We recently sponsored a session at the Enterprise Connect Expo in Orlando, Florida, where Michael Ahern, Sinch VP Customer Development & Strategy spoke on the subject ‘The Revolution in Customer Communications is Here: Personalized Mobile Video Messaging with MMS and RCS’. Check out the recording and presentation to find out just how sexy the future of messaging really is!
Type: Blog Article
In 1995, the average SMS user sent 0.4 texts per month. Twenty-five years later, it’s a feature of everyday communication that’s as familiar as making a slice of toast. More recently of course, OTT messaging apps like WhatsApp and Viber have surged forward in the P2P space, yet in enterprise communications application to person (A2P) SMS has endured and continues to grow. Sinch’s own research,…, 1. Smartphones have changed consumer behavior, Pew Research estimates that, more than 5 billion people, around the world have a mobile device (approximately two thirds of us), over half of these are a smartphone. While it’s true that people in advanced economies are more likely to have smartphones, and are more likely to use the internet and social media than people in emerging economies, penetration of mobile devices breaks down as 76% in advanced economies vs 45% in emerging. Of course, the rise…, 2. The increased use of A2P messaging in customer facing industries, A2P SMS is a quick and reliable way to reach consumers at every stage of their interaction with a company, making it ideal for any customer facing industry. One major benefit is that customer service functions can now be operated out of hours and on demand. A, consumer study, by West UC, found that 70% of respondents want more convenient customer service options to support 24/7 lifestyles, whilst 74% agree that it’s frustrating when customer service is only available during working hours. In areas like banking and financial services, which are increasingly facing disruption and churn from startups, customer service is the key battleground for winning and retaining…, Accenture estimates, the cost of customers switching due to poor customer service is $1.6 trillion. The, Digital Disconnect In Customer Engagement, report goes further. It found that 52% of customers have switched providers due to poor customer service, with banks, retailers, and cable and satellite television providers being the worst offenders. A2P SMS makes this possible so that things like notification, verification and one-time passwords (two-factor authentication) are routinely delivered via an encrypted SMS message - anytime, anywhere., 3. SMS is ubiquitous and trusted, Perhaps the greatest strength of A2P SMS is that it’s ubiquitous, it works on every handset, smart and dumb as a native function. SMS also works without the need for an internet (4G) connection. Going back to the Pew Research mentioned above, if half of the 5 billion global mobile users connect via a smartphone, what about the other half? SMS is guaranteed to be delivered to any handset on any…, research, from mobile trade body, MEF, SMS is the most trusted of all enterprise communication channels - almost double the trust levels seen with email or OTT apps. Looking ahead, richer forms of messaging, like RCS, will increase the consumer engagement potential for enterprises, but delivery via A2P will remain the preferred method for reaching the largest possible audience. Why? because consumers and…
Type: Blog Article
RCS is widely touted as the future of enterprise messaging. Its rich immersive formats bring a whole host of opportunities for enterprises to engage with consumers, that, combined with the ubiquity of smartphones, is tipped to replace many of the functions currently locked up in enterprise applications. Where once a hotel chain might have offered an app to its customers, now everything in that…
Type: Blog Article
In today’s increasingly digital world, we’re more at risk for data breaches and security threats than ever before. This means there are serious dangers in doing business via the internet and now mobile, and even more ways for fraudsters to compromise your customers’ data. With the growing popularity of A2P (application-to-person) SMS, mobile users are at risk of receiving targeted campaigns aimed…, How , Sinch, can help, At Sinch, we take security very seriously. It’s our top priority to keep your messaging traffic running smoothly and your customers’ data protected at all times. For example, we actively monitor for fraudulent SMS campaigns and suspicious activity on our platform. We take the necessary actions to block unwanted messages for any at-risk customers. To address the onset of smishing and the…, Get the code, In addition to hawkishly monitoring our network for fraudulent messaging traffic, Sinch is leading the charge with global industry leaders and influencers to create a more safe and secure mobile environment for all. Our mission: to drive market clean-up and major change within the messaging industry. So, we've joined forces with the Mobile Ecosystem Forum (MEF) to disrupt the norm with new…, Contact us, At Sinch, we’re determined to tackle SMS fraud and protect both businesses and consumers. With more security threats like smishing cropping up each day, we’re committed to underscoring trust in enterprise messaging for all A2P messaging players. As a global leader, we're dedicated to providing the highest quality SMS service with our deep Tier 1 integrations with mobile operators around the…
Type: Blog Article
Personalization is helping enterprises finesse the ways in which they communicate with their customers. Where once personalization meant sending an email or text message that addressed individuals by name, now advances in technology, in particular the intersection between SaaS and messaging, are enabling enterprises to get much closer by communicating against an array of data points. A digital…
Type: Blog Article
Good times! For the fifth year running, Sinch has received a Tier One rating, in the annual A2P SMS Messaging Vendor Performance Report , recently published by the Roaming Consulting Company (ROCCO). The report definitively ranks the industry’s leading A2P SMS Messaging Vendors, based on scores and feedback from over 365 mobile network operators (MNOs). Only those vendors scoring higher than four…, ROCCO A2P SMS Messaging Vendor Performance Report 2019, here , to understand why the global mobile network operator community rate Sinch so highly.
