, safety reminders, etc.

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45 texting statistics that prove businesses need to take SMS seriously

Texting has been around for over 20 years, but it’s only now just hitting its stride when it comes to business. Formerly just a way to send silly photos and emoticons (and to some extent, it still is), text messaging is now being viewed as a powerful way for businesses to connect with their customers.

For example, it’s widespread, affordable, real-time and flexible. It’s also brief, preferred, and can be used in any industry to satisfy customers.

What’s not to like?

At OneReach, we’re not shy about singing text messaging’s praises—it’s a great way to interact with friends, family and customers alike. However, we know it’s important to back up our opinion with some cold hard facts, so that’s why we’ve compiled 45 texting statistics on why text messaging is such a powerful business tool. Check them out below, then let us know what you think of texting for business in the comments.

1.Texting is the most widely-used and frequently used app on a smartphone, with 97% of Americans using it at least once a day. (Pew Internet)

2.People worldwide will send 8.3 trillion text messages in just this year alone. That’s almost 23 billion messages per day, or almost 16 million messages per minute. (Portio Research)

3.Over 6 billion text messages are sent in the U.S. each day. (Forrester)

4.Over 80% of American adults text, making it the most common cell phone activity. (Pew Internet)

5. Text messages have a 98% open rate, while email has only a 20% open rate. (Mobile Marketing Watch)

6. Text messaging has a 45% response rate, while email only has a 6% response rate. (Velocify)

7. Texting takes up 14.1% of cell phone users’ time. (Nielsen)

8. 90% of all text messages are read in under 3 minutes. (Connect Mogul)

9.Text messages are read on average in under five seconds. (SlickText)

10.75% of phones worldwide (4.5 billion) are text-enabled (DuoCall Communications)

11. 96% of smartphone users text. (Acision)

12.Americans sent 69,000 texts every second in 2012 (CTIA)

13.The average adult spends a total of 23 hours a week texting (USA Today)

14. The average Millennial exchanges an average of 67 text messages per day (Business Insider)

15. On average, Americans exchange twice as many texts as they do calls (Nielsen)

16.Only 43% of smartphone owners use their phone to make calls, but over 70% of smartphone users text (Connect Mogul)

17.55% of heavy text message users (50+ texts per day) say they would prefer to receive a text over a phone call (Pew Research Center)

18.In 2011, 31% of Americans said they preferred text messages to phone calls (Pew Research Center)

19. It takes the average person 90 minutes to respond to email, but only 90 seconds to respond to a text message. (CTIA)
20.American women text 14% more than men. (Nielsen)

21. 79% of companies believe customers want SMS/text support. (ICMI)

22.38% of contact centers currently offer SMS, and 23% have plans to add it in the next 12 months. That means 61% of contact centers will offer SMS support in 2016. (Dimension Data)

23. 80% of people are currently using texting for business. (eWeek)

24.One in five consumers is just as likely to prefer a text message from a business to a phone call. (ICMI)

25. The activities people with text capabilities would most prefer to do via text are: check order status (38%) schedule or change appointments (32%) and make or confirm reservations (31%). (Harris poll; link below)

26. Over half of customers said they would be likely to text with a customer support agent. Similarly, 52 percent would prefer texting customer support over their current preferred form of communication. (eWeek)

27. A 2012 study found that text was the highest rated contact method for customer satisfaction out of all other customer communication channels. Text earned 90 out of 100 points, while phone earned 77 out of 100 and Facebook earned 66. (CFI Group)

28. Millenials prefer automated text messaging over IVR, including speech-based solutions (Frost Sullivan)

29.Over one-third of business professionals say they can’t go 10 minutes without responding to a text. (eWeek)

30. SMS text chat converts a $6-$20 call to a chat that costs pennies per session. (Forrester & ContactBabel)

31. At least five types of social media channels are used in more than 50% of call centers, including SMS/texting (VoIP Info)

32. Sales prospects who are sent text messages convert at a rate 40% higher than those who are not sent any text messages. (Velocify)

33.Over 80% of people use text messaging for business, and 15% said that more than half their messages are for business purposes. (eWeek)

34.Almost 25% of marketers are currently using text messaging. Over 65% of them report SMS as being “very effective.” (ExactTarget)

35.70% of U.S. consumers appreciate getting texts or emails from healthcare providers. (Loyalty 360)

36.75% of people would like to have offers sent to them via SMS. (Digital Marketing Magazine)

37.Over 80% of people would only like to receive a maximum of two marketing messages per month. (Digital Marketing Magazine)

38. 44% of consumers with texting capabilities would prefer to press a button to initiate a text conversation immediately, rather than waiting on hold to speak with an agent. (Harris Poll; link below)

39. Texting in the sales process can lead to conversion gains of more than 100%. However, sending text messages before establishing contact with a prospect can adversely affect both contact and conversion rates. (Velocify)

40. 20% of financial services companies use mobile messaging to ensure business continuity and add to their multichannel capabilities. (Loyalty 360)

41.77% of consumers with texting capabilities aged 18-34 are likely to have a positive perception of a company that offers text capability. (Harris Poll; link below)

42. 44% of consumers would rather receive product details and other marketing messages through text over any other channel. (Direct Marketing Association)

43.72% of business professionals prefer texting to messaging apps. (eWeek)

44.Nearly 70% of employees think their organization should use text messaging to communicate with employees, and 86% say it should not be reserved for just customer communication. (Vitiello Communications Group)

45.64% of all consumers are likely to have a positive perception of a company that offers texting as a service channel (Harris Poll; link below).

So, what did you think of the texting statistics? Do you think more companies should start offering text messaging? Is there another, better channel that we’re missing, or are you just not fond of text messaging altogether?

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make mobile messaging part of your communications plan

The days of the single channel “call center” are gone, replaced by multi-channel contact centers. An important part of the customer service channel mix – texting via SMS – can create dialogue and support digital consumer needs.

As more companies and consumers take advantage of mobile, the financial industry now finds itself at a crossroads. Research from Zipwhip shows that consumers attempted to send more than 400,000 text messages to Fortune 100 companies’ toll-free numbers during a one-year period.

Of those attempted messages, 50% were sent to Fortune 100 financial services companies. Considering the number of customers attempting to contact financial institutions via SMS using their toll-free phone numbers, there is an enormous amount of pressure on these companies to support this “mobile-first” mindset by text enabling their toll-free numbers for customer support.

Mobile has become the new normal and is shifting the customer engagement paradigm. Customers expect to receive information at the right time, on the right device. To continue to provide superior experiences and retain customers long-term, it is crucial for financial institutions to create strategies that incorporate mobile messaging into the communication channels that customers prefer using.

