how sms has irreversibly changed our use of communication

Dynamically Send, Receive & Enhance Text Message Campaigns.

When the SMS became commercially available in 1999 the prevailing atmosphere wasn’t one of elation as you might have expected, but trepidation.

Much like today, many individuals railed against the technology’s supposedly harmful effects, citing the damage it might wreak upon thousands of years of human communication; their concerns weren’t so far-fetched either, recent studies reveal that nowadays most teenagers use texting as their main method of sustaining and invigorating their social relationships.

Others however aren’t just scared of a decline in communication, but of its complete reversal. As texting has gained traction we’ve increased our inventiveness with it, resulting in fonts such as Emoji. Whilst some herald the two byte ideograms as the new height of communication, others see Emoji’s as society slowly back-pedalling towards hieroglyphs and symbols.

Companies not to dismiss SMS as something that’s outdated and irrelevant, but rather to see it as a technology that is continuing to support, benefit and revitalise a businesses marketing strategy.

For those in mobile and telemedia SMS has long been a cornerstone of the industry. To everyone working in the business, SMS has been the backbone in initial carrier billing efforts, media interaction, voting and all sorts. According to recent research 37.2 million consumers have opted to use SMS and mobile communications as their preferred choice for receiving notifications from businesses. This number is predicted to rise to 48.7 million in 2020, making SMS the fastest growing marketing channel in the UK.

The growing influence of the medium is also highlighted by the fact that 98% of branded or business-related texts are opened by mobile users, with 90% being read within 3 minutes of receiving them. The report goes on to highlight that 23.5m people will respond to a business text message in 2017 and that 7bn texts will be sent this year alone.

So why is SMS such a brilliant tool?

It is because of its immediacy. An ignored email or lost letter, can easily be shrugged off as a colleague being too busy or Royal Mail being inefficient, but the speed and reliability of the SMS leaves no room for excuses. With SME you can deliver very timely and personalised messages. You only have to look at your own mobile and behavioural habits to understand the stark differences between SMS and email engagement. So whether you are looking to acquire new customers or engage more with existing ones, nothing beats the direct and personal connectivity of SMS. From simple marketing campaigns to personalised customer service notifications or identification authentication, SMS provides a quick and easy way to add value and deliver a great experience.

Confusingly however, the positive aspects of SMS are still rarely publicised. Great examples of these include the story of British tourist Rebecca Fyfe, who upon becoming stranded on a sinking ship in the Lombok Strait whilst backpacking across Asia, sent an SMS message to her partner in Falmouth which saved both her own life and the lives of the other ten tourists and crew members aboard the vessel by sparking a coordinated search and rescue effort by the Falmouth Coastguard, Indonesian Authorities and Australian Coastguard. More topically, during the last US election, Bernie Sanders’ use of bulk SMS messaging has been cited as one of the linchpins of his campaign, allowing him to rapidly amass record numbers of the under-thirty voter demographic and maintain their enthusiasm and support. Sanders’ campaign went further however with his adoption of mobile payments, allowing him to amass not just political, but financial support also.

With an average donation of $27 per supporter, Sanders was able to use mobile payment services to accrue at one point almost $2 million in just one week, allowing him to elevate his grass roots campaign to the next level. We can only imagine how a business effectively using the same technology could drastically transform both its outreach and prospects.

The latest research however, reveals that only 50% of businesses are using SMS as part of their marketing strategy and the other 50% are still struggling to optimise the effectiveness of this dynamic direct marketing channel – and therein lies the opportunity – for the 50% who haven’t looked to SMS to do marketing and the 50% who have, but don’t exploit its full potential.

Sending out SMS marketing messages to consumers is a fantastic, largely underused and often misunderstood method of communication. Real opportunities lie in making each SMS count: making sure it turns up with content that the consumer wants to act on, a message that kills several birds with one stone, messages that enhance the overall brand experience for the consumer.

Whilst SMS can be unfairly represented in the press and people’s considerations, whether it’s use of mobile payments to fund change, bulk SMS to save lives or incite activism or the simple text message that keeps you connected on a daily basis; SMS is exceptionally relevant for marketers, constantly evolving and could make the difference between a campaign’s success or failure.

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why a2p sms and chat apps has become the best marketing channels

Deploy a mobile ready messaging strategy across your organization

More and more enterprises are seeking the use of application to person (A2P) SMS as a channel for customer engagement, notification and authentication and increasingly embrace chat bots via chat apps or social media and other rich communications services (RCS) messaging.

A recent report by Ovum’s Enterprise Messaging Survey canvassed 100 companies in seven countries to investigate their use of messaging as a channel for customer engagement, notification, and authentication and revealed a growing business appetite for more interactive forms of messaging.

The use of A2P SMS - which is typically a web app that communicates to a mobile subscriber - continues to surge with 1.28tn messages by 2019 up from 1.16tn in 2016, indicating a 23% increase in use of two-way SMS in the past year.

The strongest indication of growth is the deployment of chat bots, the survey said. A quarter of respondents indicated that they are using the nascent technology to automate customer interactivity with specific demographic groups such as millennials.

"The Enterprise Messaging Survey suggests that there is an appetite from enterprises to use richer forms of mobile messaging to engage with their customers," said Pamela Clark-Dickson, practice leader, Digital Communications and Social Networking, Consumer Services, Ovum. "The pressure is now on the telecoms industry to ensure that their business-to-consumer messaging services remain relevant and attractive, especially as Apple joins other chat apps in engaging with the enterprise market, via its upcoming Business Chat offering."

There is also a clear indication from the respondents that they are keen to see SMS evolve as a service, with 37% stating that new features such as custom branding, the delivery of enriched content, and read receipts, would encourage them to send more SMS.

Moreover, over a third of respondents, 36%, indicated their organizations would be interested in using an enhanced SMS service, such as the Rich Communications Services (RCS) standard. From these respondents, the most appealing feature of RCS messaging was the ability to send images and videos - logos and way-finding maps from an airline, for example.

This group also indicated that the capability to provide chatbot-like interaction with their customers via RCS was a draw.