Type: Blog Article
Matt Ramerman, President of Sinch’s mobile marketing business unit, Sinch Engage, recently joined MEF features editor, Tim Green, for a web chat. Entitled Strengthening Customer Relationships Through Mobile Engagement, the discussion took a deep dive on how personalized video messaging is engaging consumers, not just at the top of the sales funnel, but throughout the customer journey. For Matt,…, Customer relationships and loyalty, Loyalty marketing no longer works. Consumers don’t actually display loyalty to brands based on discounts or fremium offers, rather, they seek out the best deal for them and are fickle about it. For enterprises this ultimately becomes a race to the bottom, undercutting competition while eroding profits or average revenue per user. The concept of loyalty in itself should of course be a goal, but it…, The technology in our pockets, The proliferation of smartphones and formerly feature phones, has had a major impact on consumer marketing and communication. Engagement is instant, personal and effective. Importantly, this means that enterprises can now move away from discounting to scrutinizing what the customer journey looks like, and what the opportunities are to offer an amazing and relevant experience within that journey.…, Personalized messaging engages consumers like no other channel, In 2010 brands were moving aggressively toward making their own app. Time has taught us that consumers aren’t keen. They don’t like branded apps and tend to disable them after a short period of time. The alternative was email, yet the email inbox is crowded and hard to get any cut through. Mobile messaging on the other hand, in the form of SMS, has traditionally delivered open rates of 90% plus.…, 1. On-boarding for a wireless carrier, On-boarding a new customer that has recently signed up for a service is a classic CRM strategy. The objective might be a warm welcome to the service, an acknowledgement of what a particular customer has signed up for and some basic orientation around next steps. The communication is based on explicit known data - in this example, a customer’s tariff plan, their name and services that they have or…, 2. Upselling for a retailer, In this example, upselling leveraged implicit data analysis where customers were filtered based on cart abandonment, i.e. they looked at a particular garment but did not purchase it. Customers were also part of the mobile loyalty program, which meant they were opted in to receive notifications and offers. Sinch Engage was able to showcase the product they had been looking at in video format, link…, 3. Enhanced customer experience for an airline, Sinch Engage is currently involved with many airlines that use SMS for flight notifications. The platform ingests the same notification data but instead of a few lines of text, the consumer is presented with dynamic rich media. The original metadata can also be augmented with third party data so that where in the original information we knew the flight, its destination and the departure time,…, Significant results, In terms of the customer journey, messaging is already well ahead of other channels just because the engagement levels it provides is established as the number 1 consumer preference. When you couple that with personalized video, the results are significant. Sinch Engage has achieved a 20% plus reduction in churn - as an indicator of customer retention for subscription services like mobile carrier…
Type: Blog Article
Robert Gerstmann, Co-founder and Chief Evangelist at Sinch recently took part in a Q&A for MarTech Series, read on for his thoughts on consumer messaging, RCS, CPaaS and find out what tech he can’t live without!, Tell us about your journey into enterprise communications, I’ve been working in mobile enterprise communications for over fifteen years. Prior to Co-Founding Sinch , originally named CLX, in 2008 I held Commercial Management positions at Mblox as Director of the Global Mobile Messaging business line and at payments service provider Netgiro/Digital River., Tell us about the evolving state of the consumer message landscape, The rise of social communication has completely redefined how we communicate with our friends and family. Once the phone call was king. However, the emergence of SMS followed later by OTT-messaging applications like Facebook Messenger , WhatsApp , and WeChat has laid the foundations for a more instantaneous and richer form of communication. As a result, brands and businesses can now engage…, How is personalized messaging finally making a huge impact on ROMI?, Personalized messaging leverages the unrivalled engagement and open rates associated with application-to-person (A2P) SMS, adds the rich media experience using images, audio and video provided both by MMS today and new messaging channels RCS and OTT tomorrow but does this in a completely personalized manner as opposed to the generic nature of much business messaging of today. As a result,…, Why should brands be excited about RCS?, Often billed as SMS 2.0, RCS represents a major