With SMS taking off in the Americas, mobile e-mail continuing strong growth in developed regions, subscriber growth driving messaging adoption in Asia-Pacific, and social networks lifting the messaging boat across nearly all regions — revenues from mobile messaging are set to hit $212 billion by 2013.
According to the new study from ABI Research called “Mobile Messaging Services,” messaging services growth will have different regional specific drivers. Despite the differences, however, the common growth denominator is that messaging services provide a timely, cost-effective, customer-specific communication and information capability.
But the benefits driving messaging growth go beyond its obvious economic, social and convenience advantages relative to voice calling. The next stage of messaging growth will be strongly influenced by new input and access capabilities, and integration across mobile and fixed-line platforms. Principal analyst Dan Shey argues there a third stage of growth for mobile messaging. “Some very creative companies are finding unique ways to incorporate advertising in mobile messaging. If done right, advertising will completely change the mobile messaging market,” he concluded.