It’s critical to find the right bulk SMS provider that services your business communication needs.
The Bulk SMS comparison site covers the features, price, reliability and customer service of several reputable SMS providers. It should assist you in finding the right bulk SMS service for your needs.
Latest update on 5 January 2024
Broker Reviewed
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Finding the right type of service that Australian businesses and organisations need from a Bulk SMS Service provider takes some time to appreciate and comprehend. There is such a variety of features offered by Bulk SMS Providers who send thousands or even hundreds of thousands of SMS each month for marketing campaigns, special offers or deals, and alerts to customer and staff updates.
Australian companies want to know more about the services and value these bulk SMS companies can offer clients for a prompt, mass text messaging service.
Of course, ensuring you have the right type of service requires extensive research, and full comprehension of the conditional requirements for distribution which covers features such as price, reliability, customer service, and certification like ISO 27001 and ISO 9001 for quality and security.
To make your life much easier, an easy-to-follow Bulk SMS Australian Comparison Table and a range of sites have been prepared by experts in the SMS discipline so that rational, clear and concise decisions can be made if you are wishing to engage the right SMS service provider.
In Australia, we are fortunate enough to have a great range of bulk SMS providers who offer a good range of text messaging services through either the usage of mobile communication systems, mobile phones or the Web. This means that bulk SMS can be distributed in small to large volumes to any modern mobile phone through the use of different wireless providers. Each text message is limited to 160 characters, including spaces. A charge is associated with the distribution of a text message.
In the review that formulated the bulk SMS Australia services comparison table and this particular site, it found that the best services ranged from ClickSend, Cellcast, WholesaleSMS, SMS Tech, DirectSMS, and SMS Central to TextIt. Although their features and services do differ, as will be discussed, they do offer the requirements that companies would want from a mass SMS company. The timely ease of distribution by only providing the database of customers, employees or the general public was all that was required. It does not matter whether the mass distribution is in hundreds or thousands of contacts.
It only takes a few moments whether it is seconds or minutes to send a single SMS to the recipient, and if required, to gain a record of responses. As you can imagine, using the text messaging service is an efficient and effective way of communication.
The bulk SMS provider can save the organisation’s contacts and able to set up groups to manage such contacts. This way when a bulk text message is required, you only notify the provider of which group or groups need to be set up and sent in a matter of seconds.
In more detail are the advantages of using a bulk SMS distribution service.
Price is a big factor when it comes to delivering large quantities of text messages. In the review of some bulk SMS providers, it was noted that prices vary significantly between different competitors for different volumes of messages distributed, whether it is 500+, 10 000+, 100 000+, 500 000+ to 1 000 000+ SMS over a month. For low volumes, the charges varied by up to 20%. With larger volumes, around 100,000+ they varied by around 30%. For the largest volumes of around 250,000 or more, the difference in variation was around 30%.
The price differences are that some bulk SMS providers are inclined towards lower volume distribution while others offer better from a larger distribution. Therefore it is to the client or prospective client’s advantage to check around and send what competing bulk SMS providers have to offer in terms of charges.
As you can visualize from the graphical representation below, based on a 0 to 100 rating, Cellcast has the best SMS pricing range quoted for a monthly period. This is followed by ClickSend and WholesaleSMS. TextIt was found to have the most expensive pricing range. SMSCentral does not disclose its pricing structure.
The comparison table of bulk SMS service providers is listed as the cheapest to most expensive.
Please be aware that in the author’s review of the pricing structure of these bulk SMS service companies, they can change their costing at any time without giving anyone prior warning or notification.
When considering the right bulk SMS service provider, one needs to consider other major features offered rather than just considering charges alone.
Firstly, be aware of the availability of a two-way process by the bulk company. This means that a text message can be sent in bulk to a specific target within a time frame specified but also the client can review and judge the effectiveness by requesting a report on the outcomes of the distribution. This can be forwarded to the client through a tracking analysis that can be exported on easy to follow spreadsheet or viewed on the web. This means that you can know straight away what are the responses to the SMS sent out.
Secondly, there are different ways these bulk SMS companies can service your needs through high-speed gateway connections which means they can distribute mass SMS within short time frames. Again, these providers can provide a delivery report that displays matters such as bounces of messages sent through the API or online platform.
As you can observe from the representation below, both SMS Tech and TextIt have a very good rating of above 90 out of hundred while DirectSMS, SMS Global and SMS Central rate in the 80s. indicating a good level of features provided to assist the effectiveness of distribution.
