The Singapore mobile market is saturated, and SMS usage is extremely high, making the country an excellent market for SMS and MMS marketing.

A recent Business Monitor International report on the Singapore telecommunications industry projected that Singapore's mobile phone penetration rate will reach 117 percent by 2009. The mobile phone market is already fully saturated, having reached over 100 percent, implying that there are people with more than one local mobile phone line. According to Portico Research, Singapore sees an average of approximately 900 million SMS messages sent per month, while globally, the mobile advertising market will reach $9.5 billion in revenues by 2011.

As mobile phone costs and their usage costs fall, and as penetration increases, the use of SMS and, increasingly, MMS as a marketing channel will increase. In spite of the fragmentation of the market -- what with differing standards and unequal development of technology globally -- wireless marketing has already taken off as a viable way to reach broad segments of the population. As it is, simple 'broadcast' SMS campaigns are no longer new; today, the focus has shifted towards more interactive and engaging campaigns.

SMS marketing is a powerful tool because of the personal nature of text messaging. People take their mobile phones everywhere they go, allowing them to be reached anywhere, and at practically anytime. They also tend to read every SMS they get, unlike emails, which can get ignored in this age of email spam, or easily removed by filters.

It also has a crucial advantage over other channels in one area -- speed. You can create a campaign in minutes, and get it out to market just as quickly. In situations where speed is required -- in response to a competitor campaign, or for a last minute deal for instance, SMS marketing sees few other competitors. Time it right so that your SMS reaches customers at an optimum time, such as when they are actively shopping or socialising, and the chances for success can be even higher.

The good…the bad…and the ugly
SMS marketing makes it easy to incorporate the interactivity factor into your campaigns. It's easy to elicit a tangible response from your customers, for example, with a keyword-based campaign. Recipients of an SMS message can respond with a provided "short code," which in turn triggers a pre-programmed computer to provide them with more information or send out an exclusive discount coupon for your product or service. This presents advantages in terms of data collection and tracking of your campaign, allowing you to maintain a detailed mobile customer CRM record, and reward customer loyalty in the future. Furthermore, as an opt-in service, there is less worry about sending unwanted communication.

A ClubTexting (SMS service provider for clubs and bars) study indicates that approximately five to 20 percent of customers respond to redeem offers via SMS -- compare this to the industry average of about one to four percent for emails! An oft-cited example of the full potential of interactive SMS marketing is the EMI campaign for the virtual band Gorillaz, conceived to drive album sales in Singapore.

Supported by free postcards and radio spots encouraging teens to start conversations with any of the four band members by sending an SMS to the service, the quirky, irreverent and sometimes subversive campaign became a hit in its target market.

Thousands of conversations were started, with software reacting to programmed trigger words and sending users automated responses and responding to requests for pictures and other virtual freebies. There are reports of users having conversations up to 20 messages long! By all accounts, this campaign had more than met their aim, which was to deepen the target audience's relationship with the band.

Advantages aside, an immediately obvious downside of SMS marketing is the limited message space you have to get your offer across. Typically, you have only 160 characters to play with -- which is very few once you've included mandatory information such as your business name, contact details and opt-out information. At the same time, you need to avoid using too many SMS abbreviations, which can be confusing and difficult to read. This leaves you with very little space for details about your campaign -- which in turn means you need to make your limited copy work harder for you. Try to get to the point and be as concise as possible, and keep your campaign mechanics simple.

SMS campaigns can also be expensive, costing several thousand dollars for the use of an SMS server and the software required to collate the data generated by the campaign, which is a necessity if you're going to be learning anything from your efforts to apply towards future campaigns. The three major telcos in Singapore, SingTel, MobileOne and Starhub, each offer competitive SMS broadcast services that integrate with tracking and analysis software, but it's also worth checking out some of the specialist independent bulk SMS providers for more competitive rates and for their experience in creating and tweaking campaigns for maximum efficiency and returns.

This article is written by 8rewardsroad.