Whether SMS is used purely for marketing purposes, a call-to-action for survey data and response, appointment reminders, or even linked to payment solutions to boost collection rates, SMS has proven the cheapest and most convenient way to reach customers. With more than 90% of us reading an SMS within 3 minutes, and almost 80% of us (it’s 95% of 16-24-year-olds) owning a smartphone, SMS has a responsiveness that no other solution can muster.
With clients reporting significant improvements in response rates, revenue collections and customer relations, our SMS solutions can positively impact your business. Here’s just a small sample of how:
SMS Linked Payments
Traditional methods for payment reminders are hardly cost-effective. A simple text message, on the other hand, costs pennies. You can even purchase your own short or long numbers to personalise any automated responses you want to send when receiving messages.
BCH’s ‘Collect Plus’ automated payment service sends SMS messages with telephone numbers for customers to make payments. Automated payments can also be made through our PCI DSS Level 1 approved system. Full receipts can be sent immediately afterwards for security-conscious customers.
PCI DSS approval at Level 1 gives the added bonus of fully de-scoping your contact centre operation from current and ongoing PCI regulations. With FICO reporting that as many as 41 % of UK respondents react positively to self-service SMS payments, and recent figures showing SMS accounting for the majority of worldwide financial payments (predicted to achieve an explosive year-on-year growth rate of 28%, that’s almost £300 billion), the uptake for business messaging continues to rise exponentially.
One time Password (OTP)
Secure multi-factor authentication is increasingly being used to safeguard against fraud. Text messaging to link a personal number to a specific device (a mobile phone) is an effective mechanism for additional factors in the account authentication process.
OTP can be used alongside call-based, speech or other mechanisms to provide multi factors for authentication. For example, a number or phrase is ‘popped up’ onto the page a customer is looking at. It could be that customer’s bank account. A text is then sent to the customer, who then types in the same number or phrase to confirm that he or she is the person making the transaction.
Broadcast SMS
Bulk “mailing” (sending thousands of messages simultaneously) can be reminders for payment, voter registration, feedback or simply for advertising. SMS messages provide a cheap and reliable way of reaching people. Even with the strictures of GDPR, people will still consent to be sent useful and relevant information.
Surveys
SMS messages can carry links to webpages for filling in forms or surveys – the immediacy of SMS messaging linked to the sophistication of smartphones and web applications means that audiences can be targeted instantly so you know what they think.
One purpose for which these SMS types are used is to encourage and grow relationships with particular demographics such as football supporters. For example, when a goal is scored or at the final whistle, registered supporters are sent messages asking them for match feedback. In this instance, SMS can help grow the valuable relationship that exists between supporters and clubs.
The potential to increase your SMS functionality is even greater
What if, for example, your system could not only understand the context as well as the semantics of SMS messages but also predict the content of subsequent messages likely to be received? Using advanced statistical probability analysis, it’s possible to understand an SMS and then even to intuitively predict the key content of subsequent messages, enabling your systems to respond intelligently and immediately without unnecessary lag. Put simply, systems will be using semantics analytics to interpret what’s been said before to infer what’s going to be said next, so your customers can be dealt with efficiently and quickly routed through to the right person.
BCH’s expertise in dealing with SMS means we have a solution ready for you. That solution is almost certainly ‘off the shelf’, but if it’s not we’ll write one specifically for you.
We love the power of SMS and hope you will too.
To find out about us follow the link. To inquire about our SMS solutions call the BCH team on 0161 537 7707.
We look forward to hearing from you.