MSearchGroove

In-Brief: A roundup of messaging news and developments with special emphasis on mobile industry stats, T-Mobile’s data capture schemes, customer feedback services in South Africa and mobile IM.

MIM CATCHING ON: Mobile instant messaging (MIM) adoption in Europe will grow from 8 percent (26.7 million subscribers) in 2007 to 24 percent (80 million subscribers) by 2013, according to a study of 22,000 consumers across France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, and the U.K. by Forrester Research.

But three years after the first mobile IM service launched, Forrester believes operators still lack a true commitment to backing the technology because of fears that mobile IM will cannibalize revenue from their highly profitable text messaging services. But mobile IM’s growth is inevitable and operators’ fears of revenue erosion are greatly overstated according to Forrester Research Analyst Niek van Veen.

Among the findings:

• Sweden and the UK will lead in mobile IM adoption with 35 percent and 31eprcent of subscribers using mobile IM respectively by 2013.
• Mobile IM will displace 13 percent of SMS traffic by 2013. In Sweden, where SMS usage is low and mobile IM uptake high, mobile IM will replace 28 percent of SMS traffic; in Spain, where the opposite is true, it will replace just 8 percent of SMS traffic.
• SMS will continue to grow regardless of the increasingly popularity of mobile IM. Monthly Person-to-Person (P2P) SMS traffic in Western Europe will climb from 190 billion messages in 2007 to 233 billion by the end of 2013, despite the fact that some traffic will have moved to IM.

USERS DEMAND MOBILE EMAIL: Email leads the pack when it comes to mobile services, according to an online survey of 1,010 consumers conducted by usability specialist Webcredible. When asked which service they would use on their mobile phone if speed and quality weren’t an issue, 33 percent answered email. The jump in interest in mobile email is driven by the spread of PDAs and the Blackberry.

Social networking came in a close second with a quarter of the votes, followed by access to local information about their surroundings (20 percent), travel route and planning information (13 percent) and shopping online (9 percent).

DATA CAPTURE SCHEMES: Information is power, but it’s sure-fire competitive advantage if it’s real-time subscriber intelligence collected from the source. With this in mind SonyEricsson is gearing up with T-Mobile in the U.K. to pilot the use of SMS-based data capture scheme to measure satisfaction among mobile phone users that have had their handset repaired. After a user has used the repaired handset for a pre-set period, a survey appears automatically in the mobile display. Unlike standard SMS, which puts much of the burden on users to type in answers in a tiny keypad, this approach - based on patented technology from Broca, a messaging solutions provider — allows users to complete questionnaires via SMS by selecting answers from a short series of drop-down menus.

As Jesper Lykking, Head of Strategic Sales T-Mobile UK of Sony Ericsson UK, said in a statement: “Broca’s technology has the potential to improve significantly our understanding of our customers’ user experience and build on our relationship with them.” Hmmm…it’s quite easy to imagine how this technology could be used in a variety of scenarios to gauge user satisfaction and sentiment. I’m think mobile advertising, mobile search and - well - everything.

Indeed, SonyEricsscon is not alone in identifying SMS as the ideal channel for garnering real-time user data.

South African online consumer advocate Dontgo has teamed up with global mobile messaging services provider Clickatell to provide feedback and complain about bad service as it happens. This way users can report bad service in seconds - and also spread the work to other users when service is exceptional.

Research reveals only a fraction of customers complain to businesses directly when they receive bad service, giving companies little chance to deal with problems directly. The SMS feedback loop is meant to change this, allowing users to sending businesses an SMS on the spot. This new service is in place in restaurants, hotels, airlines, grocery store chains, and many other businesses across South Africa.

• Posted in
• Mobile Research, Location-based services, Mobile Social Networking, Mobile Advertising

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