Web to text

The majority of people associate the term “reverse billed SMS” with premium SMS services, where more often than not consumers pay a fairly hefty price to receive alerts about the weather, football, other sports results or general informational updates.

This type of application is really useful if you want to promote easy- to- access services to your customer base but, unfortunately, the principle of reversed billed SMS has been widely abused over the years, with consumers being charged for messages they didn’t want to receive in the first place.

We want to tell you about our version of the application. We have turned the basic concept reverse billed SMS on its head because, with our version of the service, it is the original message sender who is charged for any replies they receive and not the receiver.

Why would the sender be willing to pay to receive these messages? Well, if we take the example of text notifications for emails (when you are out of the office) you don’t really want your customer to have to pay for replying to your message because it is not their fault you are not at your desk.

By combining our reversed billed SMS application with Microsoft Outlook email forwarding rules, you can be sure that you will always receive certain types of messages– a particularly useful feature if you need to monitor stock control or support messages, for example.

How does it work? Well, our bespoke messaging software will deduct the cost of each received message from your account (which is the same cost as for sending a message), even if the sender’s details are not logged on our database.

This neat application will complement a number of other email –to-SMS based services, appointment reminders, marketing promotions or job interviews for example, where you want to encourage consumers to reply but without necessarily incurring any costs.

If your customer is unable to keep their appointment, they can quickly reply to your message (at no charge to them) to rearrange or cancel.

If you are running a mobile-based marketing campaign (Christmas promotions, for example), SMS is a great response mechanism, but again, you might not want your customers to pay. If you combine our reversed billed SMS application with your marketing campaign, they won’t have to because you will be charged for each received reply.

Our reversed billed SMS service can also be used in conjunction with our personalised SMS application, which means that all message replies will be delivered directly to the original sender and not to an email inbox or central holding number, allowing you to build up a rapport with
your customer.

Follow this link to find out more about the different products and services we offer.

Mobile giant, Orange, in partnership with Barclaycard, is due to launch what it claims to be the UK’s first true mobile payment service that will allow you to purchase items like your lunchtime sandwiches, your newspaper, a cup of coffee, or anything at all, so long as the value is £15 or less, simply by waving your mobile phone at a locally installed scanning machine.

This type of contactless payment could have a significant impact on our shopping habits in the not so distant future, but do mobile payments really need to be limited to sophisticated handsets? They may well be growing in popularity, but by enlarge, their penetration is still low in relative terms, so you could potentially be alienating a large portion of the population. Retailers want to take full advantage of mobile phones as a payment mechanism for the forthcoming Olympics – which are only 12 months away. Will everyone have a Smartphone in time?

According to recent research, SMS still forms a major part of mobile advertising campaigns because, unlike other e-campaigns, you dependant on a reliable 3G signal or interaction from the user. SMS messages are delivered as soon as they are sent and push themselves directly at consumers, who are not required to do anything, other than read the message.

Retailers wanting to embrace mobile technology and contactless payments should perhaps take this into account when they are introducing new marketing initiatives in order to boost sales.

Vodafone and London Taxis have certainly recognised an immediate opportunity by allowing customers who have run out of cash to send a text with the vehicle’s license number to a central code and the amount owed is charged to their phone account.

SMS-based wallets have certainly come into their own in Kenya, where almost half of the adult population uses an SMS-based payment and transfer mechanism (known as M-Pesa) to transfer money to relatives, to pay for their shopping or simply to pay their utility bills. Users don’t even need to have a bank account – which is very costly in Kenya. All they need is normal mobile phone and an M-Pesa account.

SMS also plays an important part in mobile advertising campaigns because it can be used for sending vouchers or promotional codes that consumers can redeem while they are shopping.

What does SMS have to offer?

• It is cheap
• It is direct
• It has enormous marketing reach
• It allows for easy interaction
• It complements many other marketing campaigns
• It allows you to be targeted

At toText.net we have been providing online SMS applications to a variety of different industries in the UK for the last 5 years. Our online SMS gateway can be seamlessly integrated with many back- office infrastructures via a developers API, allowing you to take advantage of this new trend.

