Text Messaging Featured Article

The text message has taken something of a new prominence in terms of business and personal use, and with good reason. Simple to use, simple to receive, simple to digest and simple to respond to, text messaging offers high marks in terms of sheer ease of use. But when it comes to relationship management, text messaging isn't used nearly as much as it could be. That's a fault that some are looking to change, with a set of new tools arriving on the scene.

One of the biggest tools looking to come into play is the Avaya (News - Alert) Messaging Service, a cloud-based system that allows users to send SMS messages to other users' desk phone numbers, allowing more users to take advantage of SMS to send messages to other contacts, which it's set to offer for $120 per user per month. That's a sound start, but it's being augmented by other services like TextGen, a per-message service that allows any number at all—desk phone, mobile device or the like—to both send and receive SMS messages.

With TextGen, users pay $50 a month and an extra $20 for every 10,000 text messages used. TextGen then gives its subscribers an actual phone number to use for the service, though the service can also work with an existing telephone number to send and receive texts. TextGen also gives users a set of Web tools that can more readily create scripts and allow for information to be sent and received via the text messages. That allows services to essentially let users send information via text message from any number, including information like name, address, and answers to various questions like a taxi service asking where to send a cab or the like.

There are several other applications for this technology, starting with things like activating appliances, disseminating information about recall notices or the like, engaging in direct response marketing efforts or offering relevant discounts and coupons to users, and several others.

Taking together things like the Avaya Messaging Service and TextGen, and one thing becomes very clear: text messaging as a marketing tool poses significant opportunities for its users. Not only does it encompass so many potential uses all at once, in terms of both attracting new users and keeping in touch with current users, but it also is a widely-used medium that ensures there's a big user base to keep in touch with in the first place. A recent study undertaken by TextGen, CTIA (News - Alert) and the CMO Council shows that a little over four text messages were sent in 2013 for every one minute of voice time used. With further reports indicating that Twitter (News - Alert) is accounting for over 500 million tweets every day, it's clear that short messaging is becoming a larger part of our lives than ever.

That makes it prime territory for businesses to keep in touch with customers, and when it comes to things like TextGen and the Avaya Messaging Service, the opportunities available are worth paying closer attention to. That many uses, and that many users, makes it a tool that's hard to ignore.