Service Providers ?

Service Providers ? SearchSearch
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Anonymous
 
Posted on Tuesday, November 25, 2003 - 05:45 am:   

I understand that you need a service provider in conjunction with the NOW SMS program and HTTP ( connection to the web basically) to be able to send out sms mms and wap push messages.

Im slowly starting to understand this very complicated subject, ive been researching for about a week now, and i was thinking of starting a web site that would allow users to easily and reliably be able to send all three types of mesages for as cheap as possible all arround the world. My questions are:

Q1- If now sms is registered could it be used for a for profit web company ?

Q2- What servie providers woudl you suggest i look into that meet my need (SMS MMS and WAP push all arround the world, reliable, and meesages sent and receive in a timely fashion, IE dont send a message now and receive it 2 days later)

Q3- if i use HTTP, do i need anything else then the program the service provider host and domain to be able to run this service ie: any hardware required.
Anonymous
 
Posted on Wednesday, November 26, 2003 - 12:59 am:   

can anyoen help ?
Bryce Norwood - NowSMS Support
Board Administrator
Username: Bryce

Post Number: 1229
Registered: 10-2002
Posted on Wednesday, November 26, 2003 - 02:12 am:   

My perspective ...

If you're going to compete on price, you'd have a hard time making a go of it.

There are a lot of SMS service providers out there ... and margins are typically razor thin. Typically you are buying SMS from one or more other service providers, and adding a pence or two. And typically, in order to lock in a good price with your providers, you're guaranteeing some minimum amount of traffic to qualify for reduced rates.

So it's a challenge. To make it work, you need a value add that makes your service more compelling than another ... and you need a marketing message that lands a significant number of customers.

I guess I would just have to caution you that when you make your primary pitch be to do it as "cheap as possible" ... that while there is definitely market demand for such a service ... the only way that you could make it work commercially would be to deliver an incredible amount of volume of messages through the service. And to get it started, I think you'd need a considerable amount of capital to lock in agreements that would allow you to offer the cheapest prices around.

And even so, I think you need a strong value add to draw people to your web site before you can sign them up as paying customers.

I'd encourage you to do more investigation regarding service provider pricing. Look at how much you think you would have to charge in order to draw customers, figure out the margins that you would have to operate with ,etc.

It's real difficult to compete on price when you're effectively a middleman ... unless you've got the volume of customers to give you clout with suppliers.

But it also depends on what your ambitions are. That's why I'd really encourage you to think about a value add. Or maybe focus on a particular geographic region instead of the whole world.
Simon Tune
New member
Username: Airfox

Post Number: 1
Registered: 12-2003
Posted on Monday, December 01, 2003 - 08:37 pm:   

Just a passing thought....
with so many free SMS providers on the web backed by advertizing revenues, how could anybody hope to compete on price?

Another thought.... if anybody knows of a way to do/get things cheaper than free, please email me full details. thanx
Bryce Norwood - NowSMS Support
Board Administrator
Username: Bryce

Post Number: 1310
Registered: 10-2002
Posted on Friday, December 05, 2003 - 09:31 pm:   


quote:

Just a passing thought....
with so many free SMS providers on the web backed by advertizing revenues, how could anybody hope to compete on price?




That's a good point.

But keep in mind that it depends on what your audience is.

The free sites are targeting individual users, not businesses, and there is a lot more to SMS than just individual users sending SMS to each other.

If you are considering setting up a service though, competing on price is a tough road to take in an extremely competitive market that already has low margins.

In my mind, it's better to concentrate on ways that you can add value, so that you are not competing solely based upon price.