Interestingly, enterprises clearly value the advanced features that RCS offers. Over half of the respondents would be willing to pay between 1.5 times to three times the price of an ordinary per-message SMS.

While A2P SMS continues to grow, the report clearly shows that enterprises are moving past an experimental phase with new messaging formats like Chat bots and examining, more closely, how best they can engage their customers with the right format at the right time.

"It's also encouraging to see that businesses clearly value a more immersive interaction with their customers. In the near future, this will be delivered by RCS type messaging services and Chat Apps allowing the Enterprise message to go beyond text to include app-like interactivity and rich media. It's everything MMS promised but unfortunately didn't deliver."

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how chatbots can carry on a conversation with a customer to find out their expectations

In today’s digital world, the key to success is far beyond than figuring out the location of your buyers. User engagement and customer retention are the two most important factors that play a main role in taking any brand to new heights of success. With a plethora of marketing tools available, increasing brand engagement and retention rate has become easier.

Chatbots are the newest tool that many digital marketers are using to reach and maintain their target audience. Research suggests that around 40% people ignore the first message and 25% drop off after the second. But, some digital marketing agencies know the trick and find new ways to interact their customers and increase the retention rate.

mobile messaging platform

Since there is a huge variety of chatbots available today with a variety of trackable metrics, sometimes it can be difficult to know what to opt for to reach your potential and existing customers.

Here, in this blog, Some effective ways that many web design agencies, digital marketing agencies, SaaS startups can take to increase user engagement and customer retention rate by using chatbots.

Offer a Unique Selling Point

Besides the basic business objectives and the digital marketing plan you have set for your agency, you also need to create some key values for chatbot as well. It is simply not enough to tell your customers about the weather update or any latest food deal available. Your chatbots must be unique in every aspect.

When consumers communicate with your brand’s chatbot, they need to find it friendly and beneficial in any way, whether that be educational or simply helpful. In order to figure out what your chatbot needs to answer, ask your most frequent customers what problems do they face in their daily lives, what are their preferences, what they want to know about their brand, what they love more about your brand, why they prefer your brand over others and why they keep on coming back for more products. Once you got all the important information, make it your main focus and start employing it as your unique selling point.

Find Out Your Buyer Personas

Once you have gathered all the information that you want to achieve with your chatbot, it’s time to create buyer personas. This will simply not allow to reach a wider audience but create a group of loyal customers. And the plus point is, you’ve already done your homework and knew what are their pain points and what are their preferences in order to retain them.

Since you already know who your target audience is, start by classifying them. To do so, use Facebook Audience insights. It’s the most effective way to understand your audience in order to deliver them meaningful messages. Your Facebook Insights will help you learn about the demographics of your target audience, the pages they like most, their location and preferences, their buying behavior, the pattern of Facebook usage and much more.

In fact, Facebook Insights will let you discover different buyer personas so that you can target them directly and personalize your messages to offer them a seamless and great user experience.

Opt for a Chatbot Building Tool

One of the easiest ways to use Facebook Audience insights tool and reach your target audience is to create the platform directly on your social media channels. Creating a chatbot messaging platform that is dedicated to helping your customers on your website is the key to reach them.

You can use a chatbot-building platform to create an AI powered chatbot for your own brand. For this, it’s not necessary to have an in-depth coding knowledge, all you need to do is to sign up, link it to your Facebook profile and start tracking.

A chatbot that is created by using chatbot-building platform has potential to take orders directly from Facebook Messenger, posts and comments. It can integrate with all the payment systems and push personalized deals and offers to customers, on request.

Analyze the Metrics

Since chatbots generate massive data, it is important to regularly check your engagement metrics. Analyze the average number of messages received in a conversation, the average time of the sessions, and the average conversation per user.

If the number of messages in a conversation is increasing, it clearly indicates that your audience is spending more time interacting with your chatbot, thus, increasing your engagement and retention rates. And if the number of users and conversations both are increasing simultaneously, it could be a good sign that your chatbot is captivating your audience while providing the best service to your audience.

Filter Your Conversations

In order to provide your customers with the right service with your chatbot, you need to know all the pain points. However, it’s more challenging to figure it out, carefully looking at your conversations will equip you with a huge amount of data to improve the interactions you have with your customers. While filtering your conversations, it is important to know these important stages:

• Check your conversations to see if your chatbot missed any opportunity to interact with your customer.
• Analyze the conversation in which your customer explained his problem, but the chatbot didn’t deliver the right solution.
• And identify those longer conversations as well in which your customers were satisfied with the services you delivered.

Filtering through the conversations on a regular basis will allow you to optimize your chatbot’s proficiencies. This will enable you to extract patterns that will help identify where your chatbot could get more improvement, thus increasing your chances of getting more engagement and retention rate.

Use Previous Technologies to Determine Success Rate

Believe it or not, chatbots are growing in popularity in various industries all over the world. Some experts believe that chatbots are taking over mobile apps. If that is the case then previous technologies and marketing methods should be used as a standard to measure the success rate.

Some technologies could include, email marketing, SMS marketing, advertising campaigns and more. And the best thing about chatbot is that they can reach your target consumers in their favorite messaging channels, which those previous marketing methods can’t do.

If truth be told, chatbots are the more personalized form of advertising in which brands can have a one-on-one interaction with their prospects. The chatbot breaks down all the barriers between a brand and a customer, as users can easily communicate with the brand because chatbot is integrated into their favorite messaging platform.

A/B Testing

A/B testing is the key to test new ideas. Start by testing different forms of conversations. The way you interact with your customers is key to engaging them quickly. There are a lot of users who don’t bother to read the first message, your objective should be to change this mindset. If you can pass that first barrier, you may have them hooked forever.

Integrate Your Chatbot with a Human Team

Despite all the remarkable advancements in AI powered chatbots, they are still dependent on humans. Sometimes, chatbots get things wrong, therefore, your team should be there to save the lead. You should give your consumers a chance to interact with a human representative during each stage of the conversation you have with them.

This will show your consumers that your brand cares more about its customers’ needs. You will be engaging with them more profoundly, offering multiple solutions to their problems. Giving your customers the level of attention and engagement they deserve is the key to improve your retention rate.

