VoIP Market in Europe is Least 2 Years Behind US

Recent research carried on European SMEs - in the UK, France, Germany and the Netherlands is revealing their perceptions and experiences with business VoIP. Parallels were found between current European markets and the status of the US market in 2005. Identical research was also carried out in the US.

David Quirk, CEO of C21 Communications , said: “The US market in 2005, saw traditional operators lose their market leadership in VoIP services to non-traditional operators. We advise European operators to learn this lesson and act quickly to avoid a similar situation.”
C21 Communications is a VoIP solution provider and exclusive distributor of Topex products in the UK.

Over the past 18 months we've witnessed incumbent US operators to be indecisive or make a catalogue of missteps that have allowed non-traditional operators like Vonage and Skype to wrestle away control of the market. Since 2005 however Vonage, Skype and other VoIP-only competitors have carried out aggressive VoIP marketing campaigns. Today the non-traditional operators lead the US VoIP market with 23 percent and the traditional operators trail at 10 percent.

Extremely similar results to the US market's makeup 18 months ago are to be found in Germany:
• 64% of German SMEs are interested in VoIP services
• 32% of SMEs consider traditional German telcos as VoIP providers
• Only 15% of SMEs are aware of the advanced features through VoIP
The key lesson to draw is that German SMEs are interested in VoIP and if you do not pro-actively promote your IP products to them, they will buy VoIP services from one of the growing number of non-traditional voice providers instead.

From the research found there is a substantial untapped market in Germany with 70 percent of SMEs interested or very interested in VoIP. Whereas in Europe overall, nearly 64 percent of SMEs had no or little interest in VoIP services.
Despite the strong interest in Germany, the market remains largely uneducated about the benefits of IP voice services with 84 percent of German SMEs primarily viewing VoIP as a way to make inexpensive calls. Only 15 percent of the market primarily consider VoIP as a means to acquire advanced voice features that can replace an expensive on-site PBX.
Research found that currently traditional operators lead the German VoIP market with 32 percent of SMEs regarding them as the main business VoIP provider, compared with only 8 percent favouring non-traditional operators.

In the more mature US market, only 43 percent of SMEs primarily view VoIP as a way to make cheap calls, while about 20 percent perceive VoIP as offering more advanced voice features, and 20 percent identify VoIP as a way to more easily and economically manage the enterprise network.

The UK's small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are leading the way when it comes to adopting IP telephony systems, a new report claims.

Research from BT Business found that 25 per cent of the UK's SMEs currently use Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) services. However, the report found that this is expected to increase rapidly in the next year.

In 12 months time 48 per cent of UK SMEs say that they plan to use VoIP services. Companies with between two and ten employees are particularly likely to embrace IP telephony systems - 57 percent plan to use VoIP within the next year.

 http://www.articlesbase.com/

SMS Marketing Effect
For staying in constant touch with the friends, everyday several billions of SMS are sent across the world and most of them are sent by the youths, carry personal messages sent. The appreciation of SMS has more and more spread in business sectors in the current years. SMS is regarded as a cheap and effectual marketing device by bigger companies to deliver the company's message to its spectators.
SMS marketing is used in the chief areas such as banks, drink firms, entertainment, and leisure venues. The MMS is one more marketing tool with supplementary feature of picture messaging. The MMS is flattering a vital marketing device by these organizations. The special software and tools are needed for sending SMS and MMS from your desktop. Hefty number of SMS can be sent at single time through SMS marketing.



According to your ease, SMS marketing can propel. Similar to emails and other way of communications, it won't instantly vanish. Your text message gets in touch with the market within seconds with the aid of SMS marketing and instant response for your announcement, offer or message will be received. It also makes possible in budding new affairs and regular text messages will keep you in get in touch with existing customers and so brand conformity is maintained.



The dogmatic measures are to be followed when you use SMS as your business-marketing device which is analogous to email marketing. You have to accumulate cell phone numbers of users. Under the Data Protection Legislation, you should acquire the concord of each beneficiary and break down for every occurrence of this can lead you to pay fine. The telephone numbers list that has been unruffled from target market can be loaded simply into the software after receiving conformity from the target market. This software makes you gratis from retyping of the similar SMS numerous times to different mobile numbers and also it will generate the text messages to the goal audience.