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6 tips for success in SMS marketing

Text message marketing has been popular channel for many companies over the last few years. If you haven’t tried this yet, it may be because you have the wrong idea about text message marketing. Used properly, it is an opportunity for extremely precise targeting, and can be an effective tool to reach an elusive but lucrative demographic: the younger generation.

A Few Cool Facts About Text Message Marketing

Text message marketing is often referred to as SMS, or short messaging service. Consider a few of these statistics:

• SMS is the most widely accessible marketing tool, surpassing email for 18-24 year olds. 97% of Americans send or receive at least one text per week.
• Consumers who are sent text messages have a 40% higher conversion rate than those who are not sent any text messages.
• According to Mobile Marketing Watch, SMS messages have a 98% open rate (compared to email’s 20%).

However, just because a message is opened and read, it does not mean that your consumer is going to convert. In other words, you have to be very particular about where these messages are going and how often you’re sending them to potential customers.

The Ins and Outs of Text Message Marketing

As discussed above, SMS marketing has the potential to greatly grow your business if done correctly. Below lists several things you need to keep in mind when you set out to create an SMS campaign:

1. Sending to the Right Contacts

SMS would not be successful if you didn’t have anyone to receive your messages. According to the laws of the Telephone Consumer Protection Act, you can only send text messages to those who have opted to receive them. The best thing you can do is give your customers the choice to receive your messages by asking them during a subscription process online or asking them to text a certain term to your company number.

Be sure that you tell them exactly what they can expect from your messages. In the end, asking permission will help ensure that your messages are going to people who are interested and not annoyed.

2. Be Clear and Brief

When it comes to the content of your messages, you want to make sure you are clear and to the point. Any message that is over 160 characters will be broken up by the phone company into multiple texts, and this could cause a variety of problems including making the entire message undeliverable and incurring extra fees for the business owner.


Make sure you include a call to action so readers know what is expected of them and what steps they need to take next. It’s an art coming up with an engaging message and a CTA all in 160 characters, but it’s at least better than Twitter, right?

A phone number or URL are great examples of effective CTAs. Avoid slang and above all, be creative. You’re not the only business using SMS marketing so you want to make sure your texts stand out against the competition.

3. Timing Is Everything

You obviously don’t want to be sending messages too late or too early in the day, but you also need to make sure that you are giving your customers enough time to act on your message. No one wants to receive a coupon after they’ve already made a purchase. Consider writing the message in advance then sending it later.

You also want to consider the frequency of your messages. You don’t want to overload consumers with messages so they get annoyed and start to ignore/delete them upon receipt. Most businesses that use SMS marketing only send one text per week, and some companies send as little as one every two weeks and still get quite a few bites.

4. Offer Variety

Always make sure you’re updating your messages. Unlike other tactics where you can send the same message twice (social networks primarily), you should never send someone the same text message twice. Make sure you’re always changing up your message and keeping things interesting.

It’s also important to make sure what you’re offering through SMS marketing is different from all other promotions you’re conducting. Consumers will have no reason to opt in to SMS if they can get the same deal through email or social media.

5. Watch Your Database

Mobile phone numbers get changed and deleted all the time, so it’s important you check regularly to make sure you’re sending your messages to the right people. This happens more often than companies realize! If your database is running low on contacts, make sure you’re advertising SMS on any and all promotional materials, both in print and online.

If you have a company newsletter or flyer, it should include your shortcodes. Send them out via email, print them on business cards, and don’t be afraid to mention them verbally to consumers. This article by Entrepreneur lists several other ways to grow your SMS database.

6. Have an Opt-Out Option

By law in the U.S., you have to let people know how they can stop receiving your messages. In most cases, you can just put directions in your message. Something like “text STOP to opt-out” works great. Below is an example of the text messages I receive from Bed Bath & Beyond that shows not only an opt-out option, but also their frequency and CTAs:

It’s also very important that you monitor and analyze all of your results so you make sure you’re sending the most relevant information to a relevant audience. Keep track of metrics such as open rates, click-through rates, conversions, the number of subscribers as well as those who choose to opt out of the service.

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how you can manage mobile messaging better

There’s no question that texting is an extraordinarily effective way of reaching customers. Research shows that 98% of text messages are read, 90% of them within the first three seconds, and as many as 80% of customers respond.

But to succeed with mobile messaging, you need to do more than sit back and encourage your staff to text customers. Unlike email campaigns, texts can be tough to track—they reside on the personal phone of the employee who sends them. If that person is absent or leaves, other staffers have no idea where the customer is in the buyer journey. They may not even know who the customer is.

Another problem is that ordinary texting doesn’t lend itself to data analysis, an important tool to show you now only who’s buying, but why. And it doesn’t integrate nicely with your CRM database or your marketing templates the way email does.

Fortunately, all of these problems can be solved with the right enterprise mobile messaging program. But before shopping for a solution, take some time to consider your business’s needs. What mobile messaging features are most important to you?

In an IDG/Heymarket survey, 52% of businesses said they wanted the ability to message multiple customers at once. Forty-five percent wanted scheduled message delivery, 42% wanted autoreplies, and 41% wanted full-on automated messages.

A San Francisco Bay Area real estate broker is among that 52%. Agents can easily tailor and send a message to multiple recipients at once, personalizing it with the first name of each person receiving the message. Team leader Kenny Truong sends a “Home Buyers Kit” that includes a Dropbox link with helpful documents. Says Truong, “People are now replying to my buyer’s kit. Last week I had 2 out of 3 people receiving that message reply to me.”

Other businesses want to merge SMS with their customer databases to personalize messages or send targeted campaigns to different market segments using templates.

It’s possible to do all of these things with enterprise text messaging. The more you automate formatting and delivery, the more time your employees have focus on individual customers’ needs.

An enterprise messaging system also allows employees to work better as a team. You can designate a single text message “number” for all your customers—or for groups of customers. That enables any workers you designate to see customer texts, instead of just the worker who initiated contact.

Customers are more responsive to texts, and they also expect a quicker response from you. If a client needs immediate help, they’re more likely to get it if their text goes to a team, especially if it’s after hours.

“Heymarket makes life easy for my clients as well, says Patty Chen, General Manager for the Loft, an exclusive, New York event space that caters to corporate clients and curated social gatherings. “They can quickly book our event space over text messaging at their convenience. And they love that I can now manage their RSVPs and guest list.” 

Another reason you might want to consider enterprise SMS is sending videos. Like texting, videos are extremely effective in capturing customers’ attention. Including a video in an email increases click-through rate s by 200 to 300%, according to Forrester. Seventy percent of marketers report that video converts better than any other medium.

