Mobile/SMS billing – EXPLAINED!

newdom · 10-22-2004

I’ve been answering a lot of enquiries and questions (see my eralier 'SMS Billing' thread) about SMS payments, and thought it would be useful to post a few here with some explanations…

>>Which countries/mobiles do you accept?
We accept payments from mobiles on any GSM, or equivalent network that supports Premium SMS, anywhere in the world. At the last count, this was over 500 networks in more than 200 countries.

>>How does it work?
We’ve deisgned and built a payment engine. Customer lands on your payment area (CCBill/whatever everybody's using these days), and pops on our payment page. We give him instructions of how to SMS us for payment, we clear the payment here, then send him a unique PIN that he has to enter to proceed. On a good day, takes about 30 seconds, but can get slowed down by high volume calls on the network (friday night!).

>>Is this for content on mobile phones?
Not necessarily. The most obvious thing to charge a customer, is for access to a paysite. Now if you're not running pay, but have good traffic on TGPs and linklists, then the most obvious thing would be to sell something direct from those pages - either download to mobile, or a little paid area.

>>I make my money from directing traffic to sponsors, what has this got to with me?
OK, so you've got growing traffic coming through your TGPs? First thing - I wouldn't do anything to that traffic that's going to send them away, or give them any other place to disappear. I mean, don't send them to a wapsite. It's crazy. You're just going to lose them. I think if you've got traffic, you've got eyeballs, give them an opportunity to buy right there - instant, with their mobile

Now, what they're going to buy is what you need to figure out. My feeling is that guy is looking for porn, not a ringtone (not to dis the mobile content guys - but this guy is there for a reason, not inspiration). So it's either going to be some mobile content that fits with your TGPs (whatever niche), or a little 'privileged-access area' that he can go into (online) once he's paid with his mobile.

>>Should I build a mobile portal?
I think the mobile portal is a nice add-on when you have some time, but you've got opportunity to bank right now! I think you should get some good content to put into an online 'privileged-access/VIP' area that costs something like $2 for a days access. Refresh every day/week.

>>I doubt there's enough traffic on my TGPs to get customers just yet unfortunately.
you'd be surprised, I think there's a big novelty value in offering your traffic something totally fresh like using their mobile.

>>I'd also like to see how difficult it is to add SMS billing.
Just so you know. No setup costs, no monthlies, no chargebacks-we just take a few %. All you add to a website is a payment link - whole thing, from signup to trading takes a few minutes.

>>What about fraud?
Fraud definitely occurs with mobile - we've worked with people who regularly lose up to $20,000 a month from fraud! We designed our platform to verify and confirm billing completion all along the chain, so fraud is at an all time low. There are no chargebacks!

>>I’m not sure this is a viable billing just yet
This is a viable and actual billing solution NOW. No matter where you’re traffic is coming from, our payment system works like dialers - the customer just pays from where he's located, we accrue all payments centrally and settle with you. Billions of SMS are sent every month, so it’s the right time to start adding payment possibility on your sites. You don't need to be a rocket scientist to add the system (all you do is add a payment link, and we'll integrate to your server).

As always, I'm on ICQ 256033740

Best wishes to all
Newdom

cj · 10-24-2004

what about webmaster tracking?
do you have a solution to carry a tracking id through the phone system and send it back to affiliate software?

newdom · 10-25-2004

we track all sales, then pass all info back to your servers at verification of transaction (we also log it into the sales reports for each merchant/sponsor).

Vick · 10-25-2004

and this can be used by US consumers how?

Opti · 10-25-2004

I like the sound of your idea about an additional revenue stream for Linklists and TGP sites.. but about 100 questions come to mind, from content/product approval to charge disputes to issues about setting up people with no member management or billing setup in place.

Not to be negative.. I would certainly test it if it could be made easy to implement.

cj · 10-25-2004

Quote:

Originally posted by newdom@Oct 25 2004, 07:58 AM
we track all sales, then pass all info back to your servers at verification of transaction (we also log it into the sales reports for each merchant/sponsor).

well i would hope you would track all sales - but that's not what i asked

i asked do you have a way to track affiliate sales ... as in, a blank field that can be transferred from website through to phone message and back again to stats to tag which affiliate the sale came from ...

this part we are finding clunky with our existing sms processing & I'm curious if you have a solution ...

newdom · 10-26-2004

Vick, USA soon, just not yet.

Opti, why don't you ICQ me, then maybe I can use our dialogue as an extended tutorial for linklist/TGP webmasters on Oprano? I'm sure we can get your questions answered easily for you.

CJ, forgive me, I'm not the chief tech. around here, but I understand that we have a string value (that carries affiliate level information) that gets passed to the payment popup, which generates a unique message the customer texts to us. We match that unique message against the affiliate information which produced it in the first instance, which gives us solid tracking.

