News was just recently announced that Vodafone in the UK are running a pilot scheme to allow customers receive Twitter updates completely free via SMS. This kind of got me thinking a little and asking myself the question our people now starting to use social messaging services like Twitter and Facebook instead of SMS.
Apparently the deal between Vodafone and Twitter is initially for a trial period with possible rollouts at a later stage once this trial is finished. Of course there will be a deal in place so that both companies can generate revenue from any SMS sent that once this is fully launched.
Text messaging has been around almost as long as phones if we’re honest and with the new wave of smart phones and applications that are becoming available for use it is something that we need to debate as to whether we are going to finally see the end of an era.
The people who generally use text messaging are younger and this is the same audience that are embracing social networking like Facebook, Twitter and Bebo and as they move more towards the “real-time” conversation model they are beginning to gain more confidence in consumers and users alike.
We have already seen Facebook move into the conversational model by adding a similar product to Twitter. But I think we will also see a debate emerging as to costs associated with access to the likes of social networking and sending SMS text messages. Most people are used to engaging with social networks for free, and on the opposite side they understand the costs associated with sending text messages and just not sure if people will be willing to pay for this type of service once it is introduced. I think the network service providers would really need to engage with their consumers to try and come up with a better model in terms of pricing.
We have already seen unofficial Twitter applications that work just fine and some of the early adopters are starting to use this once they have discovered that they can do this on the move. I really think it’s down to debate the tariffs that some of the network service providers have at present in some countries they have unlimited data depending on what contract you were on, in other countries to date per month is actually limited and you are charged a premium rate want to go with this limit - this obviously is where the network service providers are creamy off profits and I think this is the ideal market for the SMS social networking idea.
Mark Dunne is a writer providing advice on Mobile Phones he is also a big fan of Betty Boop Mobile Phone if you have time drop by his site for some tips and information.
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