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With Verizon’s announcement last week, the US support of RCS is now at 100%. This, combined with Apple’s Thanksgiving surprise, means that RCS will work on every device on every network anywhere in the US. Sounds a lot like SMS.
The Business Messaging industry is working on the KYC, routing, number enablement, and other scale challenges. Given the business opportunity that just opened up for the players, these too will get resolved soon. There is also the unfortunate side effect that consolidation on the Jibe platform will have on Syniverse, Mavineer, and Synchronoss and their attempts to get into the RCS-enablement market. But that’s a discussion for a future post; today let’s talk about what it means to the brand.
What It Means for the RCS-Ready Brand
Brands already using RCS today will achieve 100% device reach. Given Apple’s superior version-control practices, we can reasonably expect nearly all iOS devices to update by the year’s end. Thus, the high-engagement rich messaging experiences these brands crafted will soon become universally pervasive.
Regardless of device, every message on both iOS and Android will have a delivery and read receipt; it will support an OK button to every one-way notification; step-up notifications will become frictionless, two-factor-authentication will become one-tap login. Brands will be able to offer app-like e-commerce experiences without the app store overhead. The RCS experience will seamlessly extend to iOS with little to no extra work.
Brands, you’ve taken the risks and done the hard work of understanding and implementing RCS. You have figured out the best messaging partners and built the relationships and the technical integrations needed. You now have the same competitive edge in RCS like Amazon did with AWS in 2003. Capitalize on it and win!
What It Means for the RCS-Laggard
For the rest who were using Apple as the blocker to not invest in RCS, in seven short months every iOS device will support it. What was a distant dream to most, a bitter disappointment to few, and a joke to others is a reality. As one industry leader put it, the dog has caught the car. What’s your next move?
Finally
Like I said in May of 2023, “The technology will be here before you know it. And if you start your product conversation when ‘everyone is doing it,’ you’re already late.” It is still not too late. Yes, the RCS-enabled brand has a big leg up on you, but that doesn’t mean you can’t try to catch up. Very much like generative AI, you don’t have to be first to be successful, but you do need to iterate aggressively. Invest in your product teams, find a good messaging partner, and get going!