But emailed videos can be blocked by customer firewalls, and they sometimes take hours to get through. An enterprise SMS program can ensure fast, effective delivery. That’s especially helpful if your video shows customers how to use your product or solve a problem. With texting, they’ll get back to you right away if they need additional help—and will be impressed by your prompt support.

In today’s fast-paced world, customers expect business dialog to be direct and immediate, like a conversation. With enterprise SMS, you can achieve that while retaining all the sophisticated features of a traditional email campaign.

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3 elements of a great mobile strategy

With 72% of U.S. adults using a smartphone, mobile technology is changing the way that brands connect with their customers.

Most brands have started to roll out a mobile strategy that utilizes an app. The average smartphone user has around twenty-seven apps on their phone, but studies show that most users spend 80% of their smartphone usage on just five apps. What are the odds that your app would be one of those? That leaves only 20% of their usage time for apps outside of those five, meaning your app is competing with over twenty apps for the user’s attention.

The good news: A mobile strategy goes far beyond just your mobile app. By utilizing a full mobile strategy, your brand can get to the forefront of your customers’ minds. So, beyond a mobile app, what other elements of a mobile strategy can your brand implement to engage customers and motivate them to come into your store?

Make web pages and emails optimized for mobile. While not everyone will download your app, customers will still go onto your site or check out your emails. If you are not using responsive web pages and emails, then those customers are not receiving a good customer experience and may get turned off from your brand. Make sure you have responsive web pages and emails so customers can be notified of promotions you are running, check out their reward program status and search for store locations.

Be where your customers are—on social media. Most mobile users are on some form of social media, and most often, one of those five apps that they spend 80% of their time on is a social media app. Your brand needs to connect with customers on the platforms they use the most.By adopting a social strategy, your customers will have another platform on which to engage with your brand, the ability to share your content and refer their friends to your brand.

Start using SMS messages. If 72% of U.S. adults have a smartphone, that leaves 28% that do not. The good thing about SMS messaging is the capability to connect with everyone, even if they do not have a smartphone, since all mobile phones have access to SMS messages.

A mobile app alone is not a mobile strategy. There are many aspects of a mobile strategy that can take your brand’s efforts to the next level—delivering a significant impact. Mobile is a huge space with many different avenues to engage and encourage customers to come to your c-store.

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understanding the new era of mobile messaging

There are more mobile messages going back and forth in the world today than ever in the history of mankind, and although the SMS channel is over 20 years old, it feels as if the text medium is on the brink of a new era.

Since the start of the decade, the mobile industry has observed the rise of over the top (OTT) messaging apps like WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger and WeChat with cautious interest. While there has been much debate about whether these services will complement or compete with SMS, OTT apps have already eclipsed SMS as the primary medium for P2P (person-to-person) communications across all demographics.

However, instead of OTT messaging eradicating SMS completely as some predicted, SMS has actually found a happy equilibrium as something of a failsafe backup in the event of no data coverage or OTT fragmentation.

From P2P to A2P messaging

Despite this fierce competition, this isn’t how the story ends for SMS. While SMS may longer be the first choice for consumers, in the enterprise sector the use of it for customer engagement in all its forms is accelerating fast – and with good reason.

Whilst messaging apps have improved functionality, SMS remains the only ubiquitous global messaging platform and the only one with a unique and globally recognized addressing system. It works on every handset and on any network and is also the most trusted by consumers. These make it appropriate for all manner of business and mission critical communications.

As a result, businesses across multiple vertical sectors like financial, retail and healthcare are increasingly turning to SMS. Over the last few years, there has been huge growth in the so-called A2P (application-to- person) market, which analyst mobileSQUARED predicts will be worth almost $60 billion by 2020, up from $12 billion in 2015.

The consensus among industry analysts is that A2P will continue to grow significantly, with Credence Research recently predicting that enterprises will transmit two trillion SMS messages a year by 2017.

One reason for the optimism surrounding A2P messaging is based on how easy integrating SMS has become. Developers can easily build apps that send messages to users entirely through software. They don’t need to negotiate with MNOs or aggregators and by using a simple API in their apps, can send SMS messages to users.

This simplicity has helped to accelerate the adoption of A2P messaging. Global mobile trade body MEF’s Mobile Messaging 2016 report, found that 76 per cent of consumers receive communications from businesses such as banks, healthcare and retailers via SMS, while 65 per cent had engaged with companies via chat apps.

inancial services lead the way for A2P messaging

The financial services sector is currently leading the way in A2P messaging, with 33 per cent of people having received an SMS message from a financial institution. That compares with 17 per cent for a school, 16 per cent from a healthcare provider and even 23 per cent from a retailer or e-commerce company.

Arguably there are two reasons for this. The first is that one-time password texts form an important part of bank authentication (when setting up a new payee for example). Indeed, another finding shows that ‘confirming a password’ is the most common use-case for A2P SMS. It’s been used by 30 per cent of people at least once in the last year.

The other probable reason for so much text activity with banks may be savings on fees. In the UK, for example, text alerts have broadly replaced letters as a means of informing a customer they are near their overdraft limit. The ability to act on such an alert saves customers millions of pounds.

In fact, in 2015 The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) said signing up to text alerts and mobile banking apps reduces the amount of unarranged overdraft charges incurred by up to 24 per cent.

These developments reflect a consistent migration away from physical banking services. All over the world new ‘challenger’ banks – Fidor, Number 26, Tandem, Mondo and many more – are opening that exist purely as digital entities based around apps.

However, the most popular ‘business use’ of SMS currently, is for confirming a password through a two-factor authentication process.

The future of A2P messaging

SMS is entering a new and exciting era; driven by its unparalleled versatility and the simplicity of API integration. As a result, businesses are finding SMS increasingly effective for a growing multitude of customer focused tasks, but this could be just the beginning.

The growth in the deployment of IoT devices has connectivity at its heart. Moreover, Machina Research predicts that 2.2 billion devices will be connected via mobile networks by 2024. And how will, say, a connected car communicate the fact that it has a faulty part to a service engineer? SMS of course.

Yet the next phase of A2P growth could herald an even more fundamental evolution in the relationship between enterprise and consumer – the shift towards ‘conversational’ commerce. This describes text-based communications between a customer and a business that happen in real-time – like a conversation.

Essentially, customers will be able to ‘chat’ to a bot as if it were a human operator. Many believe conversational commerce could define the next phase of brand/consumer communications – and make messaging apps even more central to peoples’ lives with SMS playing a central role.

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5 ways A2P SMS text messaging is a game changer for multichannel Merchants

When businesses consider which communication channel to use when engaging customers, text messaging (SMS) is at the top of the list. Known as A2P messaging, this process of connecting with consumers via application messages is skyrocketing. To that point, 1.7 trillion SMS messages are expected to be sent by companies in 2018, according to Portio Research.

