BT launches texting from your PC
Posted 4 December 2007 at 8:14AM by Martin Faux in Email and communications
Last week I mentioned our web expenses service, which caused quite a stir, so it will be great to hear what you have to say about our newly launched BT PC Text!
BT PC Text has been designed to make texting from your PC as simple as using your mobile phone.
It's an email based service which you can use from any compatible email client such as Outlook 2007. Replies can even be received straight back into your email inbox, allowing easy tracking and storage of messages.
Each message of 160 characters or less costs 10p (exc.VAT), with replies sent to your mobile phone. Credits can be purchased using any major credit or debit card. If you wish to receive replies via your email inbox, a one-off setup fee of £30 (exc. VAT) provides you with a "virtual mobile" number capable of receiving unlimited inbound SMS.
A free trial with five text messages is available via the BT PC Text web page.
If you fancy an open debate, then why not join us on the BT Business blog community!
Tags: bt, bt business blog community, bt pc text, messaging, mobile
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Comments
2. At December 4, 2007 11:59 AM, Bob HXC Holly wrote:
good if your running a nationwide text info company (ie text WORD to 66885 etc) but otherwise is it really worth the money?
id rather people phone HXC with a warm friendly voice to greet them than send a cold text.
3. At December 4, 2007 1:29 PM, JAMES LYON wrote:
ID NOT GET THIS MONSTROSITY AS WHATS THE POINT? WHATEVER HAPPENED TO minimising COSTS???
JAMES LYONN
4. At December 4, 2007 1:32 PM, Mr A McLoud wrote:
Another pointless BT service, I mean, when you add up the cost of all of the text messages you send to have a decent discussion, it would be cheaper to call.
After all you cant get much info in 160 characters
My budies and I at MAMPE industries would rather talk to each than text. The Doc doesnt give us much free time to text after all
5. At December 4, 2007 3:01 PM, Sara Brown wrote:
Thank you for these comments. Great to have some valualable feedback. The price should be viewed as the price for a business service rather than compared to the cost of a handset-to-handset text in the consumer space. If for example you wanted to text 100, or 500 people from your handset, this is a time consuming practice (which carries its own cost).
The service is designed to provide reliable, business-class, auditable inbound and outbound messaging from a desktop environment for business purposes.
The service does indeed minimise costs, if for example your office is needing to keep in touch/update mobile users thoughout the day, you are saving the cost of a land to mobile call plus the time taken by both parties - these are genuine business savings - ie working to streamline business processes whilst saving time.
There are many ways in which this product can be useful but probably this is not the right one if you are just sending the odd text to a single recipient.
6. At December 4, 2007 3:35 PM, Kiran John wrote:
Hmm.... potentially a useful facility, but way too expensive. Not an economical way to communicate.
7. At December 4, 2007 4:02 PM, Vicki wrote:
Why all this continual BT bashing? It may for you personally be a useless product but many ppl will find it very helpful BT wouldn't spend money rolling out a product that no one wanted to use. The blog updates are scarce as it is ive I was writing this I would be put of writing something only for it to be slagged off by ppl who think BT are some kind omnipotent of company who can please everyone all of the time.
8. At December 4, 2007 6:07 PM, anjanesh wrote:
you are right vicki - too much bt bashing going on without reason.
9. At December 5, 2007 8:19 AM, Luke wrote:
Sure, you could pay the extra few pence so save a few seconds, sure you could pay £30 for the set up, which is about the same as a cheap mobile phone these days. But why do that when all you have to do is google "free text" and you can send text messages for free from your pc, and the only downside is a little link to the website at the bottom of the text.
Eg. cbfsms.com
sendatxt.co.uk
text4free.netOne of these services also give you the options to send picture messages, and cc the same message to more than one person.
So you'd have to give me a pretty valid and hardcore reason as to why i should pay for a service i can get for free elsewhere.
10. At December 5, 2007 9:15 AM, Kurtis Angle wrote:
I find it slightly ironic that only a matter of days ago Mr Lyon was harping on about BT's blog being more business orientated only to post a comment which would seem to completely contradict himself when they do! I personally feel that the text package would be beneficial to an advertising business. For example you may have a number of consumers who subscribe to your text service for say £1 a month and you can them send texts on mass to subscribers with latest product information, money-off discount codes etc. Well done BT!
11. At December 5, 2007 9:16 AM, Bob HXC Holly wrote:
Sara, from reading your suggested ideas for this service, will this now mean small companies being able to spam their customers text inboxes with their latest deals etc?
i have enough time wasted from sorting out the e-mails.
12. At December 5, 2007 9:41 AM, steve wrote:
I personally like these type of services , but BT should look at the competition - www.e-txt.co.uk - from 7p per text , with all the features you could want.
13. At December 5, 2007 10:50 AM, Bob HXC Holly wrote:
anjanesh, you say there is BT bashing without reason, sounds like your one of their technical support agents "its not our fault, everyone has problems!"
on the whole this could be good for big business, but for the rest of us, perhaps its a service better offered (and cheaper) elsewhere. a step in the right direction, but seems a little behind others which have already jogged onwards.
14. At December 5, 2007 11:46 AM, David Nicholson wrote:
I use a text from computer sevice currently for my mortgage broking business - I use it to update clients on the progress of their mortgage applications, remind them of appointments etc. - it is a brilliant facility.
The system I use allows all responses to arrive in my email inbox, which is superb, as I am office based and do not give clients a mobile number.
BT are exactly on the right lines but the £30 set up charge is ludicrous compared to the competition (I paid nothing) - the BT text message price is also above what I pay.
