Amara’s Law is stated as: [message type=”custom” width=”100%” start_color=”#FFFCB5″ end_color=”#F4CBCB” border=”#BBBBBB” color=”#333333″]”We tend to overestimate the effect of a technology in the short run and underestimate the effect in the long run.”.[/message]
This quote applies to text messages because some people think that text messages have already had their heyday and that they are on the decline. What they don’t realize is that text messaging is still increasing. While the growth rate of person-to-person text messaging is has slowed down a little, the growth of application-to-person (a2p) is accelerating like crazy. NatMobi’s technology is considered application-to-person because a our system can send and receive text messages.
Text messaging may seem trivial, but in reality text messaging is the best means of communication around. Email has less than a 20% open rate over two days, whereas text messaging has a 95% open rate within 4 minutes. Once received, the message is read almost immediately.
We have a method of legally being able to send messages to users. They must opt-in through a simple process by texting a certain word to our phone number. This ensure that people do not receive unconsolidated text messages. This means that the list only has people who are excited to receive a text message alert.
Even though the technology works and has been proven by us and others in the market, many people still think that text messages are passe’. I believe they are wrong and that Amara’s law will prove true for text messaging.
One of the main reasons I predict this is because text messages work across nearly every device, regardless of whether the phone is an Apple, Android, or Windows phone. There is not going to be any other unifying technology for many years to come. If Web Apps win as many predict, then their method of choice for updates is likely to be a text message. SMS is to phones, what email is to computer. Texting will also be around for a while because no single company owns it and the carriers actually make a lot of profit off of SMS.
Apple, on the other hand, has very strict rules about what can and can’t be done in the App Store and if you don’t comply or Apple decides they don’t like you, tough luck, your business is now dead. Also, if you think about it, the most popular app on a smartphone is actually the SMS app. Most people send SMS much more often than they make a call.
From where we are today, text messaging’s long-term viability and potential is really underestimated for the longterm. NatMobi is taking advantage of this fact and rapidly gaining market share and positioning itself to capitalize on the long-term trend towards text message marketing.