The reasons behind this growth? Simply put, A2P SMS is the ubiquitous, cost-effective, secure, trustworthy inevitable and direct channel for businesses to communicate with their customers. And, there is a wide range of use cases to back that up. But, just how much can this communication channel improve multichannel business and relationship practices?

Here are five ways in which A2P SMS benefits the retail and ecommerce industries.

It’s stickier than email. Not only do some 7.3 billion people send SMS message regularly, but when users receive messages they also read them quickly. SMS has an open rate of 99% and 90% of consumers read an SMS within the first three minutes of receipt, while just 36A% average open rates for emails.

Flexibility to reach one or many customers. When your business wants to keep a target group informed or you need to handle mass traffic, one-way messaging is available. But when you need bi-directional communication to create dialogue with your target group you can opt for the two-way messaging. In both cases, make a memorable campaign by using a specific number /short code or make it unique by using your brand name in the message header.

A reliable customer lifecycle go-to tool. Variety of ecommerce platforms and A2P SMS create a unique synergy that gives customers the convenience and instant interaction. A2P SMS is used for authorization, authentication, product information, order notification, reminders, coupons, vouchers loyalty programs.

After a customer is hooked, it can be a handy customer service tool. It’s a perfect vehicle when a call-back request is necessary, you want to offer account status information, a customer must make a service request or you want customer feedback.

During the operations phase, texts are equally valuable. SMS offers a simple way for placing orders, password reset, delivery updates, stock availability reports and, of course, order, payment or shipment confirmation. It’s also worth mentioning that all of this can be done with the ability to track, making it easy to know whether customers are getting the message.

The simplest way to provide service notifications. A2P SMS is the most streamlined way to deliver service details in the retail/multichannel world. A consumer orders a product at the POS and registers with a cell phone number. Then a consumer receives a text when the product is ready for pick up. Straight to the point and no hassles.

Fast, safe and reliable. Top-end A2P providers can handle time- and business sensitive A2P messages through established direct connections to mobile network operators. In addition, fast delivery is a huge plus thanks to short latency and high throughput rates.

With the retail landscape shifting at a rapid pace, it’s imperative that companies in this space have a communication channel that can navigate those changes. Whether it’s the ubiquity of text messaging or it reliability, security and cost-effectiveness, A2P SMS is a solid choice.

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A2P segment accounts for over 34.1% share in global marketplace

Mobile enterprise messaging from Vectramind

With smartphones becoming a ubiquitous product, industries such as tourism, retail, banking, financial services, and insurance (BFSI), healthcare, entertainment, and media are surging ahead to reach out to the vast base of mobile and smartphone users through A2P SMSs.

 By the end of 2014, half the world’s population had at least one mobile subscription, totaling to nearly 3.6 bn unique mobile subscribers. The numbers are expected to increase by over 1 bn by 2020 globally.

Transparency Market Research analysts state that the factor is expected to have a substantial impact on the overall development of the A2P SMS and API market in the next few years. Presently, the end-use segment of bulk SMS providers is the largest contributor to the A2P SMS and API market.

A2P MOBILE MESSAGING NUMBERS

In 2015, the A2P segment accounted for over 34.1% share in the global market and is expected to expand at a 4.3% CAGR from 2016 through 2024, retaining its dominance in the global market through this period.

The rising popularity of bulk A2P SMSs as an effective and cheaper mode for undertaking business communications has helped the segment remain at the forefront of the market in the next few years as well

On the other spectrum , the end-use segments of the global A2P SMS and API market such as SMS aggregators, marketers/resellers, and telecom operators are also expected to expand at equally healthy paces over the forecasting horizon.

 The segments of SMS aggregators and telecom operators are both expected to rise at 4.1% CAGR from 2016 through 2024. Asia Pacific is presently the largest revenue contributor of the global A2P SMS and API market and is expected to expand at the fastest pace among key regional markets as well. The region’s prominence in the global market is owing to factors such as the rising penetration of smartphones, an expanding e-commerce industry, and rising online transactions.

how vectramind's synapse messaging platform can give a fillip to your messaging needs

There has been a paradigm shift in the way consumers prefer information exchange with businesses. Conversational nature has taken over singular notification nature of messaging. Vectramind's Synapse mobile messaging platform is a result of these changing sensitivities between enterprises and consumers.

These are some of the features of Vectramind's messaging platform can help organizations in their messaging needs

 Modular Architecture Synapse’s highly modular architecture offers ample flexibility and agility to upgrade & extend the platform’s inherent functionality to keep pace with organizational needs. 

Multichannel Synapse helps Create an enriching communications ecosystem for users by offering the entire spectrum of messaging channels –

 SMS, Push notifications, Voice... Database compatibility Synapse supports compatibility to major databases like MS SQL, MySQL, Oracle, IBM DB2.

 Middleware Compatibility Our Synapse platform supports standard industry middleware components allowing easy and seamless integration with enterprise applications across industry verticals.

Provides Easy, in-depth administration Effortless and hassle-free administration driven by smartly defining role based access to user’s assigned features, available actions and interfaces.

 Security & Compliance Our platform’s end-to-end secure communications is driven by highly robust and secure protocols adhering to latest industry standards.

Adaptive Routing Synapse allows you to make an informed, intelligent and real time decision on determining the channel and route for messaging.

 Analytics:  Study, query the statistics of messages being processed, across a range of different parameters.

5 crucial mobile app budgeting mistakes to avoid

Mobile app budgeting is an undertaking which most of the businesses are not adequately equipped with. Regardless of the number of organizations understanding the importance of planning a mobile app budget, there are in fact very less number of companies that really grasps the essence of what it really takes to build a user-friendly, fully-functional mobile app. This knowledge difference is the reason why many underestimate the significance of the resources, budget and time they require in building a valuable product. Check out the five mobile app budgeting mistakes companies make and you as an entrepreneur can avoid:

App marketing Budget
Marketing plays a vital role in driving user acquisition and growth and as the app market has become highly competitive, just like any other service or product, your mobile applications also need to be promoted in order to be successful. But all too often, the aspect of marketing takes the backseat.

Most of the entrepreneurs while paying attention to the mobile app development process, forgets to focus on app marketing altogether. And this is how they fail to capture customer’s attention for their app. Setting up a budget for app marketing will help you familiarize people about the benefits and usability of your app which in turn would lead to more downloads and profits. Mobile app marketing should be considered at the initial stages of the development process when you are establishing the success metrics. Just like app objectives are essential, your marketing budget also needs to be compatible with these objectives.

App Updating Budget
This is one of the most critical budgeting mistakes mobile app developers make that results in reduced shelf life of the mobile app. New technology keeps emerging in the market which makes it vital for the developers to update their application on schedule to keep it relevant with the ever evolving technology.

Constituting budget for regular app updates helps you in delivering a better user experience that meets your user’s requirements and enable your app to continue longer in the competition. Proficient mobile app development companies provide services to clients release major updates timely, thus empowering the clients to earn more profit from their app solution.

Prioritizing App’s UI
Even though a powerful UI can boost the user engagement, the app functionality is what delivers the actual benefit. To make the app appear more attractive, entrepreneurs focus more on UI (user interface) but overlook the app’s functionality. If you want to build an app with great user experience then you need to set a proper budget for its back-end infrastructure which will ultimately bring forth a business boosting app.

Excluding Cross-platform app development

Many entrepreneurs set up their budget only for a single platform and are oblivious to the involvement of cross-platform development which eventually restricts the possibilities of gaining more profit from their app. As customers today are divided on numerous platforms thus incorporating cross-platform mobile app development in your business strategy can help fabricate functionality that serves the need of large section of end-users.

Thinking Mobile apps and websites are correlated

Websites and Mobile apps both are two different elements and you cannot set the budget of your app taking into consideration the budget of your website. Developing a mobile app involves more complexities which add to the overall cost, thus it requires more budget than developing a website.

The above-mentioned five aspects are highly important mobile app budgeting factors. However, they are generally altogether absent when budget propositions are being formulated. If you haven’t contemplated these aspects, then you have only planned a budget for your project, not a functional, feasible mobile app.

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how you can optimize your mobile app for your target market

It is a fallacy to assume that having a website perfectly designed and adequately translated is enough done. Nothing can be further from the truth in this age where smartphones have proliferated in almost every market and their appeal as well as usage has penetrated every consumer journey point.

Businesses are often ready to embrace the language localization needs that new, unfamiliar languages ​​of a new market segment and consumer profile demand. They are quick to hire translators, implant proxies, document content and re-brand marketing for the taste and comfort of these new set of users. Website localization does take a lot of time and effort: getting the website translated and re-designed for the nuances and expectations of going global or transnational. The market is also brimming with many translators and agencies who promise to facilitate this challenging process with their language expertise.

However, it would be a complete waste of this money, effort, and those tremendous strategic leaps being taken if one of the mobile app part of a user's journey or marketing lifecycle. It would not help at all if one does a cursory service to this specific area. It is easy to clone whatever has been done for the website in unmindful and lazy ways to the mobile app. What is wonderful is not only half-baked but also potent when it comes to long-term hazards of copy-pasting the content.

One has to appreciate the differences between the two mediums and acknowledge that user behavior and content strategy for language localization of a website may not correspond with those of mobile app.

It is vital to understand that given the very absence of a large-screen format, mobile apps inherently different from to what pops up and appeals to a user on a website. Their space limitations aside, their user interface aspect, as well as operating system specs, make the whole process very different from what a website entails. Apart from the layout, visual parameters and processor speeds involved; One also has to consider the differences in hardware, storage, security etc., that a mobile device is constituted of.

Content has to be in consonance with the type of mobile apps enabled and their backend elements too, for instance – choosing between hybrid vs.. Native apps. APIs, their availability, their usage rights, their security features and their coding extensions have to be carefully taken into account.

The content may remain on the same theme or marketing strategy but there is not much room for it to remain exactly similar. It has to be proportionate to space, length, loading times, eye movement, UI taste and general app fatigue or heterogeneity that matters for a mobile device.

Good language service providers understand that for mobile apps, language translation, and localization is much more than simply hauling content from one language to another. The right service providers have the right set of resources and experience to dovetail marketing strategy and impact for a mobile device. They can take up difficulties in arising out form-factor limitations and can brilliantly convert these constants into creative solutions.

They combine the core muscle of language translation service with the skin of a mobile device very carefully and beautifully. A business can not overlook the need and specific requirements of a mobile translation app if it aspires to reach its target audience at the right moment, in the right frame of mind and without any processing burden. It knows that if it appeals to its customers with analytics-powered personalization, its apps can give meaning and depth to customer experiences.

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vectramind and how it helps companies map their a2p messaging needs

Contact Vectramind to know more about our enterprise messaging  solutions

messaging apps which are more secure than whatsapp

While WhatsApp is regularly adding more security features, there are other instant messenger apps that specialize in secure conversations

Users tend to sway towards the more popular apps such as WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger.

Is there a truly secure instant messaging app? This is a question many users ask, but don’t always get an easy answer for. Usually, users tend to sway towards the more popular apps such as WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger. However, these may not be entirely secure, because they are meant for a large user demographic that wouldn’t ideally care about such features. For example, WhatsApp is now adding security features regularly. One recent example is the end-to-end encryption that WhatsApp added for conversations. Now, two-step verification has been added to the app, which will allow users to verify their numbers more securely using a six-digit code, and prevent impersonation of user accounts on the app.

Android and iOS

This is a secure messaging service that encrypts video and voice calls, text message encryption and secure file transfers. The message burn functionality can automatically delete messages you have sent, after the duration you selected at the time of sending. For calls, even if you are calling any mobile or landline anywhere in the world, your end of the conversation will be encrypted, to prevent snooping. The file transfers are supported for pdf, docx, mov, mp4, png and jpg file formats, which cover most of the often-used document and image formats.


This free instant messaging app offers end-to-end encryption for all conversations. You can also set up chat groups, with complete encryption enabled, which can be very useful if you need to regularly communicate with your team and share potentially sensitive data. The app can be set up using your phone number, and there are no separate logins which are needed. While most encryption apps work only if the recipient also uses the same app, Signal can work with standard text messages as well.

This app works as the replacement for the default text messaging app on Android phones. The app does the encryption bit in two segments—first, it encrypts the messages on your phone, and messages to other users are encrypted over-the-air, which means they are secured before they are delivered to the recipient. The former is useful in case your device gets stolen, and anyone who gets their hands on it will not be able to unlock the treasure trove of information that you wish to secure. The latter method, enables end of end encryption for all calls, so that no one can snoop in during the chain, and read your messages.

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how messaging is transforming the customer experience

When you’re trying to get in touch with a friend to make plans, how do you do it? E-mail, text, Facebook? What you probably don’t do nowadays is call them. Why, then, are we still forced to communicate with brands through an 800 number? At one time, call centers were the only interactive connection between consumers and brands, aside from the in-store experience, and often, in-store sales associates would not have the resources to solve customer issues.