Well done - great service, but too expensive.
15. At December 5, 2007 11:55 AM, Martin wrote:
It's great to get your views on this new service.
We've set-up a community dedicated to the discussion of the articles we post here. This should provide a platform for a more open debate.
On the blog we only publish comments that are on topic, but over on the community you can create topics that you'd like to discuss!
It would be great to see some of you over there!
16. At December 5, 2007 12:09 PM, Moni Razzaque wrote:
I spent 10 years in the UAE where this Text Service was provided for free by Etisalat. I can only assume the BT charges are an excuse to raise more revenue.
Money for old rope!
17. At December 5, 2007 1:09 PM, Jim Duggan wrote:
This is like the texting expenses service you offer.
Its a nice idea and good to see BT offering these services but as has already been said its more expensive than other compettitors.
However im sure the massive platform you have to advertise it will help. If only i had that kind of platform to get my company going.
Now that BT are turning around people's opinons on the business side, do they have any plans for their residential services?
18. At December 5, 2007 2:05 PM, anjanesh wrote:
Moni -
BT lacks the sole operator /revenue advantage of Etisalat and of course the cross subsidies from oil from which would make this possible.
apples to apples..oranges to oranges please...
19. At December 5, 2007 3:06 PM, Bob G wrote:
Moni, of course BT are doing this to raise revenue. It's what companies do - make profits to divide between employees and shareholders. Not much point in them operating otherwise, is there?
20. At December 5, 2007 11:17 PM, Brian wrote:
when will just introduce emails straight to mobiles
that would just save all the hassles yes / no ?
21. At December 6, 2007 9:57 AM, John Taylor wrote:
Wow, there are a lot of grumpy people out there! I have to agree that this service really isnt required by anyone in business I come into contact with. But keep the ideas coming BT its what keeps you ahead of the competition.
22. At December 6, 2007 10:37 AM, Mike Mahoney wrote:
We require a texting service for Disaster Recovery purposes and have yet to find a model that best suits our needs. For instance we might send hundreds of messages to our staff over a very short period of time, then nothing for years. What we want is a subscription service (low-priced monthly or annual contract) and no cap on number of texts sent when we need to. It would be pointless to buy a large block in advance because we may never use it. Similarly, to run out of texts halfway through a disaster would be, well, a disaster!
23. At December 6, 2007 1:16 PM, Bob HXC Holly wrote:
great post bob (great name too!) and John, this isnt a new concept, however if im sat here i cant think of one thing BT could introduce that hasnt been tried elsewhere so i dont blame them for that. they key is doing it right, and at the right price.
oh and Brian, you can get email direct to your phone!
BT offer free phone numbers to technical help, unlike say Virgin. does that mean we cant compare BT and Virgin as ISP's anjanesh? creating strawmen and all that.
good to see some great postings!
24. At December 6, 2007 2:12 PM, Joe Principe wrote:
i would imagine that myself and my collegues at Amber Changing Ltd. would not get use out of this service but full marks for trying to broaden the landscape of how we communicate with each other
25. At December 6, 2007 5:44 PM, Jim Duggan wrote:
I think Mike hit the nail on the head, offer a low priced monthly subscription would be more benefical for people than buying a bulk number of texts.
Like was said earlier, texting people to remind of meetings etc is a good idea. But there is weeks where i may have no meetings then the next week it is nothing but sitting in meetings.
Bob was right about offering the right services at the right prices. Testing the water with this might lead to the introduction of the monthly subscription?
BT are really branching out now, and actually accepting the change in their business model from the basis of telephone services to offering just about everything other than a butler for your business.
Wish id bought the shares when i had a chance now :(
26. At December 7, 2007 10:08 AM, David Moodie wrote:
Until April this year Bt/yahoo offered this service which I used a lot to send details of start times etc to casual staff. The replies came back as emails at no extra set up cost and texts cost less than 10p each. This worked well as it also included an online address book so that texts could be sent from any computer anywhere. Since they stopped it I have had to use something called textmagic which is ok but has no on line address book.
27. At December 8, 2007 12:03 PM, Matt M wrote:
Good Idea. But it sooooo expensive compared to other companies. It's not like BT aren't making enough out of us Business Customers teamed together with useless customer services and ridiculous contract lengths. Cheers BT.
28. At December 8, 2007 9:17 PM, anjanesh wrote:
Jim ,agree with you, it does seem to be that BT is moving away from just a telephone service provider to a complete communications solution provider.such applications discussed here would fill niche requirements and could bring all services together in one place.
29. At December 11, 2007 11:57 AM, Marc Ferguson wrote:
Anjanesh,
Every major mobile provider in the USA provides you with the ability to send and receive texts via e-mail if you have the know-how.
Here is the format for the top 6 providers.
T-Mobile: phonenumber@tmomail.net
Virgin Mobile: phonenumber@vmobl.com
Cingular: phonenumber@cingularme.com
Sprint: phonenumber@messaging.sprintpcs.com
Verizon: phonenumber@vtext.com
Nextel: phonenumber@messaging.nextel.comI'm no expert but I'd imagine the US cellphone service provider market is highly competitive.
30. At December 17, 2007 1:52 PM, anjanesh wrote:
Marc,
Point noted on the competitive US mobile market(who by the way also charge for incoming calls too) .
but ..err..how many broadband service providers in the US provide text-to - email service or vice versa ? could not find one in the list.
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1. At December 4, 2007 11:07 AM, Vincent Mcmahon wrote: