{"id":18752,"date":"2019-04-02T15:21:54","date_gmt":"2019-04-02T14:21:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/futurenetworks\/?post_type=digest&p=18752"},"modified":"2025-03-16T10:20:49","modified_gmt":"2025-03-16T10:20:49","slug":"how-brands-are-transforming-consumer-communications-with-5-results","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/solutions-and-impact\/technologies\/networks\/digest\/how-brands-are-transforming-consumer-communications-with-5-results\/","title":{"rendered":"How Brands are Transforming Consumer Communications with 5* Results"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The latest RCS Business Messaging Seminar at MWC19 Barcelona, Intelligently Transforming Consumer Experiences<\/a>, brought experts from across the ecosystem to discuss how consumers and brands are helping to shape the success of RCS as it rolls out across the world. With 74 Operator launches, and a further 40 expected over the next 12 months, RCS now serves an estimated 239 million users, expected to rise to 900 million by 2020.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jill Cooper, the Marketing Director for the Future Networks Programme at the GSMA, opened the session with a presentation focussed on how RCS can transform consumer experiences simplifying their lives. Using an example of travel to Barcelona, she showed how RCS can improve each and every interaction along the way, from departure to arrival,  all without needing to download a single separate app. Gone is the stress of forgetting to check in remembering to download content, arranging cabs, checking the weather, managing delays, buying food, catching trains, navigating the airport – a consumer can curate their own lives \u2013 bringing dazzling content from the brands they love straight into one messaging app.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So how are brands, with their partners in the mobile industry, so rapidly enabling these improvements in RCS? In many cases it comes down to listening to the customer, and understanding how they feel in a given situation. And, as the Seminar\u2019s keynote speaker Tenor\u2019s CEO Frank Nawabi pointed out, RCS can itself help generate some of that knowledge. Digitally sending emotions is now as easy as sending a simple text message was a few years ago, and visual expression is now measurably gaining ground on traditional text.  GIFs have become entirely mainstream, and are truly ageless: 77 per cent of users over the age of 55 now use emojis to communicate, while 53 per cent are using GIFs. For more than half of those in older demographics to be routinely making use of what was seen by many not long ago as a quirk of social media, and a characteristically youthful one, is a striking shift even to those in the mobile industry who have watched it happen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

80 per cent of adults worldwide below the age of 64, and 91 per cent of teenagers, message every single day, making messaging platforms one of the most naturally conducive mediums to successful marketing investment. And in markets like the US \u2013 where 81 per cent of consumers now say they want to be able to directly message their preferred brands \u2013 the appetite is plainly already there.  Businesses like Tenor, the world\u2019s foremost search tool for GIFs, are therefore enthusiastic partners in the deployment of RCS. With over 400 million searches per day, Tenor can supply invaluable insights into what kind of GIFs people want, how they use them, and indeed how people feel about a particular event, company or service.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The data generated is of increasing interest to enterprise.  Much of this is about being able to \u2018know your customer\u2019: how they feel in a given service context can allow companies to revise and refine their offerings to meet the needs of their customers as they achieve that better understanding. Even in use cases which might not seem immediately relevant to expressions of emotion, interest is already very high. In financial services for instance, banks and their partners are taking seriously how their customers feel, and are hungry for data on the what and the why. \u201cIf we can move forward with connecting users of services to their emotions in a given context,\u201d Broxel\u2019s CEO Gustavo A. Guti\u00e9rrez told the room, \u201cI believe the results will be amazing.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While domestic take-up of RCS among consumers will drive awareness and penetration, the principal opportunity for operators is in Business Messaging, whereby consumers and brands can communicate directly with enterprise without needing to make a voice call, or open a browser or separate app.  As Interop\u2019s VP for Product Management put it, \u201cRCS is the next stage in the evolution of advertising \u2013 first it was print, then TV, then internet, and now it\u2019s messaging. And the great thing is, mobile operators own it.