The computer and smartphone changed all that and, today, pixels and not voice are the main way we connect with brands. So why are voice-based call centers, which employ nearly 10 million people globally and are incredibly expensive and inefficient to run, still the primary way to get customer service from most companies? Are they really the best retail and fashion brands can do for their customers?

Years ago, consumers were (grudgingly) willing to wait on hold for long stretches of time because voice calls were the only option for communication. Since the dawn of messaging services like iMessage, WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger, consumers have been using messaging as a primary mode of communication — spending four times longer in messaging apps each day than voice calls, according to a recent Nielsen study. Now that messaging is clearly changing the way consumers choose to interact with each other, it’s time for brands to follow suit.

So what?

First, we need to understand what is so wrong with call centers on a business level. Consumers have to wait for a few minutes to talk to a representative — big deal, right? Call centers create millions of jobs all over the world. Shouldn’t we tough it out? Ultimately, it all leads back to the consumer.

The customer experience is the most important aspect of any brand interaction. Apparel and luxury companies, especially, place a particularly high value on “delightful” customer interactions, and calling an 800 number — which now feels a little archaic — is the opposite of delight. It not only wastes time, but is frustrating, impersonal and ineffective to the customer, leading to a negative brand experience.

Voice-based support diverts people away from engagement on digital channels. For example, if a customer is looking at a handbag in a brand’s app, they can’t press a button and ask about this specific bag by voice. If the app uses messaging, however, that specific bag can appear in the message thread, so the customer stays in the app and the brand representative knows exactly which bag they are looking for, rather than making a customer explain the style verbally.

Finally, call centers are staggeringly expensive, costing businesses around $350 billion every year to run. For our clients, customer service calls cost a company nearly $7 each. Messaging? Around $1 per conversation, bringing the cost per interaction down by 75 percent.

What about the representatives?
While it’d be necessary to train employees on a new platform, the shift in workflow provided by messaging would not only streamline workflow but lead to more efficiencies among sales associates, enabling employees to tend to more customers at one time. For example, an associate at a call center can only help one or two customers at a time via voice. With messaging, a customer service representative can help up to 10 customers at a time, because consumers and representatives are no longer beholden to a schedule.

With voice calls, the amount of interactions ebbs and flows throughout the day: spikes at lunch and in the evening are fairly common, with lulls in between. With those spikes, coupled with the inability to handle multiple customers at a time, service representatives can get overwhelmed and burn out quickly, attributing to the notoriously high turnover within call centers. Often, this inflamed level of communication results in miscommunications. According to research conducted by LivePerson, 40 percent of customers make a second call within 24 hours because their issues remain unresolved.

With messaging, the workflow is much more steady — the “curve is flatter,” in industry parlance — because there is no fixed time that customers have to set aside (usually at lunchtime or just after work) to call, wait on hold, and hopefully fix their issue. This flatter curve keeps associates calm, with fewer high-pressure rush periods, and customers happy. Messaging is also less stressful for customer-service people than voice calls, because they can talk to each other and collaborate — hard to do when all your coworkers around you are on live voice calls. The result is annual attrition down from 35 percent or higher for call-center staff to less than 10 percent when staffers are messaging.

The permanent, text-based messaging structure creates a historical record that can be referenced by both customer and agent — just scroll back in the thread to see the history of that customer — so questions and informative details don’t have to be repeated. The customer-unfriendly time spent re-explaining an issue (often multiple times, to different reps!) goes down, which is a significant factor in reducing care costs, which go down by an average of 48 percent.

Saks Fifth Avenue is taking a progressive approach to messaging, connecting customers to specific shop floor staff at the location nearest to them, putting associates at that customer’s disposal using their phones, via text messages, to assist and advise the customer on store inventory. This builds a connection between those associates and the Saks.com online presence, creating a positive experience for the customers.

What about the stores?
Not only could messaging change the form and function of the call center, but SMS could completely shift the retail floor offering, unlocking new productivity from in-store associates.

Retail stores and call centers mirror each other, following the same demand curve of business — waves of traffic in the early morning, at lunch and evenings post-work. Between rush hours, retail floor associates are often bored and find themselves either doing nothing or filling their time with menial tasks. If retail associates were trained to field customer-service inquiries via messaging, not only would their productivity increase, but they would become better acquainted with the brand. This makes associates more valuable to customers in-store and on mobile, enabling them to perform their jobs more efficiently. Knowledge is power, after all.

Ultimately, satisfied and knowledgeable employees do more efficient work. Efficient work breeds solutions-driven thinking. And solutions breed a positive brand experience and satisfied customers, which is always the goal. Recognizing the need for a shift in tasks as integral as communication and enabling associates to operate quickly and efficiently is the first step in pivoting to a streamlined future.

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a mere 8% of healthcare institutions prohibit the use of consumer applications

A recent  study, on Mobile Messaging for Healthcare Institutions,” surveyed 500 professionals in the finance, healthcare, retail, and legal markets.According to the infinite group findings of  of those individuals in healthcare, shows only eight percent of such institutions prohibit the use of consumer applications for discussion between employees.

 Furthermore, it found that only one in four institutions with “official” messaging platforms recommend using an internal app (not off-the-shelf programs such as Skype or WhatsApp). This is a huge potential breach of consumer data and privacy protections and it only reinforces the notion that these types of practices do not fall in line with regulations such as the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act.

 “The global healthcare industry is under strict privacy and security regulations to protect patient information, but the latest study finds that the vast majority of healthcare institutions are not using mobile messaging services that are compliant with these regulations, The fact that “Healthcare employees communicate inherently sensitive information, which includes patient prescription and medical information, however inspite of that their employers do not have the proper mobile messaging security infrastructure in place to adhere to HIPAA or other regulatory requirements. This is a huge risk for patients and healthcare institutions and its imperative healthcare providers adhere to the best practices on mobile messaging compliant to HL7 messaging/ HIPPA standards.

a2p global messaging that will change enterprises: 2016-2022 growth trends

A2P SMS Market Report- global trends and forecasts, 2016-2022 

COMMUNICATION EVOLVED

4 mobile app marketing mistakes you no longer can afford to make

With thousands of apps competing for discoverability in every niche, mobile app marketing is no longer remaining easy. You need to mind every step starting from the launch of the app to app market presence to partnering to targeting search engines. Certain mistakes can really have deadly consequences on your app marketing goals in the long run. Do you want to know errors that actually can result in critical consequences for your mobile app to gain acquisition and drive traction? Well, read here about these four mistakes that app marketers no longer can afford.

Not having a proper pre-launch plan

It has now almost become common knowledge among the app marketers that earlier you start connecting your audience, better you get a competitive advantage. That is why a properly laid out and well planned pre-launch campaign became a prerogative now for mobile app marketing. Even before your app goes to development lab, you should start creating buzz about your upcoming app. Here we go with a few effective tips about pre-launch app campaign.

