SMS Is Not Dead! Unless You Want It To Be...

Over the new year break Mashable asked the question "Are Text Messages Declining Worldwide". They only cited figures from three locations - Finland, Australia and Hong Kong - so hardly a conclusive set of data. That being said, it is clear that to converse with friends is now far simpler to do via social networks, or one of the many group messaging applications that are now available. In fact there are so many group messaging applications available that the only true winners in the space will be those applications that can communicate across their application boundary. That is the applications that can still allow group participation with group members who don't actually use the application. GroupMe is a classic case for this as it allows people to communicate within the group not only via use of their application but also by use of SMS. Perfect as the lowest common denominator for communication across all  mobile phones (apart from voice) is still SMS.

So although the Mashable figures don't actually present a global view they don't surprise me at all. I fully expect the figures to be representative across all markets where smartphone usage is exploding. SMS doesn't provide a mechanism for social group communication. It is a person to person communication mechanism. It is only the creativity of application developers who have provided the additional level of social to SMS. Carriers should have done this ages ago. They have had exclusive access to this distribution mechanism for 20 odd years. For whatever reason they have missed the boat when it comes to social interaction using SMS.

In all the time SMS has been a massive cash cow for carriers they have done nothing to add to the service. Maybe now that it is clear that SMS revenues are decreasing it might be worth them thinking that the concept of group might be an interesting 'new' feature to add to SMS? either that or simply see revenue continue to fall. That of course is also still an option.

As I have said often before, SMS is not dead. That is unless you want it to be ;-)!

Cheers

m