SMS use in Philippines gets personal

It's easy to ignore things especially when it's become part of one's everyday routine. Filipinos, for instance, have gotten so accustomed to using SMS or text messaging that we no longer care about other innovations happening in this sector.

Just look at these numbers: 50 million mobile subscribers sending about 1 billion text messages every single day. This translates to billions of revenues for the country's top carriers Smart Communications and Globe Telecom.

Most Filipino kids, in fact, can create and send text messages without looking at their cellphones--a skill they probably find useful while inside the classrooms.

I've also seen a lot of interesting SMS-based applications and promotional activities over the years. A favorite among us in the media is the breaking news text alerts. I particularly find it very helpful for story leads.

But, as I've said earlier, we tend to overlook those that are simple in nature, but are nonetheless effective. One such example is the utilization of SMS as a customer feedback mechanism.

Last week, I went to a car dealer inside a large mall to see if I can trade-in my 1996 Toyota FX (a type of Asian utility vehicle) for a newer Mitsubishi model. Since the staff wasn't able to give an appraisal of my vehicle at that time, they asked for my mobile number. The following morning, all the information I needed was delivered straight to my phone via SMS. Unfortunately, the offer was too low and we weren't able to reach a deal.

Two days day ago, I bought a new tire for my beat-up vehicle. The guy who sold the rubber to me was extra helpful and gave me a very good price. He then made me fill up a form, which also served as the official invoice. Of course, there was a field in the form for the customer's cellphone number.

A day after the transaction, I received a text message from the company asking me if I was satisfied with the service. I readily replied and said yes. That's electronic customer feedback, Philippine-style.

Except for some ill-timed voice calls, Filipinos are actually not hesitant to give their mobile numbers to companies they patronize. Cost is not an issue, since the sender or caller pays for text or voice call.

This is a small innovation that I hope would explode into a full-blown transformation soon.

Rigodon Update
A lot of personnel realignments have been going on lately. Here's a rundown of some of these movements:

-- President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo has named Consuelo S. Perez, a deputy commissioner of the Commission on Information and Communications Technology (CICT), as the agency's first lady commissioner.

-- Randy Kanapi, the former marketing and communications head of Epson Philippines, is back in the country after a short stint in Penang, Malaysia. He, however, would still be connected with Dell Computer Asia-Pacific.

-- Tin-tin Feliciano, formerly the all-around executive (looking after marketing, communications, events, media relations) of Alcatel-Lucent Philippines, has resurrected as a marketing executive of IBM Philippines. On another note, the company has also announced the appointment of Lope Doromel as its "chief technologist".

-- Cisco Systems Philippines seems to be having hard time looking for a replacement for Luigi Robles, who has left the company as its country manager. It's been weeks, if not months, since Robles' departure but the company hasn't announced any appointment yet.

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Melvin G. Calimag

Melvin G. Calimag currently writes for the infotech section of a popular English broadsheet in the Philippines. Prior to this, Melvin served as an assistant editor at Metropolitan Computer Times (MCT), the first IT publication in the Philippines. He is currently the vice president for internals at the IT Journalists Association of the Philippines (CyberPress), and also serves as a charter member with the Philippine Science Journalists Association.