To Sum Things Up

There are many web design agencies who are leveraging the power of artificial intelligence and machine learning, while some digital marketing agencies are incorporating AI that powers chatbots into their digital marketing plan.

Now it’s your turn to convince and engage your audience by sticking around to communicate with your brand’s chatbot. All you need to follow the above-mentioned strategies and start a successful conversation between your chatbot and your audience, so that your brand can get more user engagement and customer retention.

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ten exciting ways of businesses and brands are using chatbots

Take a look at how businesses are using bots in new and exciting ways right now. And let them inspire you to set up a bot of your own. 

Chatbots exist to make life easier for consumers.

They save consumers time. They’re online 24/7. And if built right, they have personality.

In fact in a recent report from PWC stated 27 per cent of consumers weren’t sure if they’d just spoken to a bot or a human when interacting with a company via text or chat. The fact of the matter is – consumers do not care as long as their question is answered, now. From booking a taxi, to messaging a brands customer service, the odds are there’s a brilliant bot behind it.

There are inexhaustible possibilities for what we can do with chatbots. Not only can we super charge customer service, but also give consumers something more valuable – their time back.

Take a look at how businesses are using bots in new and exciting ways right now. And let them inspire you to set up a bot of your own.

1.Weather updates

There are many bots out there whose sole purpose it is update you on the weather. You can ask about the current climate in your area and receive recommendations on what to wear, as well as whether you should pack an umbrella before leaving for work. Most are pretty uncomplicated, though a few are designed to be a bit more ‘fun’.

The most popular Chatbot out there at the moment is one of the ones that is a little more fun: Poncho. "A weather cat from Brooklyn. He sends you personal weather forecasts wherever you are, whenever you want them...with funny GIFs and pop culture observations rather than boring things like humidity indexes."

2.Order food - fast

When it comes to ordering food. We just want it as quickly as possible.This is nothing new. But as technology progresses the new and ever seamless ways we can order are constantly evolving.

You can now order via text, tweet or even as Dominos has recently introduced, via Facebook Messenger or your Amazon Alexa!

3.Customer support 24/7

The advent of chatbots has allowed brands to provide 24/7 customer service on their social channels and/or website without the traditional financial penalty. There are also significant benefits for the consumer – no longer do customers have to spend hours navigating a nonsensical phone menu tree. Simple queries, “how much is X”, can be answered quickly by bots. A multitude of brands have chatbots to provide customer support whether that’s on social media like AirBnB and Spotify (they have twitter bots) or on their own sites.

KLM’s bot that exists within Facebook Messenger and offers you “a new way to receive your flight documentation” is a good example of a customer service bot done well. It handles all the simple questions we can often spend hours trying to answer and keeps you up to date on your upcoming trip.

4.Mange your money better

Chip, Plum and Cleo – just three London based personal finance apps that launched last year. This area is really taking off, and with good reason. Chatbots can plug into your bank account, analyse your spending and then give you advice on how to cut spending and up saving. Some, in the case of Chip, even take the saving off your hands and automatically move small amounts weekly to build up that much needed ‘rainy day fund’ without you even realising.

5.Save time

Automation means more efficiency. Chatbots are brilliant at taking care of the time-consuming yet important admin tasks. Think about the amount of time you spend emailing, texting and calling to try and fit meetings and social engagements into your calendar. Passing these tasks onto someone (or something) else would be incredibly freeing. And it is.

Meekan by Doodle is a scheduling assistant designed to eliminate endless back and forth of scheduling meetings. In the not too distant future anything tedious and repetitive will be delegated to a bot, leaving us with the more creative and fulfilling tasks. Simply request a new meeting and this Slack chatbot will look at everyone’s calendars to find times when everyone is available.

6.Holiday inspiration (and booking)

In need of some holiday inspiration – there is also a chatbot for that! Kayak’s Facebook Messenger chatbot lets you search for a book travel right inside the application. The time it can save you is extraordinary. In place of trawling for the best price for flights and hotels you can simply gather all the information you need conversationally. “Where’s the best place to stay in Berlin on the 5th of December?” or “I’d like a flight to London from Paris on the 6th August in the morning” and the best options will be laid out in front of you.

7.Find love

Unsuccessful in love? Why not let chatbots have a go.

Foxsy, a personal match making assistant on Facebook Messenger promises to help you find a “beautiful and meaningful connection with the right person.” Not only does Foxsy put in the work to help you build an interesting profile by asking you questions about yourself, it helps suggest conversation topics it knows you are both interested in.

8.Track your mental health

Mental health is often overlooked in tech. Not only is it inaccessible in some parts of the world, but there is still a stigma associated with mental illness that can stop many asking for help. Up steps the bot – there are tonnes of apps that allow you to chat to a ‘bot friend’ on your phone, which will listen and offer motivation to monitor and improve your mental health.

Woebot is a mood tracking chatbot with a big personality. It’s proven to help reduce depression, is able to share Cognitive Behavioural Therapy resources, and learns from speaking to you over time.

Joy is another great bots that will help you track and improve your mental health.

9.Master immigration law

Bots even exist to help people navigate the complex world of US visa applications. Visabot is an immigration attorney bot that helps to explain American immigration laws and aid applications for the right visa based on personal background and past work. Visabot makes sure forms are filled out correctly and cuts the time it takes to apply significantly.

10.Beat the system

DoNotPay is a bot that has helped 160,000 people get out of parking and traffic fines in London and New York. The bot helps users to identify possible challenges to their ticket or fine and then prepares a letter outlining these issues that you can then use to contest it. We saved the best till last!

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are you sending bulk messaging : here are the 5 best practices

Top 5  mobile messaging best practices for  Content delivery.

Limit the number of messages : Pinging your users’ home screens several times a day (or even week) is a recipe for getting deleted. Vary where users see your messages – as a push notification, in-app notification,

Send exciting content. Send different types of content. Seems obvious, but if you always send images with a link, surprise users with a video or an emoticon message to increase impressions. If you know your users’ names, address your messages directly to them! Localize. Customize message copy and content to fit users’ locations and languages. Global fitness program Les Mills, for example, tailors specific messaging for its large German user base.

