Mobile
operators have a huge opportunity with RBM to capitalise upon the post-Covid trend for
businesses to digitalise their communication channels.
Failure to
do so will threaten SMS A2P revenues from OTT messaging services.
Quolloq is focused on enabling and supporting mobile operators to embark upon this journey.
The Facebook threat
The A2P market (mainly SMS, but
also rich messaging channels such as RCS RBM and WhatsApp) was
worth $20B in 2020, according to industry analysts Mobilesquared. This represents an 18% annual
increase.
The Covid pandemic, with its many national lockdowns, was a significant driver for boost in SMS A2P traffic, driven mainly by one-time passwords (OTP).
These lockdowns were also a catalyst for OTT channels.
Facebook communicated that WhatsApp Business app users grew 10 fold between Q2’19 and Q2’20 to 50M users. Sense Tower stated that in March 2021 WhatsApp Business app was downloaded 17M in the Apple Store alone.
A2P Market potential
According to Mobilesquared, the market potential of business messaging is massive. Currently less than 5% of business use SMS A2P to communicate with their customers. However, for over 50% of customers, messaging ranks as their preferred communications channel with brands.
Mobilesquared sees the potential for richer communications channels,such as RCS and OTTs, to increase the number of use cases, such as mobile advertising, customer care and mobile apps, who have combined market value of ~ $2trn+.
Source: GSMA
Source: Google Play Store
Source: Mobilesquared
What is RBM?
RBM (Rich Business Messaging) is a part of the wider mobile messaging service called RCS (Rich Communication Services), agreed by the GSMA global mobile standards. RCS is very similar to other messaging services, such as WhatsApp. When RCS is deployed by an operator, customer handsets are automatically configured to use RCS chat messaging, where the native handsets support RCS. So far only Android handsets support RCS natively (typically as either Google's own Android Messages client or Samsung Messages client).
RBM is the A2P service that runs over RCS. It offers businesses a way to deliver a fully branded messaging experience, which is verified by the operator. It offers chatbot features such as Rich-Card, Carousels, Suggested-Replies and Suggested-Actions that drive customer engagement through call-to-action buttons.
The RBM experience is truly transformative compare dto SMS, resulting in 10x-15x better engagment with customers.