\u201d The established global reach of mobile network operators makes them an ideal partner for such strategies, as those who act as gatekeepers to user data and digital identity, and who have a ready route to almost everyone on earth. \u201cThey\u2019re going to go where the reach is,\u201d as Mr Wiggington put it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe time is now,\u201d reflected Tenor\u2019s CEO Frank Nawabi, \u201cpeople don\u2019t need to get tied up on the phone calling companies up any more. We\u2019re so excited for RCS, and for Business Messaging in particular, because this is the way for people to reach enterprises, and for those brands to reach their audiences, every single day.\u201d The sandwich chain Subway have achieved a 140% increase in conversions over SMS, and as Mr Nawabi said, \u201cthese business results are dazzling \u2013 my only question is, why wouldn\u2019t you do this?\u201d Enterprise is increasingly answering \u201cwe are!\u201d, and with some dramatic results. Virgin Trains for instance have been early adopters of RCS, working with Vodafone and Open Market to keep their passengers up-to-date and in control while they travel by rail \u2013 and the results have been exemplary \u201cThe customer satisfaction is outstanding,\u201d reported Virgin Trains\u2019 CIO John Sullian; \u2013\u201cwe\u2019ve had five stars across the board, and the optout rate is to die for. We\u2019ve had zero optouts from all the thousands we\u2019ve sent!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

RCS allows Virgin to automatically make the travel experience more efficient and less stressful \u2013 by sending, for instance, alerts which calculate whether a user is likely to miss a connecting service and allow them to book onto the next with all their preferences intact, with just a press of a button. \u201cFor us a lot of RCS is about improving trust and reducing anxiety, and the reaction from our users has been one of surprise and delight,\u201d explained Mr Sullivan; \u201cand it just looks better than an app!\u201d And reducing anxiety, stress and just everyday inconvenience is what so much of RCS is all about.  As Accuweather\u2019s Brian Lavery explained, \u201cour users check the weather multiple times a day and need the key facts at their fingertips, so they can plan their day effectively.  It\u2019s the perfect use case for RCS \u2013 it\u2019s just such a low-friction dialogue \u2013 so we see RCS as a power complement to our digital product strategy.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Even where uptake has not been as fast, there have been clear signs of movement in recent months. Deutsche Telekom\u2019s Dr Petja Heimbach explained that in Germany, for example, there has been the uphill struggle against the dominance of WhatsApp, and tension between different strategic visions: in a nutshell, between whether operators should move more towards providing services directly themselves, or support developing utilities with the data they command. \u201cI\u2019m glad to say that time has passed \u2013 the business case is now clear, and it\u2019s very strong. We can fix the blind spots in the market by making the service fully interconnected and native on devices, and this should boost penetration dramatically.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Frank Nawabi left the session with a neat encapsulation of what operators have to offer here: \u201cit\u2019s hard to get people to download your app; it\u2019s not so hard to get them to send a text message.\u201d The challenge now is ensuring the excellent progress to date is maintained and consolidated, and the ability of the mobile industry to monetise the capabilities of this market is secured. As Vice President at Interop Josh Wiggington reminded the room, the commercial text messaging market is worth $18 billion today \u2013 and, with the growing presence of RCS, is forecast to reach a potential $40 billion by 2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mr Wiggington urged the industry to make good on this through collaboration, to ensure interoperability, because \u201cthat\u2019s what brands are looking for. The big moment wasn\u2019t when one operator launched RCS \u2013 it was when the rest did, so they could start to offer that interconnection.\u201d The key takeaway for work yet to do, then, is that operators must enhance the existing proposition by ensuring brands can reach 100% penetration in a given market through RCS. That means reaching out, working together, and making use of the RCS Interconnection Hubs<\/a>. The signs that this is happening now in earnest, though, are there \u2013 and they\u2019re already greatly encouraging.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The capabilities and perks RCS allows are all but limitless, thanks to the flexibility of mobile connectivity \u2013 just a selection of what can be done was on show for instance at the Innovation City<\/a> this year, where Google, Operators and the GSMA showcased the latest brand campaigns.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To get involved with RCS, join the GSMA RCS Business Messaging Labs<\/a> and subscribe to our newsletter<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The latest RCS Business Messaging Seminar at MWC19 Barcelona, Intelligently Transforming Consumer Experiences, brought experts from across the ecosystem to discuss how consumers and brands are helping to shape the success of RCS as it rolls out across the world. 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