Reliability and latency features should be extremely important factors for any potential client who wishes to engage a bulk SMS service provider. The reassurance that the text message service can secure a schedule on a set transmission time means that the client knows that the message will be communicated when required. This is critically important for reminder notices for appointments for introducing a new product or service or for promoting a marketing campaign.
In Australia, there are ways text messaging services can function either by: 1) Premium bulk text message service offering a high level of reliability and fast execution of SMS at a higher charge. 2) Cheap bulk text message service offering a lower level of reliability, the delivery may take a longer period but may be at a lower charge.
When reviewing each bulk SMS service company make sure that they can assure you of an uptime latency of over 90% level. However, some companies will go further and provide an even better 99.9% or 100% service level guarantee as part of their overall reliability and latency features.
Reviewing these major bulk SMS service providers, the majority of the service clients are well serviced from a reliability and latency perspective with companies such as WholesaleSMS, ClickSend, SMS Central and Cellcast reaching the very high 90s on a rating scale. This is excellent from a client and a receiver point of view meeting everyone’s expectations.
Finally, support-related services are another feature that needs to be investigated, whether it be call centre support, delivery reports, spam compliance or free trial availability.
Customer or client support facilities include phone support in times of need. Other than WholesaleSMS, all the other service providers do offer this facility on a business-hours basis. So during the week, there is either the option to discuss with a call centre staff member on a dedicated number or email and wait for a response.
To entice potential new clients or customers a free trial of SMS distribution is available to review its effectiveness as a means of effective communication. The number of SMS on a free trial basis varies from five (5) free SMS to a maximum of 50 free SMS. A list of present clients can be viewed on the service provider’s website or the authors’ bulk SMS Service Providers Comparison Table.
Other than TextIt, all the other service providers are SPAM compliant and provide a privacy policy and many provide a cleansing option for present contact SMS lists.
Overall, from the analysis of customer service features offered, the best bulk service providers were ClickSend and Cellcast.
The Bulk SMS Provider Australia Comparison Table has been set up for you as a reader to use free of charge. The authors, who have worked previously in the text messaging service, and know the industry well, want you to be able to make a well-educated decision about which provider fits best with your requirements. Alternatively, this site and table will assist you if you wish to compare different bulk service providers.
The reason behind the development of this site was the awareness of the difficulty companies had in deciphering features related, costings, service-related and support-related features. Each company has a different way of explaining what it has to offer. Therefore by using the expertise of these authors’ knowledge and experience, a simple yet easy-to-follow table and site were developed. At no cost to you.
Should you use the information provided and as a result, decide to engage one of the bulk SMS companies covered, the author may request a commission from the provider but, please be assured, we will not ask you for any fee.
It needs to be emphasized that some of the service providers change their features and costing structure without any further notification. If the information on this site or comparison table is different then please let the authors know so that these changes can be made as soon as possible.
Last updated on 5 January 2024.
When wanting to use your existing CRM or e-commerce platforms to integrate into a mobile text messaging capacity, you can easily do that by sending an SMS from your current applications. By using an SMS gateway Application Programming Interface known as API from a reliable SMS gateway provider, you can ensure a reliable solution to your business messaging will be met. It’s this software intermediary platform that ensures two different applications can speak to each other.
In computer technology terms, API provides a set of processes and tools that help build application software to make the process seamless transferring from your email to a text message to the recipient’s mobile phone.
There are many different types of web APIs developed by SMS providers with the most common being Representative State Transfer (REST), Simple Object Protocol (SOAP) and Remote Procedure Call (RPC). Don’t be too concerned about the technology as long as you realize these program platforms will make your email transition to SMS easy and effective.
From your perspective, no software is required to be downloaded or installed. The SMS Gateway provider is totally web-based which means there is no software to crash your computer or the information in your computer. All you need is a web browser and internet access.
Some of the valuable features of SMS Gateway APIs cover:
SMS is a great tool for marketers and communicators as it is more cost-effective and less labour-intensive than traditional marketing means. In just a matter of seconds, a short message can be sent out to 100 persons or 100,000 persons and then be read within a short time span of 2 minutes by 92% of those end users who receive the message. This means it can be received at work or at home or anywhere where there is mobile reception.
Another big advantage is that bulk SMS messages can be scheduled well in advance to coincide with the launch of a product, an event or a reminder. Perfect for last-minute offers.
After sending an SMS, if required it can track responses and determine the return on investment thereby optimizing a campaign effectively. Perfect for promoting competitions and free giveaways. This 2-way SMS messages technology allows seamless customer interaction. You can determine if the marketing campaign has been successful.