Comments on: The hype and fall of SMS ads – Substitutes and Alternatives

By: Sagar

Sagar — Wed, 09 Jun 2010 15:26:22 +0000

One of the most pertinent problem for SMS ads (tagging content + last 40/60 char ad) is their inherent nature of limited characters. Compare this against full SMS ad i.e. most of Spam SMS. Spam SMSing has never fallen and it is just shooting up with (ever) decreasing per SMS cost. So it is natural that the advertiser would prefer full SMS with his own brand (sender title) even if it costs may be 3 times more than the tagged SMS ad.

By: Kamal

Kamal — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 19:27:22 +0000

Yeah.. that link isnt working yet

Sms advertising was just sprouting and then it was cluttered all over!

Advertisers were just thinking of spending money to woo ‘targeted audience’ but then ‘context’ was actually dead!

“Bade miyan” – the target advertiser for a start up thought its too little. and

‘Chhote miyan” – was hardly taken care of!

If contextual advertising could be really contextual.. who will avoid paying even a rupee per ad on SMS!

By: naman

naman — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 19:18:53 +0000

Thanks Hunold.
The link is fixed now.

By: Hunold

Hunold — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 19:13:03 +0000

Interesting article.
Just a thing : link on “alternatives and substitutes” is not working…

2/3 things to share :
- SMS has a cost
- SMS is more private than other channel because in mobile device
- SMS could be more segmented but often advertiser to not use the tool as the best

And there is so much to tell and to do about this topic.

By: Piyush

Piyush — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 18:13:19 +0000

Interesting Analysis. Some of the things I learnt over a couple of years for Pull SMS

1. Masses are not comfortable with command line based request for a couple of reasons:
– Lesser recall rate for strict format specification.
– Highly prone to spelling mistakes.
– Every transaction is paid (Errors included).
– Unreliability in the duration of response.

2. Footer ads are actually good for following reasons:
– It doesn’t look like an Ad but considered as part of the content.
– Contextual relevance is higher than most other channels.
– If call to action is on Voice/SMS for advertiser, it works best.

3. Absence of Toll-Free SMS service (for consumers) – Situation could have been completely different, if consumer could get a chance to SMS absolutely for free (irrespective of their plan).

Today, mini-cost for trying the service itself is perhaps the biggest roadblock.

By: Kasi

Kasi — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 09:48:29 +0000

Pricing is not the issue. Business logic is the issue.

IMHO… SMS ad should not be visualized as hand-out ads, TV ads, radio ads,… where reach to max number is the target.

If you know the behavior of a cell number and then send targeted ad … and it makes sense to spend even 20-paise per targeted cell.

Where and How to get the Cell-Behavior is the issue.

And by the way adword and adsense works on Push-On-Pull logic. Here it is just Push…

It is a pity that multi-million dollar has been spent on this.

Kasi

By: Vishal

Vishal — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 08:22:35 +0000

@Naman

Excellent analysis. My take on why sms ad. didnt work out:

1. 2 many smses in the users inbox. sms clutter.

2. 2 much of spammy smses from this kind of sites.

3. same user getting the same ad/tag line multiple times a day.

SMSgupshup IMHO has turned into another bulk sms supplier in an already hyper competetive bulk sms market.

By: naman

naman — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 06:20:35 +0000

Thank You Krishan!
Yes, I did want to refer to Google Adwords. Thanks for the correction.

By: Krishan

Krishan — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 06:16:19 +0000

Naman, your writing is really interesting and thanks for sharing the finding. But I see a little mistake at the end. I think you wanted to refer to Google Adwords not the Google Adsense.