Hyper-targeting.Pair your app with iBeacon and use geofences to increase conversions at a specific moment. .iBeacon is a protocol developed by Apple and introduced at the Apple Worldwide Developers Conference in 2013.Various vendors have since made iBeacon-compatible hardware transmitters – typically called beacons – a class of Bluetooth low energy (BLE) devices that broadcast their identifier to nearby portable electronic devices. The technology enables smartphones, tablets, and other devices to perform actions when in close proximity to an iBeacon. However for this to work you need to install either  an app like shopkick( geo local hyper targeting)  and have your location and Bluetooth turned on to receive notifications

Time of day. Schedule by time zone – because no one likes to be woken up by a push notification at 3:00AM! Frequency and cadence. Find your messaging sweet spot. Experiment with messaging frequency (how often) and cadence (when) to determine what drives the most response from your audience. Automate, automate, automate. Take the pain out of great marketing. Use automation to trigger messages to users when they meet certain criteria, for example, “haven’t opened app in 10 days.”

Relevant content : users are interested in finding out unknown and interesting facts about your product. Brands need to work with your content and marketing teams to set up content niches links so you can drive users to your most coveted content through messages. With deep links, you can send users directly to flash deals or showcase new app features

create rapport with new onboardingg customers: When welcoming new app users or website visitors, use in-app messages to convert customers to the next step in the process, such as creating an account, watching help materials, getting started using the app, or receiving push notifications. When paired with a push notification, sending another onboarding-related message via a different channel, such as in-app messaging, has been shown to increase customer retention by 130%.

how chatbots are likely to be a cornerstone of many brands' marketing

In our hyperconnected digital world, chatbots have a lot to offer to build brand equity and increase brand value.

 

Dynamically Send, Receive & Enhance Text Message Campaigns.

We live and communicate in a global village, with people more interconnected than ever. Brands are shedding their sterile, corporate images online and providing casual, boutique services akin to those you'd find at your local corner store or farmer's market. Because they exist on communication platforms, chatbots are perfectly positioned to help you achieve consumer loyalty and provide valuable experiences. This, in turn, strengthens your brand's value.

Specifically, a good chatbot can make your brand ...

• More social and connected to consumers
• Authentic
• Focused on customer needs and interests
• Up to date on the latest tech and trends

Let's take a look at some key examples of how chatbots increase brand value and perception.

Stay connected and personalized to build brand equity

One of the most import benefits to having a chatbot is its focus on personalization and open communication with the consumer. As customers talk to a chatbot, the brand can learn from and anticipate their needs, then act based on them. When given a personality, those bots can operate like personal assistants or friends, becoming essential companions in the user's day – and when they perform that role well, customers will respond.

This is especially useful for brands in industries where forming a relationship with the consumer is key. Imagine if you're in the health care business: One of the biggest complaints of the industry is how patients don't feel they have enough time to speak to a physician. Add to this the hassle of waiting times and scheduling an appointment, and going to the doctor to deal with a medical problem big or small becomes a chore.

So, how could a chatbot add value and improve customer experience for a health care brand? Look at examples like HealthTap's Dr. A.I., which provides patients quick and easy access to health information via conversational UI. It's just like talking to a doctor; one can imagine how health care brands could similarly use a bot to inform patients of health concerns, remind them to take meds or easily schedule an appointment. Because the need is there, such a bot would give those businesses a competitive edge.

Build brand equity with the latest tech

Chatbots are a bit hip these days, so if you can pull one off correctly, you signal to customers young and old that you're committed to staying ahead of the technological curve. Because companies are just now beginning to discover why and how to use bots, having a chatbot that performs well and offers a unique experience can make you a leader in your field.

In an age of connected toys like Mattel's Hello Barbie, children are already getting accustomed to conversational UI. When they transition to social media and messaging apps, they'll look for brands they can communicate with just as they do with their peers. A brand that positions itself as a conversation partner by offering chatbots is more approachable and attractive to digital native consumers. Failure to do so might make your brand seem behind the times and unable to adapt.

Make plans and improve customer experience

Chatbots can enable your brand to provide unique experiences that weren't possible before. Consumers want experiences, not just things – and if your brand is focused on commodities, you can use your chatbot in creative ways to offer experiences that keep customers coming back.

Few examples are better than Absolut's chatbot, which got users out of the house and practicing healthy drinking habits. The bot began by finding nearby bars for users to patronize. It then offered a menu of Absolut cocktails for them to try. Upon selecting a drink, the bot gave the user a code that they could then redeem at the chosen bar to get the drink for free. After the outing, the chatbot offered a free Lyft drive.

What's notable is how the bot took care of every detail for planning a nightly outing or event: finding a location, choosing a drink and arranging for a ride home (that second point is important when it comes to a night of drinking – a very smart inclusion). It provided a seamless experience in enjoying the product with friends. Because we often set plans with friends through messaging platforms, the brands that offer fun and valuable experiences are more enticing to consumers. How chatbots increase brand value depends on analytics

If you have a chatbot to improve customer experience, you'll need to iterate and perfect it over time. With chatbot analytics, you can track key metrics to gain insights on users and learn how to improve the bot. Chatbot retention rate is an important metric for loyalty; by seeing how your top users use the bot, you can ensure a smooth and enjoyable experience for everyone.

Watching conversations as they happen in real time and comparing them to historical ones also helps you gather data on how your chatbot is used. By assessing the number of conversation steps in a given conversation, you can see how well your bot accomplishes a task or holds user attention. Both are important for providing a good customer experience.

When you make your bot more attractive, useful and fun for customers, they'll keep talking to you. Therefore, it's essential that you listen and work each day to make your bot perform better. When users are continually involved, engaged and invested, your brand will be stronger for it.

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5 things you need to know before selecting your sms api service providers

API (Application Programming Interface) is basically an interface, wherein an end-user can easily communicate with various other software components. API basically consists of subroutine definitions, tools and protocols for building the required application software. 

