MMS is DEAD Its been 7 years since we started work on MMS and will be 6 years in August since the much hyped launches of the service by all of the mobile operators in the UK. So where are we with this service, the supposed launch pad to 3G? Most people I speak to in the mobile industry wrote it off 2 or more years back. Usage is climbing as the usability and penetration of good devices increases. But it hasn’t gone through the rapid increase of usage we witnessed with SMS in the early naughties or the increase in WAP requests in recent years. I am sure there haven’t been too many MMSC capacity upgrades required yet. Only in America Its widely reported in the US that MMS volumes are sky rocketing though, maybe because of the relative newness of mobile messaging (no major sms legacy) or the fact that most contracts come with high numbers of MMS bundles built in. Maybe there is just more to photo and video in America. MMS Re-suss? Is it possible for this service to be brought back from the dead? I believe so, but I am the minority. Its my baby and in the immortal words of Radiohead – I want to pull it out of the air-crash.Lots of good has been done by the operators, equipment vendors and device manufacturers (apart from my friends at apple).
- improved provisioning
- improved device interoperability
- ease of use of MMS application on phone
But more needs to be done. I will add blogs discussing what I think we can do to re-suss MMS on the following topics.
- Retail Pricing
- Viral Content
- Wholesale and Premium Rates
- MMS as a Bearer for lots of stuff
- Its role in Mobile Marketing and Advertising
- Let Charities utilisse it
1 response so far ↓
Si // April 4, 2008 at 5:01 pm |
Is it dead, or is it just too damn expensive?
For me it’s all about the charging model. The cost to send an MMS has always been an issue and a barrier to adoption. Those who work for an operator or have a phone bill paid for by their company, will use MMS. For everyone else forget it. When you can use the camera to take a photo and bluetooth to your friends or transfer to a PC and share via a web application why would you pay 25 UK pence?
My view is that application to person is the mass market opportunity for MMS. It is certainly a great transport mechanism for content. It would be a great way to overcome those with a fear of clicking on a WAP push message link and accessing the mobile internet – what does this cost (bill shock)?
But, to be a mass market product, the wholesale pricing of MMS messages need to be reduced dramatically. Operators have clearly written off the imvestment in MMS. Change the prices to that of an SMS and the service will fly..
This is just the tip of the iceberg I know…
Si
Managing Partner – We Love Mobile
http://www.welovemobile.co.uk