upgrade to today’s business messaging experience. RCS enables brands to engage with consumers using color, images, audio, and video content. RCS also offers features and functionality such as real-time and group chat, as well as the ability to automate responses with a chatbot . Marketers can also see when and how a person has engaged with their…, Are AI combined with A2P SMS still nascent in enterprise messaging? Can you share some use-cases?, Enterprises are beginning to understand how AI and enterprise messaging solutions can work together to enable a reduction in costs and improvement in customer service experience. For example, last year Walmart launched a text message powered personal shopper service called Jetblack – which uses AI to provide relevant product recommendations and thus save busy customers time. In many sectors…, How is Communications Platform as a Service (CPaaS) driving the in-app Customer Service revolution?, In the last few years, there has been a major shift in what consumers consider to be good customer service. Consumers don’t want to wait on the phone to speak to their energy provider or queue at the bank to make a simple transaction. They want to access information whenever they need it, in the most convenient way possible. In most cases, this means via a mobile phone, which is why many new…, How do you prepare for an AI-centric world as a Business Leader?, We are doing this in a number of ways, but mainly we are working on making our data more available to our customers so that it can easily plug-in and support the next generation of AI-driven services and solutions., How do you inspire your people to work with technology?, Sinch is a technology company, so most of the people who work here already live and breathe it, so inspiring our people to work with technology isn’t really a challenge we face., One word that best describes how you work, I lead by example, that’s three words., What apps/software/tools can’t you live without?, It might not be the most glamorous choice, but Microsoft Office Suite is an essential part of how I work, alongside email and SMS. I’m also a big fan of Slack for staying in touch with the team, LinkedIn for networking, and Spotify for when I need some music., What are you currently reading?, Right now I’m reading, The Savage Detectives by Chilean author Roberto Bolaño., What’s the best advice you’ve ever received?, Don’t assume malice. As important with friends, family, and colleagues as with new people you meet. It makes it a lot more likely that you’ll end up with good relationships with most of the people you meet in life., Tag the one person in the industry whose answers to these questions you would love to read?, It would have to be one of the executives at SalesForce , so let’s go with Marc Benioff . , Thank you, Robert! That was fun and hope to see you back on MarTech Series soon., First published in MarTech Series .
Type: Blog Article
Buying loyalty from customers always seemed like a contradiction. Now, the game is up. Experts think the age of marketing based on loyalty is over, here we reflect on the coming era of relevance., Is loyalty dying? Well, the canine community might disagree. Even in the digital age, dogs generally seem quite pleased to see their owners. But can we say the same of customers and brands? Are the time-honored techniques for making customers loyal to companies and products on the decline? Possibly. The evidence is piling up. In a 2018 article for Harvard Business Review, three senior execs at…, 1. Mass market (60s/70s), The era of mass production, when scale and distribution ruled, 2. Segmentation (80s), More sophisticated consumer research enabled marketers to target customers in niche segments, 3. Customer level (90/2000s), Tech advances made it possible to target individual customers, 4. Loyalty (2010s), The age of CRM, tailored incentives and advanced retention Looking back over the list, it's obvious that technology plays a key role in the evolution of the discipline. The mass-market era of Coca-Cola and McDonalds was made possible by cars, freeways and the television set. The loyalty era of Amazon was brought into being by cloud servers and data mining. So, what's powering the move towards '…, To read the full article and find out how relevance is enabled by true personalization (the segment of one) download our latest eBook - Messaging and Personalization, transitioning from loyalty to relevance , where you’ll find further insights, use-cases and stats that outline the trajectory of personalization in enterprise communication. If you’re hungry for even more on personalization, check…
Type: Blog Article
It’s clear that digital technology, in particular smartphones, have sculpted new patterns of consumer demand. Rich personalized conversation with brands is replacing what was essentially a one-way channel. Email or SMS, for example, with the direction ‘donotreply’, represents a cul-de-sac of brand engagement - the end of the interaction. Savvy businesses have long-since realized that these…
Type: Blog Article