HOW SMS API WORKS:Through the SMS API platform, you will be able to develop your own customized SMS based upon your needs, and use it for sending and receiving text messages. The integration of SMS with API is carried out through a well-defined sequence of steps. 

Integrating SMS API with your Software application involves 5 steps

 1. Selecting the right SMS messaging company: When it comes to selecting the right SMS messaging company, Vectramind is one of the best tier 1 sms aggregators, sms api and bulk sms providers with more than a decade of messaging solutions to fortune 500 companies A well-established Bulk SMS provider it brings Network reach, professional technical support, and a committed customer support team

 2. Get to know as to how other Software Apps use the SMS facility: Understand as to how other Software Apps provide global text messaging to their clients. SMS alerts and transactions is another pertinent area wherein you have to stress upon. 

3. Find your ideal SMS API Provider: In some scenarios, SMS messaging companies themselves provide us with the SMS API platform. You can count on Vectramind, when it comes to choosing for the ideal SMS API Provider, as Vectramind has got the required experience and expertise in carrying out seamless SMS API services. SMS API acts as an interface between your software app/website and the Bulk SMS Provider, so that you can send and receive your customized SMS without any hassle whatsoever. 

4. Sync up your customer database with your system: For configuring  API with your application.you will need  to use a simple web-based interface, so that there will be ease in managing your API based connections, run campaigns and view the statistics. 

5.Finally, integrating your fully enabled software app (with SMS API) with the SMS messaging company: Finally, the configurations and integration of API has to be thoroughly tested. When everything is set in place and is fully functional, then after you got to test your Software app by sending bulk messages. 

How can SMS API’s help businesses grow? Marketers are using the SMS API platform to carry out their marketing communication activities with the help of text messages. Businesses can use this profitable platform in order to streamline the business communications that take place in an organization. There are two ways in general, wherein businesses can use the SMS API platform to reach their target audience. 

1. 2-Way SMS: In 2-Way SMS scenario, a particular company can use the API platform to deliver in-built responses based on inputs made by end-users. This will, in turn, help companies to gather a wide variety of information from their customers so that they can communicate even better and in a more meaningful manner. Companies using the 2-Way SMS strategy will eventually help them get to know about their customers in a better manner, which will, in turn, help them in customer engagement. 

2. Confirmations and Alerts: On a personal level, we send alerts and confirmations to our friends in order to get their attention for an upcoming event or party etc. Professionally, businesses send alerts and confirmations to their respective customers, in order to build long-term customer relationships. Alert based messages are used for account related information such as low balance, fine-tuning the pricing plans etc. When it comes to confirmation based messages, it is used for online ordering, notifications, reminders etc.  This ensures customer relationship is strengthened to a considerable extent. 

For example, you own an online retail store wherein you want to send your customers a message, whenever they have purchased a product from your website. Suppose John is your customer and he purchases a shirt from your online store. What happens is John puts in all the relevant details as per your website rules, and then clicks on the ‘buy’ button. Technically, when John clicks on the buy button, a purchase script detects that a purchase has been made and sends the request to the SMS API Provider. Then after john’s mobile phone gets an SMS (in a matter of just a few seconds) with all the relevant details that he has typed in while purchasing the shirt, along with the purchase order number and delivery date. This is how SMS API is being implemented.

According to Transparency Market Research, the global opportunity in the A2P SMS API market is expected to rise from US$171.9 mn in 2015 to US$245.9 mn by 2024, expanding at a 4.1% CAGR between 2016 and 2024. 

Meanwhile, consumer usage of bulk SMS continues to be the leading segment worldwide accounting for 34.1% of the market. On the other hand,  the  API segment accounted for 55.3% of the market in 2015. However, cloud API segment is expected to expand at a 4.3% CAGR, whereas traditional API segment is expected to exhibit at a 3.9% CAGR from 2016 through 2024. 

how enterprise messaging is rapidly-evolving in business-to-consumer communications

Deploy a mobile ready messaging strategy across your organization

There is a growing business appetite for more interactive forms of enterprise messaging, including two-way SMS, enhanced SMS such as messaging based on the Rich Communications Standard and Chat bots, reveals Ovum's Enterprise Messaging Survey 2017.

The use of A2P SMS continues to surge . It is an established and trusted channel by which enterprises send transactional and promotional messages,with 42% and 35% of respondents,respectively,indicating that their use of SMS for these purposes increased over the past year.

However, the survey results also suggest that a higher year-on-year proportion of organizations now enable their customers to send SMS replies, for example, to reschedule an appointment or to have an SMS-based conversation with a contact center agent; 23% of respondents stated that their use of two-way SMS had increased during the previous 12 months.

The strongest indication that businesses are aligning with more interactive and richer messaging formats is the growth in the deployment of Chat bots. A quarter of respondents indicated that they are using the nascent technology to automate customer interactivity with specific demographic groups such as millennials, and had already measured improvements in customer service and revenues.

There is also a clear indication from the respondents that they are keen to see SMS evolve as a service, with 37% stating that new features such as custom branding, the delivery of enriched content, and read receipts, would encourage them to send more SMS.

Moreover, over a third of respondents, 36%, indicated their organizations would be interested in using an enhanced SMS service, such as the Rich Communications Services (RCS) standard. From these respondents, the most appealing feature of RCS messaging was the ability to send images and videos - logos and way-finding maps from an airline, for example.

This group also indicated that the capability to provide chatbot-like interaction with their customers via RCS was a draw.

Interestingly, enterprises clearly value the advanced features that RCS offers. Over half of the respondents would be willing to pay between 1.5 times to three times the price of an ordinary per-message SMS.

"The Enterprise Messaging Survey suggests that there is an appetite from enterprises to use richer forms of mobile messaging to engage with their customers," said Pamela Clark-Dickson, Practice Leader, Digital Communications and Social Networking, Consumer Services, Ovum. "The pressure is now on the telecoms industry to ensure that their business-to-consumer messaging services remain relevant and attractive, especially as Apple joins other chat apps in engaging with the enterprise market, via its upcoming Business Chat offering.”

