TECHNOLOGY ARCHITECTURE FOR TARGET & FILTER-BASED SMS MARKETING CAMPAIGNS Course Faculty: Mrs Yasmin Malik Venue: IBA City Campus, Karachi Course Start Date: Spring 2012 (Feb 1) MIS553: Mobile Marketing Strategies

Technology Requirements for Target/Filter-based SMS Campaigns  The software application that supports the above must fit into the existing infrastructure of the MNO  Essentially, it must interact with and be connected to the SMSC  It can be a 3 rd party application or it can be an in-house application deployed by the MNO itself  Its main function is to ensure that SMS/txt messages are correctly inserted before or after the existing, incoming SMS content  The MNO or a 3 rd party technology/content firm can use the application to create time and/or location based SMS ads  The application should have the ability to both use and build subscriber profiles and incorporate its own DB (database) – this is so that the campaign can be both tracked and historical data can be used for follow on campaigns or more targeted campaigns  The application is typically known as a “Text Insertion Engine” or TIE

Text Insertion Engine (TIE) Architecture Source: Adapted from Informa Telecoms MSC = Mobile Switching Centre MT = Mobile Terminated Msg SMSC = Short Msg Service Center SS7 = Signalling System 7 (a telecom signalling protocol) The (TekMedia) Router is equipped with the TIE application. In this case, a 3 rd party application is being used and the MNO (i.e. Operator “A” ref Boots Case Study) has given connectivity for this Router/TIE app to be placed on its network according to pre-determined security protocols. Note the location of the SMSC and the MSC! STP = Signal Transfer Point (router that relays SS7 messages)

Text Insertion Engine (TIE) Architecture MSC = Mobile Switching Centre MT = Mobile Terminated Msg SMSC = Short Msg Service Centre SS7 = Signalling System 7 The Router receives an incoming MT message from a given source e.g. the user’s home SMSC when the mobile user is asked for participation in the Boots campaign. At this stage, all mobile subscribers that fit the Stage 1 profile (female, Londoners and age group mid 20s) are sent the participation message by Operator “A” SMSC. This is because the Operator maintains The Profile Database and will not allow a 3 rd party direct access to it. The TekMedia Router/Application then monitors responses to this i.e. “Y/N”. If the mobile user decides to participate by texting “Y”, this initiates an external condition routing rule in within the TIE application. The rule should match provisioned conditions e.g. originator, recipient, destination MSC, submit time etc. If this matching takes place, then the TIE application is triggered and follows the rules programmed into it as per the campaign design. Source: Adapted from Informa Telecoms

Text Insertion Engine (TIE) Architecture MSC = Mobile Switching Centre MT = Mobile Terminated Msg SMSC = Short Msg Service Centre SS7 = Signalling System 7 The TIE applications receives a copy of the opt-in message to the campaign. It is designed to determine if text needs to be inserted and if so, looks up the text to be applied in the incoming message – in line with the active ad campaign. At this stage, the TIE application also starts to build up a database of mobile subscribers that are actually participating in the Boots campaign. After inserting the additional text, which is selected from a pool of active text messages, TIE returns the SMS message to the Router for delivery to the recipient. Time-based rules i.e. Saturday 9am-12pm will be defined by the TIE application and followed. Source: Adapted from Informa Telecoms

Text Insertion Engine (TIE) Architecture MSC = Mobile Switching Centre MT = Mobile Terminated Msg SMSC = Short Msg Service Centre SS7 = Signalling System 7 The Router forwards the message, and, on successful delivery, acknowledges the original incoming message to the originating SMSC. If delivery is unsuccessful, the Router forwards the error response received from MSC to the SMSC, which will perform a retry based on its delivery schedule. On each retry, the sequence repeats, and the text insertion is performed again. The latest information is inserted in every delivery attempt. (E.g., a message submitted yesterday has today’s news inserted.) Source: Adapted from Informa Telecoms

TIE Application Design Features  3 features are of importance:  Flexible Text Insertion: insertion of any text feed, commercial text or sponsored SMS, voic enrichment, news flashes etc. into incoming SMS messages Prologue/epilogue text insertion Text-separator and non/concatenated messages  Provisioning and Scheduling: Profiles for subscribers who have opted in to the service should be provisioned via a simple text- based interface to the application Provisioning updates should not impact or interrupt service Typically up to 1,000 text insert configurations Messages to be inserted should be randomly selected from an active message pool from different sponsors or different text per sponsor Text inserts should be grouped into up to e.g.100 categories, each of which should have a configurable active period (so that campaign delivery can be scheduled per day/wk etc.)  Campaign Reporting: Monitoring of success of message insertions A counter should track each time a text insert is delivered, allowing operators to charge on actual delivery System should provide a counter per owner/sponsor in order to track the number of times the advertiser/sponsor’s insert was delivered successfully Each successful insert should be recorded in a call detail record (CDR), which references the owner/sponsor