How to choose SMS service provider

What does good SMS delivery look like?

When you use SMS for business, for example, to nurture key stakeholder relationships, you need to ensure your messages get through. SMS that don’t reach the right person at the right time cause customer dissatisfaction. Poor communication channels can impact your organization by causing badwill and loss of business. When you use SMS communication, you want to know that your message will reach the right recipient at the right time, with all content intact.

One issue in evaluating SMS suppliers is that industry standards are fairly low. For a long time, the standard has been to try with “best effort” to deliver every message.  This makes it hard to ensure your messages will reach your recipients. Many operators also give lower priority to SMS traffic than to voice traffic.

International statistics show that, on average, 5% of SMS don’t reach their recipient, and many arrive much later than intended.

While this isn’t good for private SMS, it’s completely unacceptable when you use SMS for business. Businesses shouldn’t settle for this 5% loss – especially if they can’t tell which messages remain undelivered, or why.

Top SMS providers actively monitor and uphold the quality of their service based on delivery statistics. These statistics provide detailed information about the delivery process for messages that you’ve sent, including details about anything that might have gone wrong.

Delivery statistics – the key to quality

Delivery statistics confirm the number of SMS you’ve sent and how many were delivered. Be cautious when vendors only share data about the status of sent messages and leave out other statistics. Good delivery reports tell you what happened all along the route to recipients so you can trace any problems back to their source in the supply chain.

The statistics also explain how long it took to deliver your SMS. This is especially important when your SMS is only relevant for a short time, such as a one-time password, a purchase confirmation, or anything someone expects and is waiting for.

Using aggregated statistics to determine how good your SMS delivery lets you assess overall quality. For example, if all SMS arrive within 15 seconds, it’s a sign that your SMS supplier cares about quality. Low-quality suppliers can take time to send a batch of SMS. They don’t work toward clear targets like quality SMS suppliers do. In many cases, good suppliers will offer a tailored service-level agreement based on your organization’s unique needs.

The statistics should also include information about SMS that haven’t been delivered. Quality suppliers will attempt to resend these SMS. If your supplier is trust-worthy and some messages remain undelivered, it’s usually because a recipient is outside of the coverage area or their phone is turned off.

Finally, reports should contain details about messages that don’t reach recipients. These reports show you why some messages don’t get delivered. Incorrect phone numbers or phones that have been turned off for a long time can prevent SMS from reaching recipients.

When you compare the number of system errors to the number of SMS delivered, you can evaluate the quality of the delivery and the supplier.

Good documentation makes it easier to tackle challenges

The complex SMS ecosystem makes it hard to predict when and if problems will arise. But reliable statistics and real-time data let quality SMS suppliers find and solve problems, before they impact your business.

When you know your SMS supplier is good, you don’t have to monitor delivery statistics as closely every time. Good SMS suppliers will keep a close eye on the distribution chain for you. Knowing that lets you focus on making and sending great messaging.

Agile in preventing fraud

Fraud concerns all suppliers, customers, and end customers. Make sure your chosen supplier is actively monitoring fraud and taking measures to prevent fraudulent activities such as smishing and AIT.