Robert Gerstmann, Co-founder and Director CLX said: "Whilst A2P SMS continues to grow, the report clearly shows that enterprises are moving past an experimental phase with new messaging formats like Chat bots and examining, more closely, how best they can engage their customers with the right format at the right time.

"It's also encouraging to see that businesses clearly value a more immersive interaction with their customers. In the near future, this will be delivered by RCS type messaging services and Chat Apps allowing the Enterprise message to go beyond text to include app-like interactivity and rich media. It's everything MMS promised but unfortunately didn't deliver.”

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the expansion of mobile messaging usage in africa and middle east

Deploy a mobile ready messaging strategy across your organization

eMarketer projects that 1.82 billion people across the globe will use apps like Facebook Messenger and WeChat in 2017, an increase of 15.5% year over year.

The company that creates most comprehensive source of information on how to do business in a digital world says that despite the global adoption of mobile messaging, Middle East and Africa is the only region where mobile messaging users are in the minority. Just 22.7% of mobile phone internet users in this region are expected to use chat apps in 2017, which is up considerably from 16.3% in 2014, but still far below the other regions—and the worldwide average of 66.5%.

Over 243 million mobile phone users worldwide will start using mobile messaging apps this year, according to eMarketer’s updated forecast. Through at least 2020, this growth will be widespread, occurring in each of the 22 countries included in the estimates.

“A mobile messaging app provides private one-to-one or one-to-many communication between registered users, via a mobile phone number or user ID. Its messages and calls—voice or video—are then transmitted via data connections and the mobile web,” said Cathy Boyle, eMarketer principal analyst and author of our latest report, “Messaging App Usage Worldwide: eMarketer’s Updated Forecast, Leaderboard and Behavioral Analysis.”

According to the report, majority of 2017’s new users (63%) will come from five countries—China, India, the US, Indonesia and Brazil. Additionally, these five countries will be home to the largest number of mobile messaging app users in total, which is unsurprising considering that they also have the five largest populations in the world.

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3 ways how A2P Messaging is set to disrupt traditional marketing distribution

There is not a speck of doubt that A2P Messaging is going to be profitable for those companies who are interested to use this lucrative platform optimally.

Following are some of the hard core reasons as to why companies are eager to capitalize upon A2P Messaging:

mobile messaging platform

1. The power of 2-factor SMS authentication: companies are worried about the issues specifically pertaining to the breach of data, which is linked with user information and data security. To solve this sensitive issue, companies are looking forward to implement A2P messaging aggressively, as it is synced up with 2-factor SMS authentication. This will help companies to easily share notifications, login information, password reset etc., and that too in a secure environment.

2. How A2P messaging is changing traditional known marketing channels across Industries:

· Retail – Retailers can leverage upon A2P messaging platform by offering numerous services to their customers, such as event notifications, coupon discounts, launch details of new product, product recalls in a rather easy manner.

· Finance – Financial companies can optimally use A2P messaging platform in order to send billing information, payment notifications, transaction alerts to their respective customers in an easy and secure manner.

· Travel – When it comes to the travel industry, companies can capitalize upon this platform by sending booking information, check-in information, flight delays, cancellations, so that the customers can stay updated and informed.

Apart from the above mentioned three industries, there are other industries such as healthcare, education, aviation etc., wherein A2P messaging plays a pivotal role.

The risk of grey route traffic is another reason why companies are leaning towards this platform, which also is cost-effective at the same time.

What has Internet of Things (IoT) got to do with A2P Messaging?

 

Both IoT and A2P Messaging are going to impact a massive number of customers worldwide, in terms of customer interaction and engagement. SMS traffic is actually going to exceed around 2 trillion messages in the year 2017. The simple reason for the huge growth of SMS marketing is that it can be used for a number of productive purposes such as campaign management, promotions, SMS authentication, events details, notifications, reminders etc.,.

When it comes to Internet of Things, the global market for IoT would be worth approximately $124 billion by the year 2021. What’s more interesting is that by 2020, there will be 26 connected objects for every human being on earth.

The reason why integrating A2P messaging with Internet of Things would be rewarding is because A2P SMS is already using its platform to connect customers with factual data from connected devices and other online applications.

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Following are some of the factors (in line with sending notifications and alerts), wherein you will get to know as to how SMS plays a vital role in ascertaining as to how IoT devices communicate:

1. SMS Triggers: If there are certain important events that have to be triggered with immediate effect, then SMS triggers are used. For example, if suppose a company’s inventory is found out to be less than the required limit, then is where SMS is triggered, wherein new orders are initiated.

2. Data Centralization: In here, real-time data is being gathered from a multitude of devices and then being sent via A2P SMS to a centralized data center, thereby allowing for flawless collection of data. This will in turn help for smooth operation of all devices.

3. Resource Deployment: the connected devices can easily monitor resources and thereby communicate requests to confirm that critical levels are maintained what industry the enterprise is being involved into.

The above factors clearly explain as to why integrating A2P SMS with IoT can be really beneficial for organizations, who are in the process of communicating with a huge number of customers. With proper integration, critical devices can be optimally connected, thereby saving both the time and cost of an organization.

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The above data clearly suggests that the mobile messaging revolution is clearly here to stay. Companies and brands are increasingly realizing that this platform provides them a very cost-effective marketing channel which helps in optimizing their ROI apart from ensuring constant customer engagement. It also fosters loyalty and a customer base that is increasingly set to soar.

three key best practices for push notifications

Mobile, the most disruptive tool of the 21st century, is revolutionizing the customer experience both offline and online. And you can’t talk about mobile without talking about push messages. They’ve served a multitude of purposes like alerting customers to an offer, clicking a link to a website, informing news, pick-up notifications, or reminders of a pending item in a mobile basket. These are all good reasons to use push messages; however, with the mere swipe of a finger, users can ignore your push messages faster than they unsubscribe from your email list.