We pride ourselves in developing applications for niche requirements, so if our standard services are not what you’re looking for, please get in touch so we can work with you to develop a solution that meets your exact needs.

All businesses strive to provide their clients with good after sales-service, but providing consistently good customer service on a regular basis can be both expensive and time-consuming. During economic downturns existing customers often experience less than adequate customer service; sales personnel are so busy trying to secure new business they often forget about existing customers, believing they are too busy or lethargic to find alternative suppliers.

Not only that, there are so many different communications methods available to us – phone, post, email, social media – selecting the most appropriate method for different client groups is becoming increasingly challenging.

1. The phone is time consuming – especially if you are constantly connected to voicemail
2. Regular mail is too slow, very expensive and not very eco-friendly
3. Social media can be damaging to your brand if sensitive issues such as complaints are not managed appropriately

In our digital age, however, it is fairly safe to assume that our customers own at least one mobile phone and that most offices use email for the majority of written correspondence. So why not combine the two and use email to SMS applications to give your customer service team an efficient and cost-effective way of keeping in contact with your customers using technology they are already familiar with?

Messages are written as normal emails and then converted into an SMS format so they can be delivered. Not only is it practical to use email to SMS to communicate with your clients from a time-management point of view, it is also extremely cost-effective.

All replies are delivered to the sender’s email inbox, so your staff can manage all their correspondence from a single centralised point.

Below is our top 10 list of email to SMS applications:

1. Financial information – SMS is a great way to keep clients updated about stocks and shares, giving them time to sell or reinvest

2. Sports results – Loyal fans instantly know the results of important matches. What’s more, they are often willing to pay a premium to receive this information

3. Invoice reminders – Credit control departments can quickly send SMS alerts to all overdue accounts. What’s more, these types of messages can be personalised to include your client’s name and the exact amount owed

4. Insurance reminders – Postal reminders are often overlooked due to the amount of junk mail we receive. SMS reminders will also help your organisation reduce its overall carbon footprint

5. Delivery notices – Advising your clients in advance of expected delivery times mean they are more likely to be in to receive them and your drivers do not need to make multiple delivery attempts

6. Traffic updates – People can make alternative arrangements if they are aware in advance of traffic problems

7. Birthday reminders – Automated text alerts will prevent you from missing important birthdays -nephews nieces, in-laws etc

8. Email forwarding – By forwarding emails to mobile phones remote staff will always receive important messages, even if there is no 3G signal

9. Appointment reminders – No-show appointments are expensive and can be reduced by as much as 70% using SMS alerts

10. Voicemail notification – A simple text alert means you will never miss out on a business opportunity

All of the above services can be carried out using email to SMS. No plug-ins are needed, there is no need to download any special software.

In addition if you send in excess of 25,000 SMS messages on a monthly basis you’ll also benefit from wholesale SMS prices.

Organisations across the UK are using our email to SMS application to provide their clients with better customer service. Why not sign up to a FREE trial and find out how email to SMS can benefit your organisation?

Our digital era is having a huge impact on the way young people communicate. They have a whole variety of different technologies (Smartphones, games consoles, computers) at their disposal that allow them to interact with each other in many different ways. With more than 80% of 11 – 25 year olds actively using at least one social network site on a daily basis, anyone involved in youth work must embrace these changes if they want to engage with this generation.

The majority of teenagers prefer “hanging out” virtually from their bedrooms rather than going to a physical location. As this becomes increasingly the norm, unless those people who engage with young people are accessible via Facebook, they stand little chance of being able to reach their targeted audiences to promote local events, provide information about sporting events or simply keep in contact with their squad.

Promoting events and activities via social networks is one thing but getting people to turn up is another. Many sports clubs and other organisations, however, have found that SMS reminders about forthcoming activities can complement such online campaigns because it SMS is an easy, yet unobtrusive way to engage with young people.

SMS alerts are also an effective way of providing advice and guidance on wide range of youth-related issues such as health, crime, and drugs.