Create the first wave of buzz by sharing your app idea with the loyal audience and peers and ask advice and suggestions.

As soon as the app is going through development, you need to create buzz through teasers, small videos, banner ads, etc.

Publish blog posts on your upcoming app on the website.

Offer some audience targeted promotions for your coming app on the social media.

Sending non-personalized push messages

There was a time, just a decade and a few years ago when businesses used to serve every customer in an identical way. Then with the businesses taking on the digital space, the same trend continued. The first generation was all in glee with the satisfaction of being able to send generalized push messages for all their target audience. So, a customer deep in his midnight sleep or just preparing to go out for the office, a customer in his early teens or they mid-forties, all used to get the same push messages.

But then marketers learned to address customers based on locality, language, international time, demographic types like age and ethnicity, etc. Taking the segmentation further, mobile apps made their notification strategy based on the personal preferences and individual situations and contexts as well. The massive exposure to customer and user data thanks to an array of device sensors and location tracking technologies only helped marketers to address personally more than ever before. Type of app in question is also an important determinant as it is common knowledge that a health app will differ significantly from an e-commerce app in respect of push notification.

Today, ‘one size fits all’ messages no longer hold any marketing value and it has already become a norm now to send personalized push messages to gain more traction for the business. How can your upcoming app step out of this trend? No, it cannot, if it really wants to make the app a potential channel to drive business conversion with steady success. Here are some tips to personalize push messages.

The first principle is to establish a voice and tone that reflects your brand identity rough the push messages.

The second most important thing is to offer some real value with the message that makes the user experience better or just help the customers in daily life situations.

If you address young minds or millennials, make it instantly engaging or even funny. They have a terribly lower attention span.

Mind the timing when sending messages. It should not only be convenient to read but should also enjoy maximum opportunity to convert the traction into sales.

Make the message relevant for the user contexts.

Always evaluate the traction your push messages are receiving and accordingly fine tune them.

Not knowing the metrics to focus on

This is the time when an exponential variety of user preferences is making it practically impossible for marketers to address target audience with any specific campaign that can have a moving effect on sales. This is the time when customized and personalized marketing is ruling the business. But how can the quests for personalization be met with the befitting customer and user data? How do you know and assess your clients and the way they are interacting with your app day in and day out. Well, you cannot have a solid grasp over the customer data without digging into analytics. But app analytics offers you an array of metrics, and for any new app, it is pretty confusing to decide which metrics deserve priority over the rest. Here we provide a few helpful clues.

First of all, track your daily, weekly and monthly active users.

Secondly, track the average session length of various groups of users.

Thirdly, focus on average revenue per users. You can also break this figure into different user groups.

Now track the average users stopping to use your app from a month to month basis.

Now, by dividing the number of inactive users in a given period with the average revenue, you can get the Lifetime Value (LTV) of a user.

Lastly, you should also track the sources of users with high Lifetime Value (LTV).

Not doing A/B testing

The biggest mistake for any app is not giving importance to testing the app well in every respect. Users these days are more uncompromising in nature since there are countless options in every app niche. Before launching the app for the public, you need to ensure what are the elements of your app that are working and that are not. A/B testing allows you to do that. From app features and functionalities to design elements, every element can be tested this way to ensure superior performance, user engagement, and business conversion.

A/B testing should be done every time you incorporate some new elements in the app. This can be a push message or just the size of a CTA button or the new design layout. A/B testing allows you gain insights about the kind of features and design elements that resonate with your audience and the kind that does not.

You might be thinking already, are these all? Yes, there are too many other mistakes that deserve coverage here, but we picked these four because they are the most common with fatal consequences for a mobile app marketing strategy.

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mobile app surge and stickiness factor

Research often tells us what we intuitively know. The latest data from eMarketer reported on in Campaign demonstrates the phenomenon that everyone in mobile marketing has been aware of for quite some time. Yes, people are spending a lot of time on apps. The trouble is, they're not spreading that time around -- it is being focussed on a select few, favoured apps.

The result is likely to prompt a turnaround in how marketers see apps. A move away from considering them a valuable resource to win over customers and keep them loyal to admitting other well-known destination apps are far more popular, and perhaps focus needs to be applied to utilising their reach.

First, the figures. This year, the researchers suggest, time spent on mobile devices will be much the same as last. The average person will spend nearly two-and-a-half hours on mobile apps per day, compared to just under half an hour mobile Web browsing. Within two years, app usage will go up by around a quarter of an hour per day, whereas mobile Web browsing will only have gone up by a single minute.

Over the same period, the average person will open one fewer app per month -- 20 rather than 21. Again, the eMarketer researchers warn that attention is not shared equally. The top five that nearly all of us will spend most of our time using is completely predictable -- Facebook, Messenger, YouTube, Google Maps and Google Search. The further point is that the top 15 apps, according to comScore figures, are witnessing a doubling in attention. If you think about it, that doesn't leave a lot of space for other apps to find traction. To add salt into the wound, the researchers also say that in every niche, there is a massive winner that dominates that category -- Facebook in social, YouTube in video entertainment and Amazon in m-commerce.

Put simply, the mobile app revolution is unlikely to steer more customers to your door, unless they are already there in the millions or you're about to launch the killer app that will make Facebook look like a minnow.

Far more likely is that mobile app viewing will provide a resource for brands to place content and run advertising campaigns against rather than providing a window through which consumers discover their wares directly.

It's interesting to see that Timberland has used geotargeting in mobile app display to unearth people who are interested in the outdoors and fashion. Their display campaign not only comes up with an offer, but tells the viewer how near they are to the brand's nearest stockist. The result, Timberland claims, is a 6% rise in football at its stores.

That has to be the future of mobile apps, doesn't it? Nobody would suggest that a brand won't find people will use its branded app, but if we're talking mass market, it's pretty clear that the huge opportunity is tapping into the attention that other services are attracting. The good news here is that, as Timberland has found, mobile is built for proximity marketing.

So the key for a brand may be to not look at its own app usage figures, but instead tap into the wider opportunity of a small number of hugely popular apps that can hone in on a target audience by location as well as demographics.

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why should content writing and mobile app marketing go side by side?

There was a time when morning use to start with a cup of coffee which is clearly not the case now. Just recall what is the first thing you do when you wake up in the morning? Phone, your mobile phone will be the first thing you check every morning, you will open your Facebook or scroll your Instagram and then you will step out of your bed. It seems that mobile app is the first thing to start your day with.

