rahmat

Hi,

I was thinking the other day, that we are used to subscribe to a list by email. This is when visitors enter their email address to an Aweber form in the website. Then they click the submit button, and confirm their subscription via email.

Is there an Aweber-like service in the mobile website industry? Instead of using email, the visitors need to enter their phone number in the form. Then click submit and confirm their subscription by mobile phone. The member of the list will get update/special offer via sms (text message).

To entice the user enter their mobile phone number, we can simply offer them a big discount on specific product, or any other offers.

bryson

Maybe I am not understanding your question but all SMS (text messaging) services require you to opt-in and yes you can also use an html form to collect phone numbers.

loganwenger

Hi Rahmat,

In short, yes. There is one major factor that you have to look for when selecting a provider and that is the protocol they use. We want to use the Short Message Peer-to-Peer (SMPP) protocol.

If you search for SMS text messaging platforms, there are a lot of free services. These are not to be used for business because they use the Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) protocol which is the same that is used for email.

Using SMTP to mass send text messages will result in the messages considered SPAM and will be blocked.

I personally have used two SMS text messaging providers. The first being Trumpia and the second being Avid Mobile's White Label package. These two companies use the SMPP protocol that is used by all the cell phone providers e.g. Verizon, AT&T, Sprint Nextel, T-Mobile, etc.

Trumpia has a pretty good service, they include:

- Mobile Keyword
- SMS Auto-Responder
- QR Codes
- Appointment Reminder
- Two-Way Text Messaging
- Send From Phone
- Email Marketing
- Instant Messaging (MSN & AIM)
- Social Media (Facebook & Twitter)
- Online Sign-up Pages
- Embedded Sign-up Pages
- Facebook Sign-up Widgets
- Import Contacts from Excel
- Spam Filter
- Tutorial Videos
- Mobile Coupons
- MMS (Picture & Video Texting)
- Mobile Voting
- Text-to-Screen
- Custom Data Fields
- Shuffle Responder
- Mobile eCard
- Voice Broadcast
- Premium Short Code 99000

Trumpia's monthly rates are from $15/month up to $270/month. Check out Monthly Plans and Pricing Information for Mobile Marketing, Bulk SMS, Email Marketing, Social Media Marketing | Trumpia. Trumpia also has a While Label package and I believe it's around $200 - $250 per month.

Now onto Avid Mobile. I had a really good experience using their White Label package. Avid Mobile has a lot of the features of Trumpia and here is a comprehensive list:

- Keyword Campaigns
- Resellers Free US Shortcode
- Auto-Responder
- Text2Vote
- Text2Win
- Text2Screen
- Text2Survey
- Appointment Reminders
- SMS and MMS Message Delivery
- Data Collection
- Auto Generate Web Optin Script
- Fully Documented API
- Shared Short Codes
- Dedicated Short Codes

Avid Mobile has something like 30+ shortcodes and when I was with them, they did not have monthly text limitations. We just charged clients a per text fee.

Avid Mobile's White Label package was $150/month, but they had a lot of training videos from setting up the system to selling to clients. They provide their resellers PowerPoint presentations to help close sales and overall it was the best I have found to date.

Overall, Trumpia is good for starting out and getting your feet wet and Avid Mobile is for the serious SMS text message marketer.

Just remember to look for the SMPP protocol when looking for a provider.

Best,

Logan

Nick Surran

This is absolutely possible. I'm a white label client with Lime Cellular. With this SMS platform, I can create subscription forms for a website, or for a Facebook page. You would enter your mobile number and any other information the form was setup to ask for. You would then receive a text message saying "Reply 'yes' to opt-in..." Once your subscriber replies yes, they're on your list and you can send them messages in the future.

Just remember to respect that these people gave up a big piece of personal information. If you want to keep them on your list, don't inundate them with messages. Make sure to send them highly valuable messages, and if you send them to a website, make sure it is optimized for mobile devices.

I think Lime Cellular is the best white label SMS marketing platform.

Jay Moreno

@rahmat if you know what an API is and have a little knowledge of php you can implement this yourself using Twilio and use a pay as you go basis, around $0.01 per message. Additionally Twilio also have a script called OpenVBX with subscription plugins for handling your text messaging blasts.

It doesn't use SMTP either to send text and is based on long code, its US based and limited to a few international destinations. So if you are outside the US it maybe not be suitable for you.

HTH

Jay

rahmat

Thanks all for useful comments.
I will go through those services, and see which one is suitable for me.

@bryson: I'm looking for Aweber-like service, but using SMS message, not email
@Logan: thanks.. noted on the SMPP protocol
@Nick: yes, that's what I want.. sms subscription with opt-in
@Jay: yes, I know API, thanks
@Tim: pm sent

3genter

Hey Rahmat,

Being new here I guess I can't PM until I get 50 posts - will follow up with you as soon as I can.

Tim Somers