These types of services work very well because SMS is an easy way to reach a large audience, it is cost effective, messages are delivered straight away and are generally read as soon as they are received. But what happens if a young person sends a reply to one of these received messages?

In the majority of cases, replies to bulk SMS notifications are forwarded to a centralised mailbox or holding number, so the young person may not receive a reply until much later on, once the messages have been sorted.

Our SMS notification service allows organisations to send out bulk messages, but unlike many of our competitors, we also offer a personalised replies facility at no extra cost. This means that all replies are delivered directly to the original sender, allowing them to immediately begin private conversations with these young people, thus developing a rapport and obtaining their trust.  Not only that, message senders only receive replies intended for them.

The service works using a pool of shared sequential numbers that are accurately mapped to a sender ID (youth worker or football coach, for example) and a receiver ID (a young person’s mobile phone) by our SMS data management software.

If our SMS software is unable to deliver a reply (due to poor network coverage or incorrect number details, for example), it automatically sends a message to the sender, advising them to use an alternative means of communication.

Our personalised replies service is also beneficial to other industry sectors – temping agencies or estate agents, for example. In both these cases office staff are in regular contact with the same groups of people on a regular basis and two-way dialogue is commonplace.

As with all SMS applications, our personalised replies service can be integrated with existing communications infrastructures via a developers API.

Click here to find out more about who we are and what we do.

Missed NHS appointments cost the Government and ultimately the taxpayer in excess of £6million per annum, according to industry statistics. Patients believe the blame lies with the NHS – letters not being sent out in time, not being able to cancel or change the appointment because phone lines are busy or never answered, or stuck in an automated loop. The NHS on the other hand believes the blame lies with the general public because they never bother to cancel or reschedule their appointments.

Significant cost savings could be made and time wasting could be avoided if doctors’ surgeries, outpatient departments, dentists and specialist clinics made more use of SMS, as recent trials have demonstrated.

Barts and the London NHS Trust have recently deployed an automated online SMS service in their outpatients department, to remind patients about their forthcoming appointments because reports showed that over 94, 000 appointments were missed in 2009. The first reminder message is sent two weeks in advance and the second reminder is sent three days before the scheduled appointment.

If the appointment is no longer needed or convenient, patients can cancel or reschedule simply by sending a reply to the text.

Aberdeen City Council has also recently adopted a text messaging alert service to remind its social housing tenants about maintenance or repairs due to be carried out on their properties. The Council sends its tenants an SMS the day before so they do not forget and if there is a problem they are requested to get in touch by replying to the message.

Considering that more than 98% of 20 – 29 year olds and 89% of all men in the UK own at least one mobile phone, you would think that more public sector organisations would be making use of automated SMS services.

Health visitors could remind mums about their childrens’ vaccinations, community nurses could remind the over 60s about their flu jabs, housing officers could remind tenants that their rent is due, maintenance staff could remind tenants that their meters need to be read – the possibilities are endless.

The cost of sending an SMS message is significantly cheaper than the cost of a first class stamp or a phone call made during the day, particularly to a mobile number.
Text messages are delivered almost immediately and, unlike other forms of communications, the majority of people do respond to their texts straight away. Not only that, sending a reply essentially costs nothing because most phone contracts include a certain number of free texts as standard.

Automated SMS reminders can also benefit other industries – informing drivers their car is due for a service or MOT, for example. It’s good customer service as far as the owner is concerned and it’s  cost effective for the garage because  they can keep their contact list up to date with minimum effort or resource.

Our online SMS facilities are really easy to set up and, by deploying one of our services, you would benefit from significant cost savings almost immediately. There is no software to download because you manage your account online and no training is required.

You can upload your appointment spreadsheet onto our servers quickly and easily and schedule single or multiple reminder messages to be sent on specific days and times.

Unlike other providers we also offer a “personalised replies” facility as part of our standard package. This service ensures all your replies are delivered directly to the original sender, allowing them to immediately begin private conversations and start building relationships.

Many organisations in the public, private and not-for-profit sectors are saving themselves money by deploying out online texting services.

Click here to find out more about who we are and what we do.

