Aberdeen Group's newly released "Benchmarking Enterprise Mobile Messaging Report: December 2006", sponsored by the world's premier mobile messaging operator, Clickatell, reveals mobile messaging is becoming a key consideration for enterprises. It further confirms SMS as the globe's foremost mobile messaging service.
Analysing the use of push e-mail, enterprise SMS, enterprise multimedia messaging service (MMS), mobile instant messaging and mobile voice over IP (VOIP) in over 150 organisations worldwide, this study found 85% of all organisations surveyed have at least one mobile messaging solution in place and 68% have two or more.
"The need to react more quickly to environmental changes is driving organisations to adopt mobile messaging solutions. Moving beyond push e-mail, companies are now also assessing other mobile messaging solutions such as SMS, for their ability to improve workflow.
"The ideal is to have all these communication options available on one device," says Pieter de Villiers, chief executive of Clickatell, whose customers include John I Haas, Heart of Birmingham Primary Trust Care, Vodacom, First National Bank, and Oracle.
Multi-modal mobile messaging, combining voice, e-mail, SMS and fax delivery channels, ensures companies of confirmed delivery of mission-critical information.
The flexibility of multi-modal messaging further allows enterprises to stay in touch with staff, partners and customers anywhere, anytime by switching between the recipient's preferred communication mediums at any time.
SMS's quick and cost-effective data delivery, together with its proliferation as one of the most commonly-used and understood forms of non-voice mobile communications, has seen it emerge as the world's primary messaging service in recent years.
According to Aberdeen's research, 48% of all organisations and 59% of best-in-class companies deploying mobile messaging applications are opting for SMS.
The top factors driving SMS's uptake is the ability to satisfying customer needs (81%), to react quicker to change (67%), and to achieve operational cost-efficiencies (57%).
Best-in-class organisations use SMS predominantly in customer service and sales departments, while newer users of the technology still mostly deploy messaging in their IT departments or to communicate with colleagues.
While 69% of all organisations prefer to have their SMS solution either completely outsourced or hosted by a third party, 67% of best-in-class enterprises already have an infrastructure in place that supports a platform solution unifying their mobile messaging applications.
"The technical experience and expertise of an established mobile data solutions partner, and redundant connectivity, makes outsourcing messaging worthwhile - instead of re-inventing the wheel.
"Multi-channel solutions such as those provided by Clickatell, get companies up and running quicker with less initial expense, providing a clear path towards a unified messaging environment across the enterprise," says De Villiers.
To download the report, go to http://www.aberdeen.com/link/sponsor.asp?spid=30410590&cid=3703.
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Clickatell is the premier global mobile messaging operator, with over 8 000 customers across 600 networks, spanning almost 200 countries.
Clickatell's messaging gateways connect directly and securely with the infrastructure of carriers worldwide. This enables Clickatell to guarantee delivery and receipt of massive quantities of inbound and outbound messages in real-time to any device, including: cellphone, smart phone, landline, fax, pager, PC or any IP-connected device.
Clickatell's enterprise-grade multimode messaging manager is built on open architecture and standards allowing today's devices to connect transparently across multiple channels.
Headquartered in Redwood Shores, California, the company has offices in the UK and SA. For more information, please visit here.
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