As a marketing device, SMS text messages are used in many other ways also. The consumers will admit your message. The five digit text number short cut codes make easy in receiving the responses and organizing them automatically. Using email, the received reply is sent to your counter. The SMS marketing is the most attention-grabbing advertising intermediate for foremost companies, as the numbers of mobile users are getting augmented everyday. The mobile users can get catalog with advertising companies and in turn the advertisers will get in touch with them, to get the advantage of SMS marketing. The advertisers send SMS based on the users occupation, sex, interest, locality, and age and bearing in mind other several factors. Advertisers acquire SMS credit then only SMS text campaign is run. The advertisers will make available customary SMS to users who have paid. Part of the commission is used by the marketing company for the line of action. The advertiser and the user are gained by SMS marketing. The companies consider SMS marketing as an immense instrument to produce, manufacture and keep hold on relationships with customer.
http://www.articlesbase.com/

SMS MARKETING

SMS Marketing is growing as best method of marketing world widely. SMS marketing is first time available in market in 1996 and now this is one of easiest way to connect with people. In SMS marketing, bulks of numbers are gathered to send a message to all of them. This all done by automated software and anyone can get them from internet.

Now days are going to more competitive day by day and business needs to be solid marketing in cheap way and that directly connect to people. In this approach, SMS marketing was came in tradition. But before SMS marketing there are need of legal actions too, before getting this marketing as spamming.

SMS marketing is related to only related to mobile offers or ring tones, it is more than that including awareness of education program, new business offers and local activities around you.

SMS marketing is also good for getting lots of feedback from users at minimum time. You can give your contact at end of message to give them your feedback. In SMS marketing there is some limitation also like SMS message length, its legal action too, common language support, time and targeted user and area too. All these actions are done by software and would create leads for all activities.

SMS marketing contains much type of activities that may engage user to give them feedback in response of marketing. Some of are voting, win contest, promotional plans and times vouchers.

By voting marketing, you may engage your customer to get them their taste about any product, or feedback about their services. Time vouchers are best to give them promotional and new plans time to time.

In all other marketing services, SMS marketing is shortest way to reach their customer in any region by mobile network provider. Any one of us can use SMS gateway to do marketing at low cost and low price. SMS gateway is used to send and receive SMS without any help of mobile phone, so SMS marketing services provider use SMS gateway mechanism to fulfill client’s requirement. To get good response from targeted user of any area or region, message should be short and clear, otherwise it would loss its importance.

SMS marketing has great importance in some region where numbers of mobile users are more then other. For example china is at one place in using mobile services just because of its huge population. At Second place India introduces itself maximum number of using mobile services. Services of mobile provider also have great effect on SMS marketing also.

VoIP in Texas is becoming a growing trend in the recent years. Since 2004 the trend has skyrocketed not only among Texas VoIP subscribers but all around the country. Texas has and will remain to be a trend setter for the rest of the country since it is such a large state and very populated.

VoIP stands for Voice over Internet protocol. VoIP allows users to have normal phone access through an internet service provider but still use regular phone networks. Which helps users avoid unnecessary long distance charges? For companies the use of VoIP is more practical than regular phones because it allows the companies to cut major costs on their phone bills.

Several Texas VoIP users, especially larger companies, can gain a good advantage from the extras VoIP’s have to offer. Since almost every company uses multiple lines and VoIP’s in Texas can have more than one call going over the same connection at the same time it makes it simple for adding those multiple lines.

There are several other features that companies can enjoy from VoIP providers such as conference calling, caller ID, call forwarding, and automatic redial. Normal telephone companies charge a decent amount for each of these features where VoIP subscribers pay very little to nothing for them. Also since VoIP’s are already digital it makes for getting a secure line much easier as all they have to do is encrypt the already provided data stream.
Several other technology advancements are also coming into the market for Texas VoIP users. Since the VoIP phones are on the same data level as computers it opens up new possibilities for upcoming features such as call routing.

As with any technology though VoIP does have a couple of downfalls especially for VoIP in Texas. Since Texas has many hurricane issues the biggest problem with VoIP is that it runs off of modems. Which in turn run off regular power so in the case of Texas VoIP users if a hurricane causes the power to go out they won’t be able to use their phones?

Since normal phones don’t rely on traditional electric they are still preferred in some instances over the new technology. The other downfall is not as big but its still causes problems for some users. The fact that VoIP is hardly mobile makes some users skeptical to switch to it. However, with emerging technologies such as Wi-Fi and WiMax it’s predicted that those new technologies will allow VoIP’s to be more mobile, universal, and more widely accepted.
Some Texas VoIP subscribers that are larger companies struggle with the problem of highly congested networks. Since VoIP is so easy to add lines to and expand the network it opens up the problem of momentary voice drop out and lower voice quality due to lost or delayed data packets. As technology advances though this problem will continue to diminish.

