SMS stands for Short Message Service. Almost anyone who owns a mobile phone is comfortable with SMS (even George from the Vodacom adverts). Billions of SMS messages are sent each year where the majority are sent from one person to another. When one looks at leveraging SMS for mobile service delivery, one usually considers the interaction between a business application and end users. In terms common usage, there are 3 types of such interactions: Bulk SMS, 2-way SMS, and Premium rate SMS.
Bulk SMS usually involves integrating with an existing database of users (from a CRM system for example) and automating the process of sending information to these users. A simple example is when you log into internet banking, you can elect to receive an SMS which contains your one time pin (OTP).
2-way SMS allows SMS's to be sent to end users and for those users to respond to these messages. The response is then processed by the business application and some automated action taken.
Premium rate SMS is also 2-way in nature but allows for rates other than standard SMS rates to be levied. A multitude of billing options exist, including rate bands (where a set fee is charged for a number) and variable billing (where billing is based on the requested service or content). In a non-subscription type service, when a user sends an SMS to a premium rated number, funds are deducted from their cellphone account. In a subscription type service, funds are deducted periodically or on some stated basis. The network operator takes a share of the revenue and the remainder is passed on to the application owner or service provider.
What are custom SMS solutions good for?
- Reasonably simple interactions: exchange of information (predominantly text).
- Capturing larger (relatively) quantities of textual data.
- Simple "conversational" interactions - where the state of the interaction must be maintained or where the context is important.
- Revenue collection (via premium rated SMS).
- Textual information dissemination.
- Communicating with a large number of users, quickly and reliably.
What are custom SMS solutions not good for?
- Capturing structured, formatted information or data which must be validated in some way.
- Multiple, extended or continuous interactions (due to cost).
- Rich media (video, images, music, etc).
- Client-side processing (i.e. performing some custom action on the recipient's device).
What is the extent of device support?
- Almost every mobile device worth considering (mobile phone, GSM-enabled PDA, pager, etc) supports SMS.
- It is by far the most widely supported mobile technology after voice.
Example application
Qpid is a premium rated SMS service, developed by Clyral which allows users to send anonymous secret admirer messages to one another in a safe way. The system tracks who "fancies" who and interacts contextually with each user (conversational). All interactions are text based.
This post forms part of a series on a comparison of mobile technologies.
