SMS stands for “Short Message Service”. As the name suggests, it is a short text message. It is necessary to distinguish it from the MMS to which you can add photos or even videos. In French, the English acronym SMS or texto is used interchangeably. The name minimessage is very rare.

SMS, the reasons for its success

SMS was hugely successful in the 2000s because it allows you to save on a telephone call, especially when your interlocutor has selected the answering machine mode or is in the middle of a conversation. This is how a real compound SMS jargon appeared:

A phenomenon in decline?

We are witnessing an undeniable decline in SMS: 3,000 billion text messages were exchanged worldwide in 2016 compared to 6,000 billion in 2014. This is due to the success of generally free instant messaging services such as WhatsApp, SnapChat, Messenger , WeChat, etc. SMS resists, however. It is very popular in the United States. In France, 40 billion text messages were sent during the second quarter of 2019, or 571 per person. In 2017, 58% of French people preferred SMS to instant messaging.

What is an SMS used for?

SMS obviously saves time compared to an ordinary telephone conversation and to address a list of contacts for example. Two traditional uses of texting should be distinguished.

Personal SMS is certainly the type of text message most affected by competition from other messaging systems which are almost free. Differences in prices and storage capacities are decisive in the choice of users. However, its ease of use explains the resistance of personal SMS.

In France, SMS marketing represented 7.7 billion text messages in 2020. They have a reading rate of 95%. They have a 200% higher response rate than email, Facebook, or phone calls. 92% of them are read within four minutes of receiving them. They offer a memorization rate of 60% compared to 15% for television and 14% for radio. 10% of them are classified as spam against 50% for emails.

A text message, how does it work?

SMS works using TDMA, GSM and CDMA network technologies. It allows you to send and receive texts of 160 characters, whether they consist of numbers, letters or symbols in the Latin alphabet. In Chinese or Arabic, messages are limited to 70 characters.

Exchanges with the control channel: text messages pass through the control channel to access the telephone tower and end up at the Short Message Service Center or SMSC, which is translated as the messaging server.

Sending to the recipient's smartphone: the message is stored in the SMSC. As soon as the recipient is present on the network, the cell tower sends it to him and he receives it as soon as he turns on his smartphone.