Although there are still some bugs to work out for VoIP’s in Texas, the convenience and cost effectiveness of the technology out weighs the downside for most Texas VoIP users.
source:  articlesbase.com

Text messaging or texting refers to the exchange of brief written messages between fixed-line phone or mobile phone and fixed or portable devices over a network. While the original term (see below) was derived from referring to messages sent using the Short Message Service (SMS) originated from Radio Telegraphy, it has since been extended to include messages containing image, video, and sound content (known as MMS messages). The sender of a text message is known as a texter, while the service itself has different colloquialisms depending on the region: it may simply be referred to as a text or a texto in North America and Australia, text in the United Kingdom, an SMS in most of Europe, and a TMS or SMS in the Middle East and Asia.
Text messages can be used to interact with automated systems, such as ordering products and services for mobile phones, or participating in contests. Advertisers and service providers use texts to notify mobile phone users about promotions, payment due dates and other notifications that can usually be sent by post, e-mail or voicemail.

In straight and concise definition, "Text Messaging" by phones or mobile phones should include all 26 letters of the alphabet and 10 numerals, i.e. alpha-numeric messages or text to be sent by texter or received by textee

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Text_messaging

Why use SMS?

SMS is a very inexpensive method of communication. 160 characters take up as much room as a one-second voice call. Messages are delivered immediately (or when the phone is turned on). Like e-mail, they can also be reviewed or stored in your phone for as long as you wish. SMS messages can also be sent out to huge groups of people with the single press of a button.

SMS also allows for unified messaging. This is where SMS can take on a number of different message formats (including voice mail, e-mail and fax) and allows users to access them from their mobile device.

Is SMS really that popular?

Yes! Europeans send each other well over a billion messages a month. This fact may be hard to believe if you live in the United States, where SMS service is practically nonexistent.

There are a number of reasons why the SMS is slow to take off in the United States. The main reason is that the United States does not use the digital wireless interface standard (GSM—more on this in a moment) that is necessary for SMS to function. Although GSM is starting to grow in the United States, the change is slow.

How does a mobile device have enough room to store information?

Most mobile devices can be fitted with SIM (Subscriber Identification Module) cards. These are plastic cards that, when placed in the back of a mobile device, store various types of information.

Isn't writing messages on a mobile device (like a phone) difficult?

You might be thinking that typing on a miniature telephone keypad is hard, even for nimble little fingers. Well, most devices contain 'predictive input', a sort of software that allows the device to guess what you are writing and try to finish the word for you. Besides, most people abbreviate their words anyway. Unless you're not trying to write a novel on your phone you should have no problems.

Can my mobile device use SMS?

For a device to utilize SMS, it must be SMS-enabled. Also, the device must be connected to one of the GSM networks that support SMS. Check with your device supplier to determine whether a device is able to receive SMS messages.

http://archive.devx.com/wireless/articles/SMS/SMSIntro.asp

What do you mean by 'SMS-enabled'?
SMS-enabled means that only devices with SMS technology built into them will be able to access and utilize SMS. Most mobile device manufactures such as Ericcson, Motorola, and Nokia offer SMS-enabled products.
What is GSM? What is a GSM Network?
GSM stands for Global Systems for Mobile Communication. SMS resides on GSM networks for SMS communication.
Back in the early 1980's, analog cellular telephone systems were growing rapidly in Europe. Each country started developing it's own system. These systems were incompatible with everyone else's equipment and operation. It was not a good situation. For one, mobile equipment was limited to limited to their national boundaries. Thus, markets were limited for each type of equipment.
The Europeans realized this early on, and created a group to propose a new, universal system. This new universal system became GSM. Eventually commercial services became available in the early 1990's and GSM networks have spread worldwide.
GSM is a digital system, which is what allows SMS features to exist. Most countries use the GSM standard—the United States is one of the few countries to favor use of CDMA and TDMA standards over GSM (though there are GSM networks throughout the US). CDMA and TDMA allow extremely limited SMS capabilities.
GSM allows for messages to be sent from point-to-point, or in a cell-broadcast mode (point-to-omnipoint).
So, is GSM to remain the standard for SMS communication?
Probably not.
The world requires more and more Internet functionality from their mobile devices. And GSM, in all its complexity, is having a hard time keeping up. GSM was never designed to service text information, let alone large amounts of text such that the wireless Internet would provide. Using GSM for anything more than SMS would become a slow and cumbersome method.
With that said, it seems that GPRS (General Packet Radio Service) is being touted as the new best thing. GPRS would allow the sending of Internet information through mobile devices at a high speed. Experts believe that GPRS will be capable of delivering information at a speed of up to 100,000 bits per second.
Currently, GSM can deliver information at a speed of 9,600 bits per second.
What's point-to-point?
A point-to-point SMS message is where a user sends a message to another subscriber in their service. Once their message is sent, an acknowledgement of receipt is provided to the sender.
What's cell-broadcast mode?
Cell­broadcast mode, or point-to-omnipoint, SMS messages are those such as traffic updates or news updates that are sent by services to multiple subscribed users within a given cell area