Hope that helps! Newdom

10-25-2004	#4
Vick Celebrating Company's Success with A Beer From Mini Bar Want to see your own Advertising Here! Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Little South of Sanity Posts: 6,551	and this can be used by US consumers how? __________________ Pssst Click the Button Above I once wanted to be a Gynecologist But I couldn't find an opening

10-22-2004	#1
newdom Members Join Date: Oct 2004 Posts: 17	I’ve been answering a lot of enquiries and questions (see my eralier 'SMS Billing' thread) about SMS payments, and thought it would be useful to post a few here with some explanations… >>Which countries/mobiles do you accept? We accept payments from mobiles on any GSM, or equivalent network that supports Premium SMS, anywhere in the world. At the last count, this was over 500 networks in more than 200 countries. >>How does it work? We’ve deisgned and built a payment engine. Customer lands on your payment area (CCBill/whatever everybody's using these days), and pops on our payment page. We give him instructions of how to SMS us for payment, we clear the payment here, then send him a unique PIN that he has to enter to proceed. On a good day, takes about 30 seconds, but can get slowed down by high volume calls on the network (friday night!). >>Is this for content on mobile phones? Not necessarily. The most obvious thing to charge a customer, is for access to a paysite. Now if you're not running pay, but have good traffic on TGPs and linklists, then the most obvious thing would be to sell something direct from those pages - either download to mobile, or a little paid area. >>I make my money from directing traffic to sponsors, what has this got to with me? OK, so you've got growing traffic coming through your TGPs? First thing - I wouldn't do anything to that traffic that's going to send them away, or give them any other place to disappear. I mean, don't send them to a wapsite. It's crazy. You're just going to lose them. I think if you've got traffic, you've got eyeballs, give them an opportunity to buy right there - instant, with their mobile Now, what they're going to buy is what you need to figure out. My feeling is that guy is looking for porn, not a ringtone (not to dis the mobile content guys - but this guy is there for a reason, not inspiration). So it's either going to be some mobile content that fits with your TGPs (whatever niche), or a little 'privileged-access area' that he can go into (online) once he's paid with his mobile. >>Should I build a mobile portal? I think the mobile portal is a nice add-on when you have some time, but you've got opportunity to bank right now! I think you should get some good content to put into an online 'privileged-access/VIP' area that costs something like $2 for a days access. Refresh every day/week. >>I doubt there's enough traffic on my TGPs to get customers just yet unfortunately. you'd be surprised, I think there's a big novelty value in offering your traffic something totally fresh like using their mobile. >>I'd also like to see how difficult it is to add SMS billing. Just so you know. No setup costs, no monthlies, no chargebacks-we just take a few %. All you add to a website is a payment link - whole thing, from signup to trading takes a few minutes. >>What about fraud? Fraud definitely occurs with mobile - we've worked with people who regularly lose up to $20,000 a month from fraud! We designed our platform to verify and confirm billing completion all along the chain, so fraud is at an all time low. There are no chargebacks! >>I’m not sure this is a viable billing just yet This is a viable and actual billing solution NOW. No matter where you’re traffic is coming from, our payment system works like dialers - the customer just pays from where he's located, we accrue all payments centrally and settle with you. Billions of SMS are sent every month, so it’s the right time to start adding payment possibility on your sites. You don't need to be a rocket scientist to add the system (all you do is add a payment link, and we'll integrate to your server). As always, I'm on ICQ 256033740 Best wishes to all Newdom

10-24-2004	#2
cj Members Want to see your own Advertising Here! Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Down Under Posts: 5,202	what about webmaster tracking? do you have a solution to carry a tracking id through the phone system and send it back to affiliate software?

10-25-2004	#5
Opti Members Join Date: Oct 2002 Posts: 1,205	I like the sound of your idea about an additional revenue stream for Linklists and TGP sites.. but about 100 questions come to mind, from content/product approval to charge disputes to issues about setting up people with no member management or billing setup in place. Not to be negative.. I would certainly test it if it could be made easy to implement.

10-26-2004	#7
newdom Members Join Date: Oct 2004 Posts: 17	Vick, USA soon, just not yet. Opti, why don't you ICQ me, then maybe I can use our dialogue as an extended tutorial for linklist/TGP webmasters on Oprano? I'm sure we can get your questions answered easily for you. CJ, forgive me, I'm not the chief tech. around here, but I understand that we have a string value (that carries affiliate level information) that gets passed to the payment popup, which generates a unique message the customer texts to us. We match that unique message against the affiliate information which produced it in the first instance, which gives us solid tracking. Hope that helps! Newdom