The main challenges public sector organisations have had to face since the General Election have been how to reduce costs and operate more efficiently while still maintaining high levels of customer service.

Such pressures are taking their toll and nowhere is this more apparent that in education. Schools are obliged to keep parents/carers updated of their children’s progress during the academic year via reports, parent evenings etc. Failure to do so reflects badly on them and can effect funding.

In addition to this, schools are in contact with parents/carers more or less on a daily basis about routine information such as exam dates, school trips, after school clubs, teacher training days, parent/teacher meetings, school uniform, fund raising events and so forth. Administration staff are increasingly overstretched and keeping up with routine communication is becoming more and more challenging.

Many schools have been using electronic communication for some time and Government has stipulated that by the end of 2012, all schools will be required to communicate with parents electronically. Email, however, is not necessarily the most effective way to communicate routine messages, particularly time sensitive ones. Unless the recipients are online (assuming they have Internet access in the first place), or have a Smartphone, chances are they won’t receive the message until it’s too late.

The most effective way to deliver time sensitive information, both from an execution and a cost point of view, is via SMS. This was demonstrated by the findings of a BBC survey carried out in Scotland in December last year, which showed that after local radio, SMS was the second most popular way to receive information about school closures. 

SMS notifications could easily be much more widely adopted to deliver routine messages and to provide parents/carers with progress updates of pupils. They are currently updated via parents’ evenings, which happen two or three times a year.  Indeed, a recent survey carried out by Becta has shown that more than two-thirds of parents would like to receive regular SMS or email messages about their childrens’ progress in school. Only 8% of those surveyed benefitted from such a service.

No specialist software or equipment is needed and single or multiple messages can be sent to individuals or pre-define groups. Messages can be targeted (by year group about a school trip for example), written and delivered instantaneously using online SMS services. Unlike bulk emails, which can be affected by SPAM filters, you know your message will get through. Even in the unlikely event that a parent/carer does not have a mobile phone, text messages can be left on landlines.

SMS notifications are cost effective because messages can be bought in bulk. You can also see at a glance how many messages have been delivered and how many replies you have by looking at delivery reports. 

We are a provider of online SMS services and unlike most other SMS providers, we also provide a personalised replies facility at no extra charge. What this means is – if a parent responds to a message received from a teacher, that message is delivered directly to that teacher and not to a centralised holding account, as is usually the case with online SMS services. It is an effective, yet non- time consuming way for teachers to establish relationships with parents/carers about a pupil’s progress, so that help and support can be provided when it is needed.

All our online SMS solutions integrate seamlessly with electronic registration systems via a developer’s API, and this API can also be customised to meet specific requirements. Click here to find out more about who we are and what we do.

Over the centuries the most successful inventions have been the most simple. The same goes for technology – the more straightforward the application, the more likely it is to succeed. You won’t find a better example of this than in the field of mobile communications.

The rise of the mobile Internet and Smartphone apps has had a profound impact on mobile marketing campaigns. They have become increasingly complex as the larger brands try to outdo each other in their efforts to provide rich mobile content.

But is there really any need to reinvent a proven wheel just for the sake of it? With regards to mobile advertising, some of the most successful campaigns have been executed using good old fashioned SMS – the best example there is of “less being more”

According to research carried out by comScore during the last quarter of 2010 by, there are more than 100 million subscribers to SMS marketing services in the top 5 EU countries (UK, France, Germany, Italy, Spain). The research showed that SMS adverts reached almost 50% of the 230 million mobile users and that the most popular types of SMS adverts were product, service or brand-related.

SMS adverts for donations to charities reached almost 10 million consumers and more than 10% of subscribers responded at least once during a 3 month period. Coupons or discounts sent via SMS also received high response rates.

Why then, in the age of Smartphones and Tablets, is mobile messaging still a popular delivery medium?