Effective push messages are particularly critical in industries like retail and quick-service restaurants, where the need for engaging with a customer or potential customer at the right moment can make the difference between a sale or not. Many misuse push messaging and end up clumsily spamming users at random times. The ability to integrate push messages into an overall omnichannel customer experience strategy is key. For example, Burger King executed an integrated customer experience strategy to increase sales in the Russian market and capture the highly competitive customer base. Below are three types of push message that they utilized in their omnichannel strategy to engage, delight, and ultimately convert customers.

1. The Welcome Message

The customer experience begins the millisecond your user downloads your app. Sometimes referred to as onboarding, this is the stage where you’ll need to make a good first impression. Welcome your customers with a personalized message when they first download the app. According to mobile expert Andrew Chen, “sending a single onboarding-focused push notification to new customers during their first week on the app increased retention by 71% over two months.”

2. The Urgent, Limited-Time Offer Message

When in a market as competitive as Fast Food or QSR, driving traffic sometimes requires instilling a sense of urgency. An effective type of push message is the classic urgent, limited-time offer. What Burger King did below is trigger a message when users entered the store. It’s a message with a barcode to scan at the register and it’s offering a deal on chicken nuggets, only available to redeem for 7 minutes. This moves people to purchase quickly, within a timeline that allows them to move customers through the line faster. And with integration into their POS system, coupon redemption is quick, easy and results in happy, fed customers.

Burger King also leveraged the power of proximity marketing for this push message. They trigger the message based on the customer’s location, knowing which store they are in to serve them the appropriate promotion. They leveraged proximity marketing techniques for both outdoor (geo-fencing) and indoor (beacon) targeting.

3. The Personalized, Reward Message

An effective, comprehensive customer experience strategy includes some type of loyalty program or campaign. Messages triggered based on customers’ loyalty status is a tried and true way to delight. Instead of spammy, non-targeted messages, customers get personalized notifications that they’ve reached a certain status or they’ve accumulated enough points for a reward. Burger King did this by coaching the users through the program, then alerting them as they’ve accrued “crowns” for which they can redeem for items at purchase. The message below welcomes the customer and guides them through the crowns program and how to earn more crowns for more rewards.

Overall push messages are an integral part of an effective omnichannel customer experience strategy.

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the power of push notifications on messaging

 Drive conversions with Push Notifications.

Compelling copywriting takes many forms and infuses many channels. It turbocharges advertising, social media, landing page calls-to-action and email subject lines. But push notifications have their own challenges, and there’s not a ton of copywriting advice to help.

So, what are push notifications? Push notifications are messages apps send users on their mobile devices to bring them back into the app experience. This is usually a communication channel you allow a particular app to utilize in order to improve your app experience with timely information. For example, a news app may send a reader a push notification about the latest political scandal, a retail app may send a shopper details about a sale or a ride-sharing app may send a traveler an alert when their car is pulling up.

Of course, there are several contributing factors that make a great push notification:

Delivery time: Don’t send push notifications to everyone at once regardless of time zone and risk waking sleeping users. Instead, segment delivery times by location, behavior or times when users normally use the app.

Audience segmentation: Only send content that is relevant to your users. For instance, a music app should only send listeners an update about a new Lady Gaga album if they’ve played her songs within the last few months.

Content personalization: There are lots of details you can add to your push notifications to make them more personalized to each individual, like a user’s name or shopping cart item.

But what about the most basic element of a push notification -- the copy?

To make the lives of mobile marketers everywhere a little easier, our team put together a new Mobile Marketing Trends report.

Here’s what we found.

Power Words Can Be Categorized Into Four Themes

We set out to understand the top words that lead to high open rates regardless of the content in a particular push. So we analyzed 2.6 billion push notifications sent between January 1 and December 31 of 2016.

Within each push notification, we looked at the word engagement score. In order to understand the impact of each word, we measured how that word performed across different messages. For example, if the word “perfect” was included in 1,000 messages, we needed to understand if it had a high word engagement score each time; in other words, we wanted to know if it lifted open rates consistently. The result of the study is a list of 120 “power words” that increase app engagement.

In the study, four categories surfaced:

1. Urgency

Your store is holding a last-minute sale, but you’re not sure how to promote it. Solution: Remind users that the clock is ticking. Urgent push notifications will capture the person’s attention and encourage conversion.

Take this message, for example: “Breaking News! John Legend’s new single is out! Check it out today or be the last to hear it.”

2. Exclusivity

Who doesn’t like feeling special? Effective push notifications tap into the feeling of exclusivity by letting users know they’ve been specially selected. This could be for a promotion, a new piece of content or anything else.

Try something like this: “Here’s an opportunity you won’t want to miss! You’re eligible to try our latest feature before anyone else.”

3. Emotion

Exaggeration turns heads, regardless if it's positive or negative. Experiment with tone to discover the optimal writing style for your audience. By using words you don’t hear every day, your messaging will stand out from the crowd.

Here’s an emotional push notification for reference: “Indulge and unwind. Discover new restaurants in your area to hit up this Thursday night. Reserve a table now!”

4. Value

Some deals are too good to pass up. Words that relate to monetary value and daily deals are guaranteed to attract attention. Emphasizing value is a simple but powerful way to encourage conversions.

Underscore the value of your promotions with a push notification like this: “Reminder: Sale ends tomorrow! Take advantage of these timely deals before they’re gone for good.”

Every Vertical Has a Unique Set of Power Words

Within each app vertical, a unique set of power words is required to command user attention. Here are some of our favorite learnings:

Travel Apps

Emotions evoke longing. “Dream,” “see,” “hear,” “escape” and “memories” entice people to open a push with the promise of adventure (and bookings).

Here’s a great push notification sent to boost wanderlust and bring travelers back to the app: “Hello, Parker! Your dream destination is just a tap away -- plan your escape now!”

Retail Apps

Lead with desire. “Want,” “sweet,” “amazing” and “incredible” are just a few words marketers use to deepen shopping FOMO.

Here’s an influential push notification sent by a retail app to increase summer sales: “Host the perfect backyard BBQ with barbecue essentials.”

Music Apps

Personalization is key. “Curated” and “selected” indicate that these apps take user preferences seriously and that each recommendation is hand-picked for you.