Mobile apps have become an inseparable part of our daily routine. Every micro-moment is related to the mobile application, whether it be your gym time when you put on some music by using any of the top music apps, or you want to order some food during office and turn to any food app. Mobile is always on you and mobile application comes along with.

But any mobile application

Mobile app marketing is not like marketing of other products as it involves plenty of other things to be considered like the catchy name of the app, its description, Screenshot, ASO, UI, and UX. Now decide how many of them will need content writing? It’s time to rethink the strategy if you are a mobile app development agency.

One of the best ideas for mobile app marketing is ads. Constant ads will be a reminder to the users to keep using the app and always keeping them informed about the improvements and new added features for better usage experience. Is it possible to give ads without content? Mobile app and content writing is the tagline of Vodafone, “Wherever you go, our network follows.”

The need is huge and the competitors are plenty, to survive the switch to marvelous mobile app marketing with creative content writing.

You need to drive the audience to your app which has to be done with marketing through content writing. The tagline is something which drags the attention of the public, let’s take the example of Nike. The tagline of Nike is in everyone’s mouth. Just do it. This is the magic of content writing. To make the mobile app make boom, you need to make your content gloom.

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3 trends and glimpse into the future of text messaging

Text messaging is currently a mix of instant messages sent via cell phones, an array of apps and instant messaging software built within sites like Facebook. Text messaging is slowly, but surely, replacing cell phone calls because of the ease of use and convenience it offers. Many innovations are being introduced in the world of text messaging which may completely transform the way we interact with employers, coworkers and companies in the future. Here are a few trends to watch in the world of text messaging in the coming years.

Mobile Security

Mobile apps used for chat are having their security upgraded to eliminate the risk of messages being intercepted by the app servers on the cloud or recorded by spyware on the device from which it is sent or received. Mark Cuban’s app Cyberdust sends messages encrypted end to end and then deletes them only a few seconds after the message is read, and companies such as Spok offer secure text messaging for the healthcare industry.

Encrypted apps are certainly the future of messaging apps, especially as “bring your own device to work” becomes a cost saving technique for companies and more common way to let employees work anywhere they are without bothering with multiple devices.

Companies want the ability to remotely wipe conversation logs if the device is stolen or hacked and have user authentication methods beyond the standard username and password so someone can’t take your phone and read the company’s secret information.
Application to Person Apps

Application to person messaging are most likely to reach a person today when sent via text message. The user may not answer a phone call from an unfamiliar person while email notices often go to spam. Send them a text message, though, and they are more likely to receive it while the sender can still verify it was read.

Artificial intelligence is accelerating the rise of app to person messaging, such as Facebook Messenger bots that let you send messages to a store’s bot to place or check on the status of orders. Expect to see more chat apps evolving into personal assistants, sending text messages to people and other apps on your behalf.

Chat Apps Becoming Your All In One Resource

Chat apps have a benefit over other types of apps as they try to add new functions. First, chat apps using SMS are relying on text-based interactions everyone already knows so there isn’t a learning curve. Second, when they use an existing chat app to introduce the new functionality, it eliminates the need for users to install yet another app and keep them working with each other. Third, the most basic function, the chat function, gives people far more options for interaction than a drop down menu while you run it out of a streamlined user interface – the chat app.

The startup Gone is trying to become the next eBay or Etsy. Its app is intended to help you sell unwanted items by taking a picture of the item, inputting some information, getting a quote and scheduling someone to take it away. And you start the process by sending a text to their app server. A number of financial apps like Digit use SMS to help people track spending, make purchases and encourage saving.

Conclusion

Secure text messaging is a necessity as companies start using it more and more for business communications. Chat apps allow companies to market to customers in a low cost, personalized method with better results than email marketing. Chat apps are turning into entire application ecosystems using the chat app as the natural interface for all of the functions. And chat apps are evolving into personal digital assistants talking to both people and other apps on our behalf.

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the best secure mobile messaging apps 2017 ! how to send messages privately

In a world stricken by worries over illicit surveillance, a new generation of secure mobile communication apps wants to ride to the rescue of the privacy conscious. This type of application has been a cottage industry for desktop computers for years, usually for secure email or instant messaging, but the arrival of mobile platforms has given them the sort of kick that is leading many to dream of reaching the mainstream.

These days, activity in the sector is now so fevered that several platforms have launched in the second half of 2015 alone, a striking uptick for a type of software that used to be seen as the preserve of the technical users with a paranoid bent or political dissidents. Once small scale in their ambitions, the mostly new companies making these apps sense a huge opportunity to grab business users anxious about the implications of living in the post-Snowden world.

Android still tends to be the default platform although iOS versions are usually available after a short delay. The issue of platform support is more important that it might appear. Even if you don’t personally use an iPhone, say, the fact that your favoured contacts do will render any app that doesn’t support both platforms useless if the same app is needed at both ends. Some apps integrate with third-party applications, for instance email clients. That can be important for businesses – can the app support the preferred communications software used by an organisation and will it work across desktop as well as mobile? Some can, some can’t.

WhatsApp?

WhatsApp is one of the most popular messaging apps out there, and while it might not be the most secure, it can offer a good level of protection even among times of controversy.

This week, WikiLeaks released information documenting over 8,000 CIA spying files in its 'Vault 7' collection. Reports surrounding this claimed that the CIA was able to easily bypass WhatsApp's (and Signal's) security systems and read user messages. In addition, WikiLeaks also said that the CIA uses malware and hacking tools to remotely hack smartphones and turn TVs into recording devices.

While understandably alarming, this information has been challenged by some, claiming that the WikiLeaks report is misleading. "The CIA has some exploits for Android/iPhone. If they can get on your phone, then of course they can record audio and screenshots," stated Robert Graham from Errata Security. "Technically, this bypasses/defeats encryption - but such phrases used by Wikileaks are highly misleading, since nothing related to Signal/WhatsApp is happening," he added.

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using messaging apps without being creepy

The use of messaging apps is growing worldwide along with the sophistication of artificial intelligence and ‘chat bots’, but can brands earn the right to share this private space and how will consumers choose to respond?

Used by billions of people worldwide every day, messaging apps such as WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, WeChat and Line have been cemented as an every day part of life. However, as consumers opt for the privacy and speed of chat apps, brands are still playing catch-up in their attempts to devise more sophisticated methods to connect with consumers.

More than 77% of content shared via mobile takes place on messaging apps, according to research by RadiumOne, but consumers need a compelling reason to interact with brands in an environment they do not consider to be public. This channel is sometimes referred to as ‘dark social’, as people share content out of general view.

An element of exclusivity can help create a messaging group consumers actively want to join. Adidas took this approach with the global launch of Tango Squads in July – communities of socially savvy 16- to 19-year-old football obsessives operating on Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp and Line.

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