• It’s cheap – both for campaign executors, who can purchase SMS messages in bulk very cost effectively, and for consumers, who can send and receive predefined numbers of messages  as part of their contracts
• It’s quick – SMS messages are delivered almost instantaneously
• It has a wide marketing reach – all mobile devices support SMS
• Is not reliant on 3G networks so campaigns are not reliant on good network coverage
• It provides an easy response mechanism  – allowing for spontaneous decisions
• It is easy to monitor the success of different campaigns
• It’s direct – unlike mobile apps or mobile web pages, which require users to pro-actively access them, SMS pushes itself directly into the site of the consumer
• It integrates seamlessly with e/marketing activities
• It’s widely understood by everyone
• It provides a positive user experience because messages can always be delivered

Targeted mobile advertising campaigns can be carried out quickly, efficiently and cost effectively using our effective PC to SMS or email to SMS marketing tools.
Once you have set yourself up with an account you can be running successful campaigns within minutes and reaping the rewards as a result.

Our PC to SMS and email to SMS products can be easily integrated into your overall IT infrastructure or corporate website via a developer’s API, thus complementing your overall e-marketing strategy.

Click here to find out more about who we are and what we do.

Short messaging service, more popularly known as SMS, has become one of the most popular ways of communicating to others. It is a very personal mode of communication where people text each other messages. A whole new language has evolved as a result of SMS. It makes use of all sorts of short forms. This is regarded as the next generation of communication.

The next generation tool of communication
The people who use this mode of communication on phones are often teenagers and youngsters who can text faster than some people talk. As a result, the concept of SMS has become very popular. This is being recognised as a good way of communicating and people have tweaked it and have made significant improvements. SMS has gone one step further as you can now use the internet to SMS. Email to SMS and internet SMS is the future of communication. So how does internet SMS work? It is pretty simple. People have to register themselves with one of these internet SMS providers. They also have to add all the contacts they want their SMS messages to go to.

Marketers using the tool to target people
This has also caught the eye of marketers all over the world and as a result of its accuracy and speed, marketers promote their products through SMS. Thus, internet SMS is a communication tool that is growing in popularity.

Mobile phones are one of the most useful devices people can have with them. These devices are used for a variety of purposes. They are the best help in emergency situations, perfect for people to stay in touch wherever they are and if that is not enough, they are the best when it comes to taking messages. The messaging feature of mobile phones is definitely one of the most beneficial and can be put to various uses.

Text messaging is especially useful when the person is busy and cannot take calls. It is easier to leave a message than keep calling and disturbing the recipient. The latest in text messaging is the Internet to SMS service which companies have started using to reach their clients and even employees.

What is an Internet to SMS service?

The Internet to SMS service allows users to send text messages to several contacts through e-mail or the Internet. All these contacts receive the messages as soon as it is sent. This is a useful feature to companies if they do not want to get in their customers’ bad books by calling and disturbing them. With an Internet to SMS service, you can be sure that clients will get the message as and when it is sent.

Many companies have also started using the Internet to SMS service to send their employees important messages. This is usually done when the company is very large and has to inform a large number of employees at a single time. Internet to SMS service is an excellent asset to companies as it can save a lot of valuable time.

These days, more than ever, technology and its innovations play a vital role. Mobile phones are one of the widely seen and used accessories across the globe. These devices greatly help people to remain connected with the world irrespective of whether they are at their office, home or elsewhere. Some 10 years ago, mobile phones were rarely seen and used, but today almost everyone uses a mobile phone.

These mobile phones have become so popular that one can hardly imagine a day without a mobile phone. Due to several advantages of a mobile phone, they are increasingly becoming the most effective means of communication. Short messaging service or SMS and voice based calls are two main forms of communication that a mobile phone is capable of.

Using the SMS, businesses can easily reach their target audience and employees. It is also an effective way of informing the employees and customers about the latest offers, schemes and promotions. Due to these advantages, more and more businesses are presently looking forward to reach their target audience with the help of SMS. However, internet SMS or online text messaging service is the newer version of communication that allows businesses to send messages to their clients and employees at a relatively lower cost.

Bulk messaging is another feature provided by internet SMS providers which enables organisations to send a single message to many different recipients at the same time. Internet SMS is easy, convenient and reliable because of which it has gained a lot of popularity in the past few years.