Here’s a timely push notification sent by a music app that's sure to lure listeners back: “Our playlist of the best 40 songs of 2017 is the perfect pre-game music for New Year’s Eve! Get it poppin’.”

Yes -- There Are Words That Can Hurt App Engagement

Higher. Faster. Guarantee. Affordable. What do these four words have in common? They might actually decrease your push-notification open rates.

We found two themes that could lower engagement:

1. Boring reminders were more likely to be ignored. While sometimes you have to send transactional messages (“Your app version is outdated”), spruce up your language to keep users engaged.

2. False promises come off as spammy. There’s a fine balance between using power words and inauthentic-sounding superlatives. Keep things delightful.

This way, you can go from “Your app version is outdated. Update now!” to “We’ve got a sweet surprise for you. All you’ve got to do is update the app to find out!”

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enterprise chatbot is to design the architecture for custom workflows

mobile messaging platform

Various enterprise solutions have now entered the market, allowing large companies, teams, employees, and even leaders to become more productive on a daily basis. Gone are the days where you have to manually input events into your calendar, send dozens of emails to arrange just one meeting, and save your files on external hard disks. Thanks to advancements in technology, enterprise solutions have become smarter, making managing your workflow a little bit easier.

The Benefits of Enterprise Solutions for Workflow Management

Modern day enterprise solutions allow you to link and automate numerous business processes. They allow team managers to keep an eye on operating information in real-time. They also give back time to employees by taking on repetitive and mundane tasks. With that in mind, they can also help you cut operational costs, and even increase revenue by giving your teams the chance to focus on revenue generating activities.

Thanks to the data that can now be gathered through these enterprise solutions, you’ll be able to react more quickly and smoothly to changes in your industry’s market. You can receive more regular and in-depth analytical reports that will allow you to further cut costs and track profitability within your organization.

How to Manage Your Workflow With Enterprise Solutions

Perfecting and managing your workflow takes time. You must know what needs to be improved on and what will best suit your company. Before choosing the best solutions for you, think about:

• The best communication methods for your teams
• What is the most recurring work within your departments
• The best ways to make information readily available
• The deliverables for each department
• What data gives you the most insight based on your company goals
• Whether or not employing new team members could help with workflow management

While the list of enterprise workflow management software is abundant, finding the right one for your company can be challenging, as they’re often complex and require a lot of additional internal training. As a result, adopting and integrating various different enterprise solutions can be the best option. Here are a few enterprise solutions that can help you with workflow management:

Handle Company Documents in the Cloud

Collaborating in the cloud gives you the opportunity to work more closely and efficiently with colleagues. It also gives you the chance to access information directly without having to wait for hard copies or devices like external hard disks and USB drives.

In addition to the above, working through the cloud allows you to:

• Cut costs by eliminating the need for external devices
• Reduce carbon footprint by cutting down on unnecessary printing
• Keep your company information on one database
• Keep your documents safe
• Increase company productivity by eliminating the waiting game associated with traditional information processing workflows

There are mounds of cloud computing systems available today. Some of the most popular ones include iCloud, Google Drive, and Dropbox. All of these offer different payment plans and business upgrades that give you an unlimited amount of storage space and other company benefits.

Use Data to Measure Productivity

Many, if not most, enterprise solutions offer vast amounts of important data that can help you measure productivity. After all, if you don’t have the right data, you can’t establish what you’re doing well and what needs to be improved upon.

To choose the right data analytics software for your company, you need to consider whether or not it will have limitations and who will have ownership of the data it generates. You must also consider privacy. While many smaller companies choose the free Google Analytics platform, this may not be the best option for certain business needs.

Choose an analytics platform that can give you a 360-degree view of your company, is easy to navigate through, and can be test driven before purchase. You should also ask yourself these key questions:

• What does your business want to measure?
• Which departments will need this data to generate reports?
• Does your business need access to raw data?
• Will your business need access to older data so that you can create comparison reports?

Embrace Messaging Platforms

Email is still a valuable and widely used method of communication, especially in the enterprise. However, despite it being good for certain conversations, it can be a very time-consuming way for departments and colleagues to interact.

Instant messaging platforms have become increasingly popular in recent times, and companies such as Slack now make it easier than ever for people to get instant answers to their most important questions, without spending hours going back and forth between emails.

Automate Mundane and Repetitive Tasks With a Chatbot

Unfortunately, the majority of a person’s workday involves catching up on emails, attending meetings, and undertaking repetitive and mundane daily tasks. While these are necessary, they do leave less time for you to focus on activities that can help you generate leads or make money.

Lucky for us all, we’ve been blessed with the modern-day chatbot. These robots equipped with natural language processing (NLP) and artificial intelligence (AI) are now more educated than ever. They can have human-like conversations as well as take on simple, yet repetitive tasks. Better yet, they learn with every action they’re asked to undertake, meaning they get more intelligent without you having to do anything.

Today, creating an AI-powered chatbot is extremely easy, thanks to chatbot platforms. These tools allow you to build your own enterprise bot with no coding knowledge, in a matter of minutes. Many integrate with your Facebook profiles and allows you to create an enterprise chatbot solutions that can:

• Be integrated into your business solutions
• Work as integral part of your marketing team by pushing offers and promotions, on demand
• Use NLP to recognize variations on your trigger words and phrases
• Help with your customer support activities
• Increase sales by taking orders directly from Messenger and Facebook comments

Create an AI-Powered Personal Assistant

Chatbots aren’t just good for taking on some of your workload, though; they can act as personal assistants that can schedule, amend, and cancel meetings. They can also set alarms, answer general questions, place orders for you, publish content, and gather additional data.

AI-powered personal assistants, or chatbots, are a cost-effective way of getting an extra helping hand without physically employing a new employee. They’re great at managing certain aspects of your workflow for you and they can do so instantly without the need for you to pay weekly or monthly invoices.

Finally… 

Managing your workflow with some of the enterprise solutions mentioned above will allow you to not only reduce project costs but also risks. You won’t fall behind on projects, and you’ll have instant access to a mound of information that will help you to become more productive, giving you back the time and capabilities to focus on achieving your business goals.

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